MODELING REALITY WITH VIRTUAL WORLDS

Virtual worlds, such as the popular Second Life, are a significant part of new media. They can be used just for entertainment (i.e.: video game), they can be used to meet new people, or another way of interacting with friends you already have. Virtual worlds can also be used to teach, that is, people with shared interests can have a meeting area in which actual lessons ranging from a variety of topics can be taught at a specified time. It can help people improve on their social skills, especially if they are shy or have trouble communicating. Virtual worlds can be used by business organizations to conduct meetings, which is particularly useful if you want to communicate with team members who are spread around the country or world. Businesses can also use virtual worlds to conduct orientations and training sessions. An example of this comes from the article. “IBM Learning Programs Get a ‘Second Life.” The article states, “New IBM employees separated by thousands of miles will be able to mingle, interact and share ideas in the virtual world before their first day on the job.” “They can learn real-life working skills such as signing up for benefits, developing code as part of a global team, and ramping up sales skills before they meet with IBM clients.”

Virtual world technology is beneficial to society in that it provides convenience, ease, innovation, and even help. If a school or business wants to host a class, or training, it would be convenient to just turn on your computer and be connected without having to travel. Since virtual worlds provide an innovative way to socialize or train/learn, they appeal to large groups of people because people are attracted to the unconventional methods used. And as for help, virtual worlds can make people with low self esteem feel better because they aren’t judged, they can help those with serious socializing problems learn to deal, they can give people who are unable to move or function completely the chance to do so via the virtual world, they can provide language assistance, and the list goes on. An example of one of the ways virtual worlds provide help is shown through the article, “iReport: 'Naughty Auties' battle autism with virtual interaction." It states, “For people with autism, we've found it's a very nice way of setting up situations they might come across in their everyday lives," Bignell [a psychology researcher] said. "For people who have social, emotional, communicational problems ... we can get them familiar with an environment before they actually try it out in real life."

The dark side of virtual worlds would have to be, when used for more serious or professional reasons, there’s a limit as to what can be done. Everything in the virtual world is simulated, which can hinder actual real life performance. You may learn to deal with certain situations but not everything can be truly learned through the virtual world.

I think virtual worlds will continue to grow while technology grows. As more and more of our society become technologically advanced, things like virtual worlds may become the norm. And it will lead to some new, unique technology being developed.