>
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
> Well, I don't know very much about Second Life, but here's what I find
> scary about the Linden Dollar:
>
> - People are beginning to take this online virtual world almost as
> seriously (or even more seriously) as the real world, as evidenced by
> their willingness to pay real-world money for virtual money. The human
> imagination is free. Why pay someone to "help" you imagine things?
> Even if you consider Second Life to be just a communication tool, to
> share imagined things, we already have that at far cheaper prices
> (email, the web, etc.)
>
> - I am somewhat afraid that the above indicates that people are
> practicing escapism into their avatars. Rather than putting effort
> into becoming who they want to be in real life, or valuing who they
> are already in real life, they channel this effort into a virtual
> world which cannot provide what the real one does.

The virtual world provides what the real world never could.  I see no  
problem with this.  It is no different than climbing all the 14,000  
ft peaks, or collecting cars, or going to movies, or amusement  
parks.  Could be better than a lot of relationships.  Life of the  
mind and senses can be virtual.
cc

>
> - One of the primary determinants of the value of real-world goods and
> services is what economists call "land" - that is resources whose
> supply is fixed, and "labor" - the human effort required for
> production or service. This (almost) doesn't exist in a virtual world.
> Creating extra "land" requires nothing more than disk space and
> processor time. "Labor" may or may not equate to actual human effort
> (copying a file takes only processor time, not human effort, although
> creating computer art involves some human effort). This should mean
> that the goods and services in a virtual world become very inexpensive
> (limited by the cost of disk space and processor time), but it seems
> to me that this is not the case, indicating some kind of price control
> by the creators of Second Life.
>
> Sean
>
> On Sun, Mar 30, 2008 at 12:49 PM,  <piclist@ian.org> wrote:
>>
>>  As for Linden Dollars (the online thing) it's not that scary.   
>> It's just
>>  paying in dollars for some service or product.  It's the same as  
>> buying a
>>  downloadable computer game.  You don't get a physical item there  
>> either.
>>
>>  --
>>  Ian Smith
>>
>>
>
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