New World Newsfeed: The BBC's Video on Virtual Infidelity

Recent dispatches from the outside world...

Narrated with a plummy diction usually reserved for nature programs, the BBC recently aired a 40 minute documentary on love in Second Life.  If you're in the UK, you can see it on the official site here; outside Britain, it's available (for the moment at least) on YouTube, and unsurprisingly, it's a beautifully crafted, observant, and sensitive work, well worth watching: Part I is here; Part II is here; Part III is here; Part IV is here.

It juxtaposes two real life couples, one which came together because of Second Life, one which is near falling apart (along with their family), with SL as the catalyst.  I say "catalyst" because it's made fairly clear that the tumult of their relationship existed before Second Life brought it to a painful culmination.  "I definitely was depressed," Caroline, an attractive redhead, tells the BBC interviewer, describing her state before even knowing the metaverse existed.  "I was looking for something but not knowing what I was looking for." If you look long enough, you eventually find it; being online just lubricates the process.

Comments

[Mal Burns]

Just to say that I have the full programme running at http://www.mogulus.com/metaworld2 which is a support for the "Second World Monitor" channel at http://www.mogulus.com/metaworld - check them out.

Malburns Writer (inworld)

[Yuvi]

Wow. Thanks or sharing this! I think any SL resident can see themselves in part represented in these people. How strange is it to see someone else at the computer at home? .

[Robertt Avro]

A very interesting documentary....I would like to know more about why the Anglo/American couples' relationship did not click in rl. The video seems to imply that they did not have a physical relationship at all when she went to England....was that because of the shock of meeting the real person and finding them so much different then the imagined one, or had the relationship already run its course? Based on the type of relationship they had in sl, it seems a shame to go through all that they had and not consumate the rl relationship...or was that just the way they made it appear so as to protect her situation at home?....and that maybe it just wasnt so great after all. Regardless, a cautionary but fascinating relationship analysis for all of us who inhabit SL.

[Renmiri Writer]

I thought it was a bit simplistic. I think SL love goes to the heart of the immersionist & augmentationist debate. It showed a woman torn between her immersion persona and her RL reality, unable to chose. But instead of digging deep in the situation, the program tried to skirt the issue. A topic ridden with angst and pain - RL adultery - was treated in a very one sided simplistic view, like it really was "all a game" when it is obvious there was RL pain to all involved (the woman, her kids, her husband, her lover).

The RL husband of the woman is shown as pretty much running for sainthood, i.e., did nothing wrong and is the perfect guy waiting for his wife to find out how wonderful he really is... On the other hand, the woman and man on the other couple, the "happy couple", also had previous relationships and broke those off to be together, but none of it was shown. It seemed to me that the program told the two couples stories differently, biased towards pain and loss on one, cleanly scrubbed and full of happy smiles on the other.

All in all, I found the story telling moralistic and too superficial. I hope the next time this complex subject gets approached it gets a more in depth treatment. People are no saints and demons in RL or in SL. They all have flaws and complex stories to tell