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Jo Kay from JoKaydia’s workshop
Learning Technologies Conference 2008
Friday 7th November
A look at Second Life
Jo is actually, or rather virtually, ‘JoKay’ - a character in the online community ‘Second Life’. Created back in the 90s, her character is now infamous in the online community and she has a huge following of Second Life ‘gamers’. I wonder if you can call it a game however, as Second Life is a virtual life that anyone can live through a constructed ‘avatar’ - an online identity chosen or created to suit just who it is you choose to be!
JoKay is one of Second life’s most successful citizens - a virtual entrepeneur! She has created her own nation/realm called ‘JoKaydia’, merchandises her own range of products, and is a real estate landlord! She runs educational conferences, organises hot air ballooning events and much more than you can imagine, for an online community of people.
Perhaps these skills are the result of risks that can be taken in a virtual life. Maybe this is the value of such communities? After all if you fail, what can be lost? Well, real dollars at the very least, even if your ‘real’ identity remains intact! Yes, Second Life has an economy based on real US dollars! Not even virtual is free!
In terms of the value of Second Life for educators, JoKay tells us that:
- The whole architecture of JoKaydia is designed with network learning in mind
- The fun and play in Second Life connects and engages learners
- Learners have to engage to participate
- Learners can engage in action learning tasks and can collaborate to achieve tasks
- There are educational spaces in JoKaydia where people can meet, collaborate and hold events. Jo has held several such events
- People organise community events where people can engage in a shared experience as well as fly all over
JoKay is as real in the virtual world, as she is in real life!
She owns several islands in JoKaydia and rents them out to virtual tenants. They pay her in real US dollars each month! She also owns a merchandise store where citizens of Second Life can buy products such as T-Shirts etc!!
Jo and JoKay merge in mixed reality events where the community gathers for realtime live events, and they stream the audio and some vision of the event into Second Life to share with people from across the world.
Jo also uses Flickr, Twitter and Facebook to provide an online presence for her character, as well as the 3D presence. She has a huge following who twitter to her incessantly
What do I think of all this?
This looks fun but scary at the same time - I wonder… how does an avatar transform your sense of ’self’ when you find yourself in a virtual body, moving through a virtual world, talking to virtual friends (Jo says many of her virtual friends are also real friends in real life!), spending real money in a virtual world(!), living actual time as virtual time?
Perhaps the reason why Gen Y kids love virtual online worlds is that here, risk-taking is safe. Some say we have robbed this generation of the real-life experiences gained from taking risks and learning from consequences. We have controlled their outcomes at every turn, created soft landings for them. Perhaps they revel in the sense of control they can assume in constructing a new virtual identity (I wont say fictional as Second Life is far from fictional), and the lessons they learn, albeit virtual-risk, actual-safe!
Is this the future? A kind projected life memory, as ‘real’ as the past is, in our minds and imagination?
Will people one day live their lives more virtually, than actually? Will virtual become actual? Suddenly the Matrix is looking very ‘now’……
