The introduction to virtual worlds has so far been the most interesting part of learning2.0 and worth exploring further.  I’d seen news reports about Second Life before, as on occasions it has hit the headlines where various controversies had emerged, most recently a story about “virtual world” affairs leading to real life divorce… there were a number of stories over the last couple of years about the world of virtual worlds.  After setting up an avatar (which was fairly straightforward) we’d managed to enter Second Life and wander about, unfortunately it was not possible that day for everybody attending the workshop to make it to virtual Imperial College London.

It could be worth having another go and trying to get anyone that wants to (possibly using 5 minutes during the wrap-up session?) back in to Second Life and over to virtual Imperial.  In terms of work or academic teaching value, there are certainly possibilities such as the virtual Medical School (SAF building) exercise demonstrated, for students to gain some sort of experience and learn certain aspects of their subject, even if it were slightly detached from reality.

Overall virtual worlds seem to have the broadest and biggest range of possibilities (work/academic/social) out of all of the things we’ve been introduced to so far.  There was something recently about how an avatar of a real life person could eventually become living itself, in that the person wouldn’t necessarily have to operate their avatar in the virtual world.  This has certain possibilities, for example the real life descendants of a real life person who had been dead for a long time (maybe great-great grandchildren) could locate their virtual ancestor through the virtual world and meet with them to learn about their family history. 

It is alarming at the same time when considering how virtual worlds could perhaps become too advanced.