Second Life?

Post Reply New Topic

Should I start playing Second Life to improve my social skills?

I'd think you'd get sucked in, but that's the opinion of someone who hasn't played it.

I play second life and its not improved my social skills but it has sort of made it clear that my social skills lack just as much online as they do in real life if not more.

I still find myself being the quiet one when theres groups of people socialising. Or being opinionated/contravercial when there is an interesting subject or issue to discuss.

There is things I do like on SL though. I can have fun scripting devices or building things and this is what I end up doing 70% of the time. SL may be like a 3D chatroom but there is more to do than socializing so if you did join you would probably be drawn into the more creative aspects of SL.

I also like that there are lots of ASD people that are on SL organising chats/meetings to talk about everything in relation to autism. One support group I attend on SL has a meeting every wednesday night on SL and usually there 10+ people there mostly autistic, others are family members wanting to learn and once a teacher was there to learn and understand a student.

There is a lot of good that can be done in SL but there is more bad stuff on it. Like the sex industry on SL is big with people selling virtual sex for money (L$). Gambling used to be the biggest but it has been mostly banned so there are few surviving casinos. There is lots of people ready to take advantage of people wherever possible just to get your money. The worst thing in SL as you may have seen on the news is that some paedophiles use it although the main grid is for people of 18+ there was no limit on what age your avatar can appear to be so when you have avatars that are clearly underage offering sex for money then there is definitely something wrong and dont matter if the person playing the avatar is an adult but LindenLabs are trying to get rid of these people and make it safe.

Ive said a lot more than I thought and probably more than I should have but I dont find the bad things in SL a problem because really if your looking for sex/gambling on SL you will find it like on the rest of the net. If your looking for Star Trek, Roleplaying or to learn a lot of things you can find them too. Its easy to avoid the parts of SL you dont like.

It looks like the bad outweighs the good on SL, and I do get sucked into things easily... maybe I'll just avoid it for now.

Thanks for the advice

I've been involved with SL since the public beta in 2003, and my opinion is the bad does not outweigh the good. The thing is that "bad stuff" gets much more press and attention - this is true of the real world and the web too. Journalists will often only focus on controversial stuff. There are tons of positive things about SL. Education, creative skill development, collaboration, lots of social opportunities, gaming, role-playing, live music, art galleries - the list is endless. You just don't hear about this as much in the news. Look deeper below the superficial stuff and what the media reports and you will find lots of great things and great people.