Have you heard of the virtual world SecondLife? I know next to nothing about it. Apparently you can buy and sell virtual clothes for your character. They actually have some pretty cute things.
Here is a sample of some of the clothes you can buy. Does anyone know if you have to try these things on?
If you would like to see more of these virtual fashions check of Camie Cooper’s blog where she posts them. Again, I have not idea of how this stuff works. If anyone wants to try and fill me in please try.
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Virtual Fashions - An entire new world.
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The Short Answer: Second Life is an online 3d virtual world whose content is completely created by the users, or “residents”.
The Long Answer: Inspired by Bruce Sterling’s “Metaverse” in his novel SnowCrash, Second Life is attempting to create Web 3.0, essentially: a virtual environment in 3 dimensions for carrying out most of the same functions of the web.
Many people on the outside look at it, and are fooled by the fact that it uses the same mechanics as an online game: 3d graphics, an avatar that represents the “player”, etc. But the fact of the matter is, a game has a set of shared rules and goals, whereas Second Life doesn’t. Second Life, like the web, is an _environment_, whose goals are whatever YOU choose. If you’re just looking to socialize and meet people with shared interests (like say, MySpace) you can. If your interest is in educating and presenting information, you can. If you’re interested in selling a product, you can model it in world, let people examine it in 3 dimensions, then link them to your web store to order it (as yet, full web integration is still in the works, though you can script an item to call up a webpage on whatever your preffered browser is) - a number of actual companies have retail presences inWorld: Nike, Adidas, American Apparel, BMG, Toyota, IBM, etc. Then there’s inWorld product - items that are for use within Second Life - skins (the topical appearance of your skin - color, makeup, shaded enancements for muscle, etc, shapes (the actual proportions of the body), clothing, animations, gadgets (vehicles, weapons, accessories, etc), structures and funiture, etc. These can all be purchased for the inWorld currency, Linden Dollars, which can be purchased at a rate of about L$260=$1 USD from Linden Labs, the company behind Second Life, or earned InWorld any way you can think of. Some places, in an attempt to increase their visibility, offer chairs/dance pads/animations (making you look like your working) that pay you lindens by the x amount of time you spend connected to them. In essence, paying you to make the sim (sim=simulator, the term used for a set size of a region and all it’s contents) look busy. Some people engage in the world’s oldest profession (and if you think it’s a statement on the moral character of Second Life users, try turning your safe filter off on google, and see how many innocuous words bring up porn). Porn is a fact of life and will use any mode of communication to sell itself. Still others make a living selling items - and since the L$ can be converted back into $USD, some people make an actual living off of Second Life, simply selling virtual items (last year, one resident made the press by making in excess of $1mil USD in sales and assets from SL). This sticks in a lot of critics’ caws because these people are making money off of things that have no actual physical value, however, consider this: if you start to use SL in the same ways we use other forms of communication (cel phones, email, IM’s) then your avatar becomes an extension of your public image, and we spend a LOT on our public images in the outside world - makeup, hair, jewelry, clothes, possessions, etc.
And that’s really it - SL’s permeability with communication - voice chat, text chat, streaming audio and video - SL can currently be viewed as just another media tool. You can watch movies inWorld (”Xmen 3″, “Smokin Aces” and “Live Free, Die Hard” all had inWorld events, including virtual appearances by the actual stars), attend a concert (streaming audio allows for virtual performances by musicians/speakers - Duran Duran, Susan Vega, Kurt Vonnegut, amongst others have all performed inWorld). On top of this, there are a number of bands, and performers who make a living off of performing at various venues inWorld - not taped, but performing live, from their homes, visible inWorld as whatever they created an avatar for - a very popular performer performs as a guitar toting frog. Voice chat allows for anyone within range to join in a conversation, or you can voice directly just with a select few, locally or remotely. Images and objects can be sent to anyone.
Here’s a current what if: you build an inch for inch model of your real life home/office/business, and your intention is to completely remodel/redecorate. You could have design consultants from anywhere in the world meet you inWorld at the site, walk through, and they could swap the wall treatment, window treatments, furnishings, etc right there, right then, no actual cost involved, and use that as a template for what you want to have done. You could have a contractor visit inWorld, take a look at the changes in full 3 dimensions with you present, and give you an estimate on what it would take. All without having to leave your office. Since inWorld textures are uploaded from users, you could have sketches of say murals for instance, or custom paint chips/textures. You can adjudt the sun angle to be accurate for your location and see jut how the sunlight will stream through the big bay window over there. The options are yours.
On a not-too-far-off what-if: You visit an inWorld branch of say Macy’s, or maybe some exclusive boutique in Milan, slip into a shape and skin that accurately replicates your own form (not an exact science currently, but certainly not too far off from today), try on a virtual ensemble, see how it looks from various angles, whip out your smartCard (whatever they’ll call it - eventually there will be a system that links directly to your real world credit card) and buy it on the spot to have delivered to your rw address.
The press takes great delight in slamming the hype, the promises surrounding SL, but what keeps me there is not stated promises, but the promise I can see in the idea.
Hi, wow, what a compliment! Of all the content creators you decided to feature me! This makes me smile!!
Basically what I do, is I go into Photo Shop and design on a template, I then upload this image into Second Life, apply it to my avatar, and there we have it!!
Again, thank you, I was so surprised to see this!