[geeks] SL = game? (Was: Ubuntu partition on Bootcamp Mac?)

[Jon Gilbert]

On Jul 31, 2007, at 10:35 PM, Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:

> But you can't deny that most of SL is pretend.  The overwhelming
> majority of what happens there has no bearing at all on the real  
> world.
> If you construct a tree object and place it somewhere, you haven't  
> given
> a home to a living plant form; you've twiddled some bits in a database
> somewhere.  If you build a structure of some sort, the county doesn't
> asses taxes on it, and you can't skip out paying the mortgage on your
> real abode and go live in it.

This same argument can be made for regular webservers. When you get a  
domain name and a webserver, the county doesn't charge you taxes for  
that either, even though a lot of people consider domain names to be  
a sort of "online real estate." You can post a picture of a tree on  
your website, but it's not a real tree. Etc... this is all obvious  
stuff... if there is a picture of Oprah Winfrey on her website, and I  
punch my computer monitor, she doesn't get a black eye in reality.

And yes, I won't deny that a lot of people use SL as a diversion from  
reality. My argument is just that SL does not force them to do that;  
it's just what people have chosen to do with that technology. Just in  
the same way, lots of people use the web to look at porn and watch  
stupid crap on YouTube that has no bearing on reality. It's just the  
nature of people, I guess.

But to me, the important question in this argument comes down to  
whether there is a difference between things being "virtual" -- i.e.  
being "useful representations" -- and things being "pretend." To me,  
things in a game are "pretend" -- I pretend to have a gun and shoot  
aliens; there's no other end to it. It's about the pretend activity  
being fun. You're right in that much of SL has been made into what  
might as well be Barbie Online; that's what those particular users  
have chosen to make it into. There are the "pretend" Star Wars areas,  
the "pretend" sex-slave areas, etc.

However, there are lots of areas which, on the other hand, are not so  
much "pretend" but are simply "virtual." For example, take the Die  
Hard movie site in SL. It contains virtual models of some of the sets  
from the movie. When I visit it, I'm not really "pretending" that I'm  
in the movie; it's more just like looking at a website with  
production stills -- except, it's in 3D. It's more of a 3D promo  
website for the movie. There is an end to it: that it makes me want  
to go see the movie in real life (which I did, so I guess it worked).

They even had an in-world interview with Bruce Willis, which the  
public was not invited to, but you could watch a video of it on  
www.slcn.tv. Bruce had an avatar that looked like himself, and the  
virtual audience asked him real questions via text chat read by the  
interviewer. Does this mean that anyone was "pretending" that the  
avatar was really him? No, even though it was really him on the phone  
being streamed real-time into the virtual world. The avatar was just  
a virtual proxy, there to facilitate the communication.


>
>> That said, "pretending" is not limited to Second Life. I would argue
>> that all GUIs involve massive amounts of pretending, in the sense  
>> that
>> you're using the word. When you throw a file in the recycle bin on
>> your computer, are you not "pretending" to throw a "document" into a
>> "trash can?"
>
> I suppose, but I tend to rm or Cmd-Delete; modern GUIs have an  
> annoying
> habit of being in my way.  That said, the "document" can actually  
> become
> a real document (by printing), and CAD drawings can become real
> equipment (by emailing them to a machinist or PCB fab), sound files  
> can
> become actual music by feeding them to a DAC and an amplifier, and  
> most
> of the other things I create within the confines of the box on my desk
> eventually manifest themselves in the real world.
>
> -That- is the difference I'm pointing out.  If SL is self-contained on
> that aspect, it's an interesting simulation at best, but primarily an
> amusement.

Well, I would argue that SL is not necessarily self-contained.

Here are just a few examples:
* a choreographer who choreographs real-life dances using Second Life.
http://slballet.org/inarra.html
* architects who build things (like hotels) in Second Life that are  
mimics of the real-life counterparts, to give customers the ability  
to "preview" the real-life version.
http://www.virtualaloft.com/
* photographers who photograph in both RL and SL and combine them to  
create their art.
http://www.flickr.com/groups/slart/
(One can make real-life prints of these works of art just as easily  
as one can make prints from a digital camera or other digital art  
medium.)

Yes, no serious architect is going to use Second Life as a CAD  
program, but I'd say that the above examples do not exactly qualify  
as "pretending," either.

I can easily imagine someone creating a line of clothing using Second  
Life, and then manufacturing the most popular items from it in the  
real world as a real line of clothing, using the virtual economy as a  
testing grounds for which items would sell best in the real world.

Also, there are a lot of computer programs (such as Flash) that do  
not have "the real world" as an export destination. The content  
created with them is never intended to be printed or created in the  
real world, but that does not make that content necessarily  
"amusing." It's just the limitation of animated media that it must  
remain on your monitor.

>> But more to the point, I think that you think it's "pretend" just
>> because it is in 3D.
>
> And I've pointed out that this reasoning is flawed because I use 3D in
> dataset visualization and CAD.  I've written sufficient software that
> uses OpenGL that saying I'm anti-3D is laughable.  I mean, come on, I
> had an SGI workstation or OpenGL-capable RS/6000 on my desk for 10 of
> the last 12 years!

Well, that's good to hear. Anyway I'm not trying to say you're  
anti-3D, just that you seem to have issues with online multi-user  
forms of 3D as being useless.

>
>> I mean, how is a mall in SL anymore a pretend mall than Amazon.com  
>> is?
>
> Because Amazon doesn't have virtual stores to walk between.  I don't
> have a 2D representation of myself walking around the screen,  
> picking up
> items, and dropping them into a cartoon shopping cart, pushing the  
> cart
> across the window, picking the items up again, putting them on a
> countertop, handing over a few currency sprites, and collecting an
> animated receipt.  It's far closer to a mail-order catalogue than a
> mall.
>
> I'm not -simulating- a transaction, I'm causing a real transaction to
> come about by providing input to a machine.  Yes, there is a metaphor
> (and it even uses the word "shopping cart", possibly even with a  
> cutesy
> icon), but the metaphor is just a transitory medium.

Well actually, in Second Life, you neither pick up items, nor push  
around a cart, put them on a virtual countertop, collect virtual  
receipts, nor hand over currency sprites. Actually, you just use a  
search engine to find a store that sells what you want. Then once you  
bring up that server, you just zoom the camera in on things until you  
find something you want, then click on it, and then you click "yes"  
in the currency dialog box. Then the item is delivered to you  
invisibly. The only difference is that the item which is delivered to  
you is usually virtual, although there are companies using Second  
Life to allow people to order real products as well.
http://www.slnn.com/article/iwoot/
http://www.iwantoneofthose.com/

In Second Life, just like on Amazon.com, you are conducting a real  
transaction with real money by providing input into a machine.

Although, I do agree, Amazon.com is more like a catalog than a mall,  
but then again catalogs are 2D, and malls are 3D, so it only makes  
sense that in the 3D medium, the natural metaphor would be something  
3D like a store, or a mall.

>> I would wonder what are the "two ... primary properties" of the
>> internet are that SL loses?
>
>    1)  Most communication on the Internet is asynchronous.
>    2)  Most communication on the Internet has modest bandwidth
>        requirements.
>
> #1 is important.  You were able to read my communique from this  
> morning
> well after it was sent, and I was able to read your response, even
> though you sent it while I was away from my desk.  We didn't have  
> to set
> up a time in a virtual world to converse.

Actually, while you are not logged into Second Life, instant messages  
that are sent to you get redirected to your standard e-mail address.  
Also, you can send people text notecards, images, sounds, LSL  
scripts, and virtual objects that can be composed of any combination  
thereof, which they then receive when they log-in. It's quite  
asynchronous.

> #2 is also important, even in the face of most of the world getting
> faster and faster connections to the desktop, or we'll face a  
> situation
> in communications where a growth in available resources is matched or
> outstripped by the inefficiency with which we use them, much like our
> desktop GUIs.

I agree with you here, for the most part. But this is not limited to  
just Second Life; as you've pointed out, it extends all the way to  
the new GUIs. Also, you can't watch YouTube on a Mac Plus.

Well, technology changes. Times change. Moore's law, and all that. I  
won't argue with you that Second Life is GPU-intensive and loves  
bandwidth, but nobody is arguing that it should replace IRC, e-mail,  
newsgroups, or the web. Also, due to the fact that SL is open source,  
there have been low-bandwidth, non-graphical, and web-based clients  
created.
http://metaversed.com/09-jul-2007/ajaxlife-second-life-your-web-browser

Anyway, I agree that the march of technology always forwards is not  
necessarily a good thing, and that lots of the times, it just gets  
used for purposes of amusement despite its potential. But that's not  
isolated to Second Life. It's just what's happening... Second Life is  
only the beginning of the 3D revolution.

I do admire your spirit of trying to make sure that technology does  
good for humanity. I think that is an important thing to remember. I  
do think these new technologies can come to good use. One can only  
hope that people of a similar spirit to yourself come up with the  
ways to do it. I'm certainly not opposed to that.

-
Jon Gilbert
PGP fingerprint: 7FA9 B168 73CA A698 DD9E  2DF2 EE1A 3E73 3119 741F