Wife Files For Divorce Atter Husbands Second Life Affair

Recently a Japanese woman was jailed for killing off an online character in a virtual world and now a British woman is filing for divorce from her husband (both online and in real life) because of his sexual escapades in Second Life. Even though her husband has never met in person the woman with whom he has been having a Second Life affair with, Amy Taylor is ending their marriages both virtual and real. “It's cheating as far as I'm concerned, but he didn't see it as a problem and couldn't see why I was so upset,” To put things into perspective the two met online in 2003 and married in 2005 both physically and in a lavish Second Life ceremony. According to Ms. Taylor they spent as much of their time together in the virtual world as they did in the physical one. When she suspected her husband's Second Life avatar of cheating she hired a virtual private detective to catch him in the act. Oh my, what are these worlds coming to?

Globe and Mail article.

Holodeck Like Interface To Second Life

Check out this video from the guys who made Second Life possible. Using a 3d camera and the Segway as their inspiration Mitchell Kapor and Philippe Bossut have developed an interface to the 3d world of Second Life that is driven solely by body movements! It's reminiscent of the holodeck. of Star Trek's Federation starships! Cool! More at handsfree3d.com

Online games new tool in epidemic research?

The CBC is reporting that researchers at Tufts University are considering online gaming platforms such as World of Warcraft (WOW) and Second Life as a means of studying social interaction and the spread of disease. "By using these games as an untapped experimental framework, we may be able to gain deeper insight into the incredible complexity of infectious disease epidemiology in social groups." The researchers cite a case two years ago where a programming error caused an outbreak of a highly contagious disease within WOW which left thousands of characters dead. See, there are lessons to be learned from game playing!