I’m surprised and fascinated at how alone I feel in Second Life when no one is around. Someone else talked about this too, an extreme feeling of being in a deserted, lifeless place. It’s the oddest experience for someone who’s not at all uncomfortable with solitude.
I wonder what this feeling’s about. Of course if I were busied with building stuff then it might not be the same. But there’s something more, and it seems to driving my argument for exploring and experiencing In World/Out of World first and building later, if at all.
I can’t help but think of the “build orientation” as having to with colonization, a sense of material entitlement. There’s something very American about it, too, the drive to “own lots of whatever there is to own”. We don’t really see this about ourselves, how much stuff we own, just because it’s there and we can. Of course that’s only one way to look at it. I’d certainly be engrossed in building something for hours on end, like I could be creating music in Garageband.
To me, SL is a world that already has marvelous wonders to look at and experience, and along the way I’ll meet some wild people no doubt. I’m just not sure what’s so fun and interesting about being alone in my own little world, on my own little plot of land.