My Second Life in Second Life
After my first encounter with the virtual world of Second Life, I was truly amazed of this digital environment. McLuhan's predicaments of our media extensions are portrayed in each and every single animation, gesture, texture for clothing, mesh, tree, discotheque, or botanical garden that Second Life houses. Initially, and to my surprise, my first avatar was a vampire. I believe that naturally, my intentions for this avatar was to be as similar as possible to my physical characteristics. I tried on a few clothes, a couple of animations (courtesy of 'am garota'), and went on to explore the virtual realm of SL. I began to purposely feel as if I was completely immersed in this world, without actual connections to the 'real' world, but eventually acknowledged that this was impossible. The physical connotations that SL suggests is that we never leave our space, since it is our common ground, and that we only seek out to create a set of multiple identities in the virtual space. I was particularly childish when exploring the 'human' capabilities that, as an avatar, I had. Then I though to myself, of course, it is a digital human...err..avatar..err..robot? A common cultural, identity question rised: who am I?
The second time I entered SL, I felt that I was part of the community (another question came to my mind, what community? I don't even know these people). On this occasion, I tried to be someone else. A muscular, sweaty, aggressive male apparently with the capability of dancing as a Brazilian native. I came to the conclusion that my subconscious pushed me into transforming my previous vampire avatar to a modern, hype, virtualized Anaconda's Jon Voight. I remembered Beth Coleman's TED Talk about her book "Hello Avatar: Your Networked Life". She expressed the multiplicity of identity when we become part of a virtual network. Our social media has become a multi-legged extension of our identities that have a wide variety of identifiable elements. In other words, and paraphrasing that Galloway speaks of networks, we are nodes of a distributing network where our information becomes a particular characteristic of a social environment. In my experience in SL, I felt as one of those nodes. I was creating a unique environment that could only have existed with my individuality (another question coming up: what is individuality?). My flash mob dancing skills improved surprisingly in my digital avatar, although I tried to dance Salsa, but did not accurately follow my real-life abilities (I enjoy dancing salsa). In fact, it became my first flash mob ever, and I knew all the steps. Our SL guide, Pygar, led us into the hallucinations chamber, where schizophrenia can come to fruition in SL (advice: listen in stereo headphones). I encountered unicorns, I flew, I did not have sex, I danced at a gay club, and enjoyed the solitude of a gondola ride. I definitely came to the conclusion that the more we immerse ourselves into this digital realm of multiple identities, the more questions rise regarding our true self and individuality. We are nodes that cannot be identified if separated from other nodes. We contain several elements that makes us unique, but are inevitably attached to the similar attributes other avatars/humans possess and define our modus vivendi.