Mini-Rant: Second Life is FarmVille and I Feel Fine

Teleportation in virtual worlds lets you travel faster than the speed of light. Maybe that's why three or four years as a Second Life avatar leaves so many rezzerati waxing more nostalgic about the good old days than great-aunt Moonbeam on the 40th anniversary of her acid-drenched, mud-covered deflowering at Woodstock:

"Before Philip sold out to The Man, Second Life was totally cool anarchy. It was a techno-sexual, Haight-Freaking-Ashbury, Fellini-worthy wet dream for digitopian, art-making, prim-building, nube-griefing MoFos. Back then, when corporate clones brought their boring vanilla unambiguously-gendered asses into our world we'd show them the business end of a giant penis. But it's all gone to crap. M. is turning Second Life into FarmVille."

Get over it. Second Life was destined to be FarmVille from the very first sim. Like every avant-garde scene in the physical world, by the time Nascar Dads show up looking for exotic punani the real cutting-edge has moved on. I say, let 'em have it.

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