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May 13, 2008
Coffee Talk: Second Life
The main topic of conversation at Monday's coffee break was Second Life and how it's being used in libraries and in the corporate world. Most of the people at the coffee had at least visited Second Life and some had even managed to create avatars and do a little exploration. A couple of people had attended Patricia Anderson's Enriching Scholarship session on Second Life, so had lots of information to share about what they had learned. Her presentation is available on SlideShare.
I visited Second Life once a couple of years ago and found the experience less than compelling. There seems to be a fairly steep learning curve. But, people are using it. The latest issue of Time has an article on Second Life which says that 13 million people have visited it at least once and there are about 450,000 users per week. LindenLabs, the company behind Second Life, tracks a number of statistics and is very open about sharing them. The latest statistics, through March 2008, are available here.
Posted by kfolger at May 13, 2008 09:56 PM
Comments
One thing that Patricia said in her ES presentation was that she forced herself to go into SL for at least a short time every day. It's the best way to force yourself to learn how to function there. I think you also have to be somewhat assertive. If you don't introduce yourself to people you find around you, you won't be able to create that all-important social network. I find it difficult to be assertive in SL myself so I wander around rather aimlessly. Also the places I visit (library sites almost exclusively) are often completely lacking in any other visitor!
Posted by: dpn at May 28, 2008 04:34 PM
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