Re: Virtual Freedom of Virtual Speech

Follow-up over at The ValleyWag about the supposed John Edward's virtual vandalism of his virtual campaign HQ entitled, "The Real Saboteurs of Second Life" has some interesting additions to the story.

A "hardcore liberal" called Mudkips Acronym, a name used by a longstanding troublemaker in the bizarro virtual world, has claimed responsibility for the sabotage of the Democratic candidate's pseudo-pioneering online presence, according to blog 10 Zen Monkeys.

Still not convinced 'hardcore liberal' is anymore interesting as a virtual label as 'republican'. I'm more convinced by the following comments,

"Griefing is pretty much the only way to make Second Life fun if you aren't a furry or a pedophile or something," says one Second Life observer.

And there you have it as far as I am concerned. It's gamers gaming the game . . . filling out to the extent that environment allow . . . nature abhors a vacuum.

You might want to read the following as well for more on the 'griefers' . . which is a better name then 'saboteurs'.

Second Life griefers claim responsibility for Edwards vandalism

8M Subscribers in the Sandbox

This is a placeholder for some thinking notes:

Web 2.0
can't keep up there's so much new and cool usability

WoW
8M subscribers in a community of practice that shares and creates knowledge

8M potential Web 2.0 users focused on a purpose should be our monkeys at the keyboard. If we can trawl this community we should see emergent Web 2.0 uses for CoP uses...and may the best ones win out.

---

Irrelevant cool image: Viamedia, lvl 70 warrior, solos Deadmines whilst Kuu and Draaga watch and loot and laugh maniacally.

Virtual Freedom of Virtual Speech

John Edwards Second Life HQ Vandalized

"Shortly before midnight (CST) on Monday, February 26, a group of republican Second Life users, some sporting "Bush '08" tags, vandalized the John Edwards Second Life HQ. They plastered the area with Marxist/Lenninist posters and slogans, a feces spewing obsenity, and a photoshopped picture of John in blackface, all the while harrassing visitors with right-wing nonsense and obsenity-laden abuse of Democrats in general and John in particular."

O.K., still not sure what to think about this. It does raise some questions in my mind [another virtual place that has often been vandalized]. Is Second Life a battleground state? Is it likely to go red or blue? Is the feces spewing obscenities available for private parties?

This reminds me more of Monty Python's, "Silly Election" skit. I would categorize this more as an act of anarchist antics than political pugnacity. Yet, I am registered Slightly Silly Party.

The other day some Paladin asked me to assist in a quest [in WOW . . . not in real life, but that would be cool] . As usual, I agreed, even though I was grinding specifically and had pots burning [I’m a charitable guy in WOW]. About a minute into it I noticed his guild was Crusaders for Christ [4 Paladins, 1 Warrior and 1 Mage . . . no Warlocks!] and cringed.

In a way that is uncharacteristic for me, I was kind of . . . err . . . well . . . slightly offended [I think I'm generally known as open and accepting of all races, creeds and colors . . . unless they are Elves]. A fleeting thought of breaking the party and going my own way was quickly discarded. Then thoughts about would Jebus approve of the WOW lifestyle? Or of Crusaders? Then my mind wandered to the scene in Clerks II where Randal explains how Transformers are a slight against God. Then I looked up GoBots on Wikipedia . . .

O.K., back to the topic . . .

Why was I . . . errr . . . well . . . slightly offended? I don't know. I tend to prefer my online experience to be a political and religion free experience. I have never thought of ViaMedia's political or religious affiliations . . . nor do I want to [whatever it would be would be dedicated to a LOT of killing, but killing without regards to race, creed or color].

Yet, in regards to the Edwards stuff above, a place like Second Life is based far more on free expression [and just go see how disturbing that free expression can be . . . I'll wait . . . well . . . errr . . . you've been gone a long time].

The real question that all of this really rises in me is what type of world do we wish to create in the online environments? Are they to be reflections of the constraints of current culture or are they to be based on the constraints of the online environments? WOW is designed solely [IMHO] to get me to pay $12 a month and $50 a year and allows no evolution of experience. Second Life is designed more for an open communal experience and allows for evolution of that experience.

Question: Can't you lock down your Second Life land to prevent this type of expression?

Addendum from the John Edward's Blog Forums:

Friendly greetings!

I'm Torley. I work for Linden Lab; while "abuse" per se isn't my specialty, I'm involved with community development, and wanted to raise awareness of our land parcel control tools, a benefit to clear unwanted objects & other detritus easily that is far easier than sweeping up a mess offline (in "RL").

Especially since it hasn't been mentioned yet here, nor on Digg...

I checked out the John Edwards HQ inworld, and looks like autoreturn is set to 1 min., and the Create Objects & Object Entry checkboxes are set to OFF too. Great move!

Just so everyone knows, these are a feature available to any parcel owner in Second Life, and help undesired stuff from accumulating, including litter and malicious garbage. We also have Knowledge Base articles about this, so feel free to have a look and I hope with a better understanding of what these tools can do for you, you'll enjoy your Second Lives more:

» http://secondlife.com/knowledgebase/arti cle.php?id=395

» http://secondlife.com/knowledgebase/arti cle.php?id=380

T'care!