I gave up on video games in elementary school, having been officially recognized by students and faculty as the best Pac-Man player in the entire fourth grade. Never again, I proclaimed, would I enter a digital world. By late high school I had sworn off dating any more boys who played role-playing games. I'd taken a backseat to Dungeons and Dragons one time too many. So why now, fifteen years later, am I so interested in an Internet-based virtual world called Second Life?

Unlike Pac-Man, there isn't a specific objective to meet. The purpose is simply to exist. As the character you create navigates the different realms of Second Life, you can buy land, build a house, meet new people, and do just about anything you can do in your first life—even make money.

More than 885,000 residents have joined this online society since it began in 2003, and as I write this, more than $516,000 has changed hands in Second Life on this single day alone. That's more than fifteen million U.S. dollars per month, which is the equivalent of three billion Linden dollars (the currency of Second Life). Now let me emphasize: This is not Monopoly money. You do not acquire it by pathetically whining, "I'm sooo thirsty, Sis. Can you get me a soda?" and then sneaking a few large bills from the bank while she's not looking. Linden dollars (which you can buy or earn) are exchanged for U.S. dollars. If you sell a product or service, or land, or real estate, or any other commodity, you can earn a profit. Or, take a loss.

When you register for a basic account, you automatically get 250 Linden dollars (L$250). If you register for a premium account for $72 a year, you get L$1,000 plus a weekly stipend of L$400. Somewhere in between these two extremes is an addi-tional basic account for $9.95. (How sad is that? Even your second life sucks, so you have to buy a new you yet again?) You can also purchase land for a monthly maintenance fee ranging from $5 to $195.

Don't believe it's real? A West Chester, Pennsylvania, lawyer certainly does. He is suing Linden Research (the San Francisco-based owner of Second Life) for $8,000 restitution after the company shut down his account following an auction of virtual land that he acquired well below market value. Market value? Market value! It's fake land, people.

Or is it? People are building businesses on this land—and while some of these businesses are virtual, some bend into reality. A quick look at job postings reveals opportunities for a cocktail waitress, an event coordinator, and a newspaper writer. Send a resume and cover letter (seriously), and Linden dollars are yours to earn. Perfect for a workaholic like me!

Before I jumped head-on into Second Life, I read several blogs and message boards, and the Second Life website (secondlife.com). Even so, I still floundered quite a bit once I was inside. I wandered aimlessly until I noticed a tab that read "Search," then I clicked on "Popular Places," which provided me with a list of places and images. Hmmm. Plenty of "mature" locales to visit, plus a college, a welcome center, and several dance and jazz clubs. Let's party!

But wait! I was still just the generic prefabricated avatar I had picked during my registration. I couldn't be seen in pseudo-public like that! I right-clicked on my avatar and "appearance" popped up as a choice. The options for every aspect of an avatar's appearance are unlimited—I could even select the chubbiness of my cheeks.

Now a digitized diva, I teleported to one of the dance clubs. The music was good (a mash-up of Nine Inch Nails and 50 Cent) and there were maybe twenty other people there. But, I had an entire world to explore … Click … Click … Click. I looked up from the computer, stretched my arms, and painfully realized that four hours of my "first life" were gone.

For others, the line between their two lives is much more blurred. For instance, Jerry Paffendorf, 24, is a futurist in residence with The Electric Sheep Company, a consulting firm that helps organizations find ways to use virtual worlds to achieve their business, educational, and marketing goals. (The Electric Sheep Company is the leading provider of professional services for Second Life.) "I'm pleasantly surprised, although it was the plan all along, that I'm now earning my living working in Second Life," Paffendorf says. "I'm one of those active futurists who doesn't just watch where things are going, but likes to get their hands dirty and help shape what's next."

So for Paffendorf (aka SNOOPYbrown Zamboni), his first life isn't much different than his second. The biggest difference? "I definitely dance more and better in Second Life than I do in real life!" he says.

Tim Allen, 31, (aka FlipperPA Peregrine) is one of Second Life's most active residents ("Flip" is also affiliated with The Electric Sheep Company). "I was expecting to just check out Second Life for a week, to see how virtual-world technology had improved over a few years," he says. "Here we are three years later, and I have sold a virtual company and run two Second Life conventions." Allen says he's very much the same person whether in-world (as it's called) or out, though his avatar is a younger version of himself with a look "similar to mine during college," he says.

Then consider Timothy Moenk (aka Lyre Calliope), living in Second Life as the opposite gender. "Unlike many other avatars, Lyre is not a role I play but an idealized version and female extension of myself," writes Moenk on his blog. "Others like me view their avatar as an extension of themselves and act no differently towards others than they would in physical space. I have also met people who share the identity of a single avatar, and individuals who orchestrate multiple avatars at once as a deliberate exploration of self. Each of these is a valid way in which to express identity in a virtual medium, and each of these is a window into what it is to be human."

Of course, part of the human experience is lost in a virtual world. Avatars are programmed to show the emotions you choose, but you won't catch an unconscious nose-twitch or an involuntary flushing of the cheeks. A connection is lost, on scales both personal and universal.

Evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey Miller wrote in the April/May issue of Seed magazine that virtual worlds are keeping us from exploring the universe, and perhaps keeping the universe from discovering us. While pondering why extraterrestrial life has not yet found life on Earth, Miller writes, "The aliens … get addicted to computer games. They forget to send radio signals or colonize space because they're too busy with runaway consumerism and virtual-reality narcissism. They don't need Sentinels to enslave them in a matrix; they do it to themselves, just as we are doing today." I begin to wonder what the human race could accomplish if it were channeling its brainpower into the natural world instead of virtual ones.

It was easy to get lost in Second Life for hours; that's true. But I barely have time to live my first life, so I won't be visiting often. Still, I won't be ignoring Second Life completely, now that I know it's there. I fell in love with the Internet when it was nothing more than white text on a black screen, and like the original World Wide Web, the 3-D Web and its virtual worlds are infinite. Now, if I could just get my avatar to look less like me and more like Pac-Man.


—Angela Davids has written for thirty publications, both local and national. She is Urbanite's copy editor.