I discovered yesterday that a new book called Second Lives by writer Tim Guest has just hit the off - and online bookstores. It looks like it includes several stories about the "RL" author's adventures in various virtual worlds, incl. interviews with other inhabitants. It's difficult to get a grip of what it is "really" about, but it looks like it's more an essayistic piece of writing and not very academic. But as a piece of virtual gonzo journalism, it might be interesting in itself.

I havent been able to find a proper summary, but here is the review of the book in the Guardian.
And the review on the SecondLifeInsider Blog.

I'd like to note that it is not the first book of this kind: Katie Hafner has written an interesting piece of journalism/research on the life and development of the Well in The Well -A Story of Love, Death, and Real Life in the Seminal Online Community ; and Julian Dibbell has told us about his adventures in My Tiny Life (primarily about LambdaMOO). And there are probably more stories out there that I dont know of.

Update: heh, it turns out that the WoW-guild of which Im a currently passive member is also featured briefly in the Second Lives book. Esther, who has already read the book, notes that on page 329 Guest mentions a "cultural symposia" of academics in WoW: that's actually from a guild meeting which included a lecture by one of us - there is also a screenshot of it!
# posted by Lisbeth at: 13:58