Working-worlds - Your first steps in Second Life

Creative applications for a new form of e-learning

A University of California psychology class provides students with the experience of powerful virtual hallucinations. As you get closer to a poster on the wall, words on it change to profanities and an ominous voice tells you to "kill yourself."

This experience illustrates schizophrenia in ways that listening to a lecture or reading a text simply can't match.

A virtual step, your next business step ? What can Second Life do for your Business ? Your first steps in Second Life

Your first steps in Second Life

The best way to fully understand the appeal and potential of this strange, intriguing digital world is to explore it yourself. Open up a free account, then download the free software and create your "avatar," a virtual image that represents you online.

New Second Life users select their avatars from generic male and female templates. Although a resident could use an unmodified template, everyone else would know that he or she was a 'newb' -- a new user who doesn't know how things work. Most residents customize their avatars a little before leaving 'Orientation Island'.

Once you've decided what your avatar should look like, you're ready to begin roaming around the fantastically detailed landscape. You can abandon traditional notions about the limitations of space and gravity. If you're tired of walking, you can enter a command and fly to your destination. If flying takes too long, teleporting gets you there instantaneously.

Users can make friends, race cars, fly airplanes, hold meetings, exchange ideas, engage in combat, attend live concerts, buy and sell both real and virtual products and services, and much more.