second life; first love. mmorpgs, subjectivity, and capital flows

“Bobby always wanted to own a little yellow cottage on the beach, where he could go out on the porch and feel the salty breeze while clasping a margarita in one hand and a beautiful woman in the other. Now he finally has it, and his life has become so much happier.”

“"I was looking for someone to do a customised animation for a guitar I had built and after a lot of research and talking with various animators I decided to choose Moopf Murray. His quote was a great price for the work I wanted done and he got it done quickly and exactly as I wanted it. I would recommend Moopf for any work as his quality and time that goes into is well worth what you get. I am extremely happy with the quality of the animation and the fast friendly service I received. Thank you so much!"

-Second Life Testimonials

Similar to the way previous media dissolved social boundaries related to time and space, the latest computer-mediated communications media seem to dissolve boundaries of identity as well. [...] I know a respectable computer scientist who spends hours as an imaginary ensign aboard a virtual starship full of other real people around the world who pretend they are characters in a Star Trek adventure. I have three or four personae myself, in different virtual communities around the Net. I know a person who spends hours of his day as a fantasy character who resembles "a cross between Thorin Oakenshield and the Little Prince," and is an architect and educator and bit of a magician aboard an imaginary space colony: By day, David is an energy economist in Boulder, Colorado, father of three; at night, he's Spark of Cyberion City—a place where I'm known only as Pollenator.”

- Howard Rheingold, referring to a MUD in 19993

The emergence of mmorpgs and virtual communities has fundamentally shifted the ways in which “users” are inscribed within social systems, flows of capital, and information technologies. In the mmorpg “Second Life,” a full consumer economy has emerged involving real money with “Real-world” value and all the associated monetary issues such as inflation, bank-runs, recessions, gambling addictions, etc.

For my final project, I plan to explore the emergence of mmorpg’s (massively multiplayer online role playing games) and, more specifically, the ways in which the mmorpg “Second Life” is reorienting flows of capital and information and redefining notions of subjectivity, personhood, and presence. As people can increasingly lead what they consider to be whole, fulfilling, perhaps better-than-real lives through virtual communities on the internet, their patterns of social and economic interaction have changed drastically. My project will interrogate, through close readings of Hayles, Terranova, and Sherry Turkle’s work on MUDs, the ways in which this new frontier of human communication and socioeconomic activity is changing the ways in which identity, subjectivity, and personhood are configured. By exploring the burgeoning but highly regulated capitalist economy within second life, I will attempt to understand how and why this new system of economic exchange has captured the hearts and minds of millions willing to put hard-earned “earth money” into purchases of land, clothing, and accessories that exists only in the realm of the virtual. I will also be concerned with the rapid influx of “earth businesses” into the virtual world of second life. As second life has expanded, numerous earth-bound businesses such as Mcdonald’s, American apparel, Reuters, and Toyota have opened up outlets within the virtual world. Furthermore, non-profit organizations such as the anglican church and the embassy of the Maldives have decided to open outlets in the virtual world. Why, I wonder, have these businesses decided to expand in this virtual space, and what are the costs and benefits of their decision to do so?


As this project continues to take shape, I hope to embrace its "projectness" rather than writing a conventional research/criticism paper. Part of my project research will certainly involve creating an avatar and walking the streets within the second life world, entering businesses and talking to other users from around the world. Through this crude form of “cyberethnographic” research I will be able to get a better sense of the feel and form of the second life experience. Drawing from my experiences within the virtual world as well as my readings of Hayles, Terranova, and Turkle, I will attempt to understand and critique the emergence of second life as a viable social and economic alternative to “first life.”