Since its inception on June 23, 2003, Second Life has become deeply entrenched (or is that embedded) into our popular culture. Several television shows have featured elements from Second Life. On October 24, 2007, Second Life was featured prominently, and used as a tool to locate a suspect, in the CSI:NY episode "Down the Rabbit Hole." Second Life was also featured in the CSI:NY episode "DOA for a Day" (air date: April 2, 2008).
In an instance of virtual reality being stranger than television fiction, the show featured an interactive component. The CSI:NY Virtual Experience encouraged viewers to continue the hunt for the killer avatar. A separate Second Life region was created by The Electric Sheep Company (those of you who have read the book on which the movie “Blade Runner” is based will understand the reference to “electric sheep”) to act as a gateway for the episode viewers. The Electric Sheep Company created its own Second Life viewer called OnRez.
Other television programs have featured Second Life in the show’s plotline. Law & Order: Special Victims Unit parodied Second Life in its episode "Avatar.” Dwight Schrute from the television series The Office is an avid Second Life resident; this was featured prominently in the October 25, 2007 episode "Local Ad." In that episode, Dwight has an avatar named 'Dwight Shelford' who is able to fly, and Dwight creates a virtual world within Second Life named Second Second Life. And in an episode of the CBS drama Ghost Whisperer, Melinda Gordon experiences a similar online world, at one point pulling an avatar out of her computer at the shop as the user's ghost.
Second Life has also been featured in popular literature. The Darkest Evening of the Year is a novel by Dean Koontz (one of my favorite mystery writers) released on November 27, 2007. In the novel, one of the characters is a private detective by the name of Vern Lesley; Vern lives vicariously through his Second Life avatar, Von Longwood. Koontz himself has “attended” several Second Life writers’ forums. His portrayal of Vern and his fixation with Second Life is less than flattering, however. Perhaps as expected, Koontz reserves his best treatment for the novel’s principal protagonists - Amy Redwing, her boyfriend Brian McCarthy and a rescued Golden Retriever named “Nickie.” In the novel, Koontz shows the reader how Amy takes great personal risks on behalf of abandoned Golden Retrievers; he also learn how Brian must overcome his past in order to become a better person; and, finally, we see how “Nickie” touches the lives of every human (and animal) she meets.
In the novel, we learn that Amy is being pursued by those who wish to harm her, Brian, and her dogs. As the novel rushes headlong towards its exciting conclusion, Amy and Brian work past their respective dark pasts in order to save each other, their dogs and the lives of other innocents caught in the mess.
Incidentally, the novel’s title is a reference to a poem by one of our past featured poets, Robert Frost and his poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. In Chapter 13 of the novel, Amy goes back to a recurrent dream (no, I am not going to give away the novel's plot here) where she is walking through the woods. In remembering her dark dreams, Amy also remembers how Frost's poem had sustained her during those earlier days. Koontz also refers to Frost’s poem at the beginning of Parts One, Two and Three of the book.
Even though Koontz’s portrayal of a Second Life resident is less than flattering, The Darkest Evening of the Year is one of Koontz’s best recent novels. If you love a good mystery novel, if you believe that good will eventually trump evil and if you have a keen appreciation for the innate nobility and kind heart of all dogs, you will enjoy reading this novel.
For those of you who are counting, this is our blog's post #99. Stay tuned for post #100 and learn a thing or two, that you may not already know, about Between Homes. Coincidentally, we are also coming up on BH’s one-year anniversary; this is indeed a very exciting time for all of us.
Enjoy!
NOTE: The artwork for the cover of the two books referred on this post is copyrighted and it is the property of its respective owners. All rights reserved.
4 comments:
hi hi deb
Thanks for this article !
It is very interesting! do you mean that sl is taking an important place even in sl ?
What is sl finally ?
we are just pixels, we are just ghosts here in sl and nothing else, aren't we ?
A friend of mine always tells me that !
Or are we more ? are these avatars in fact humans who have feelings, who are feeling a lot of things and sl is a place to escape the reality, the truth and rl ? it is maybe a refuge, an easier refuge to escape our lives our problems, a way to have fun to enjoy moments !
maybe it is like an artifice because it is virtual !
do you understand what I mean ?
it is virtual so maybe it is nothing but is rl not virtual ?
isn't rl the same ?
please think of it !!!
where are we ? in rl or sl ?
where is the world ? we are just on a planet and we are nothing on this planet ! finally we are just like avatars ! even in rl ! so sl is the same this is the way to think that we can escape to something ! but do we really do ?
I have to say that it is a good way to meet people from all over the world and relationships in sl could be very very deep ! I do think we have to share that to share the different point of views we have about that and i do understand deb that TV could be interested in sl ! and what people feel and how people can act here ! so we should organize a meeting or a talk about that if people are interested !
maybe our rl is sl !
think of that
byeee
arc
Arc, to paraphrase Rudyard Kipling, SL is SL and RL is RL and the 'twain shall never meet. Regardless of whether we are flesh and blood occupying physical space, or pixels traveling in the ether, we all shine on, like the moon, like the stars, like the sun. (Thank you John Lennon).
I wish to briefly clarify (and apologize) for my comments above, paraphrasing Rudyard Kipling’s poem, “The Ballad of East and West.” When I wrote that, “SL is SL and RL is RL and the ‘twain shall never meet” I did not mean to say that there cannot be RL meetings between people who meet in SL. RL meetings can, and do, happen all the time.
What I meant to write is that we need to be careful not to blur the line between SL and RL. Both “lives” have their own separate reality and there is a danger when we blur the line that divide the two realities.
That is all I meant to write and I do apologize for any distress that my comments may have caused. That is what happens when you go to bed too late and wake up too early and then try to write a pithy, witty remark.
Here is the intro to Kipling’s poem, “The Ballad of East and West.”
Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God's great Judgment Seat;
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
When two strong men stand face to face, tho' they come from the ends of the earth!
hi hi deb
you don't have to apologize for your comment ! there is no problem about it ! maybe my comment wasn't clear ! maybe confused ! I just wanted to say that we are pixels in sl maybe pixels and in rl we are just men and women so quite nothing on this earth when you compare us to the earth planet and the world and the sky ! of course we have blood in our body ! I didn't tell anything about sl and rl meetings it wasn't my thought but maybe i wasn't clear ! it is the problem with a french guy like jerry lewis ! it is confused ! hehehehe
but yes you are right when you tell that people who met in sl could meet in rl ! sure !That happens sometimes but is it a good or bad thing ? I don't know, it is hard to tell because people don't really know each other in sl !
It is not evident and maybe yes there is a danger as you said if you blur the line !
see you later
byeee
arc
a crazy man (you have the right to say that i am really crazy, silly french man ) sure you are right if you think that (hehehehe)
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