Politics of Second Life

I think my favorite Second Life writer is Pixeleen Mistral. Read her (I guess it’s her) amusing coverage of politician Mark Warner stumping in the virtual world here. Some excerpts:

Second Life avatar Mark Warner today shocked the metaverse by disclosing his RL identity as Mark Warner — the former Governor of Virginia….

I tried to strike up a conversation with the Mark Warner avatar and got no response. I felt unsettled. A politician that won’t talk is like no politician I have ever seen. Could it be that this avatar was nothing more than an SL “action figure”? ….
More interesting than the interview itself was the scene backstage before the interview, where the Millions of Us handlers put the governor through his paces, practicing waves, helping him keep his feet on the ground and apparently adjusting the size of the avatar as well. He sure looked a lot taller once he was on stage, but maybe it was just the hardware lighting. Perhaps the best RL use of SL for politics going forward will be in producing inexpensive machinima-based political attack ads. This would help create a market for lifelike G.W. Bush and Hillary Clinton avatar costumes, with obvious benefits for SL content creators….