Virtual Living Or The Real Thing?

In my continual research to find out what’s new in the web 2.0 world, I have to say that I am still not totally sold on sites like twitter and second life. These websites are definitely hot topics in the media, but are they really society’s #1 entertainment of choice these days? From where I sit, which is working at the computer for the better part of the day, a break means I am out the door, and outside.

I did find this article recently, Time magazine best and worst web of 2007, and “Second life” is in the bottom five. It starts this way, “We’re sure that somebody out there is enjoying Second Life, but why?” So I guess not everyone has become a Second Lifer … well at least not just yet. In all seriousness though, I started writing about this today because I began to wonder if people, especially the younger generations, are actually starting to prefer living in a virtual world over a real one. I hope not. Having the internet evolve like it has, especially living in a remote town, has been better than great, and I find the whole “online collaboration” concept fascinating. What sounds so unappealing to me is the thought of all of our future leisure activities to be solely based on social networking while sitting and staring at the screen of a computer.

As far as living here in Jackson Hole, rarely does the subject of avatars and twitting on twitter.com come up in conversation. I would not say this is in any way related to ignorance though, just a lack of interest, and a focus on other things. The mountain lifestyle is definitely more conducive to spending as much free time as possible, outside in nature, all year long. I guess once again, this comes down to priorities and interests. You are probably not even considering living in the mountains if you prefer spending most of your free time on the computer. Right?