Mr. Linden Goes To Washington: Philip Rosedale To Appear At First US Congress Hearing On Virtual Worlds

This Tuesday, according to a Linden Lab media alert, the company's exiting CEO/future Chairman of the Board will speak on the topic of “Online Virtual Worlds: Applications and Avatars in a User-Generated Medium” before the House Telecommunications and the Internet Subcommittee.  The purpose of the hearing, an official invitation from the Committee reads, "is to obtain testimony on the nature and growth of online virtual worlds; the types of applications and services, both commercial and non-commercial, supported and offered in such worlds; and any policy issues raised by virtual worlds that may need to be addressed or monitored."  (Emphasis mine.)

And no, despite the April 1st date, this is no fooling: it's even on the Committee's schedule, and the video will be streamed live from the site starting at 9am EST, 6am Noon Second Life time.  Billed as the first Congressional hearing to directly address the topic of virtual worlds, it'll be led by Chairman Ed Markey (D-MA), who happens to have an avatar of his own.  (Last December, rather than jet to Bali for the UN's conference on climate change, Rep. Markey addressed the topic from within Second Life.)  Philip is not the only virtual world expert being called: Susan Tenby (Glitteractica Cookie in SL), director of Techsoup.org's Non-Profit Commons in Second Life, will also appear.

Image mash-up credits: Tao Takashi, Frank Capra.

Update, 10:05am:  Adam Reuters has more details on the event-- namely, the House will also call Dr. Larry Johnson of The New Media Consortium and Colin J. Parris, Ph.D., Vice President of Digital Convergence at IBM Research.

Comments

[Ann Otoole]

Indeed when the quantity of blogging regarding a bunch of people in some computer games wants to form their own government grows to a certain level then you betcha the real world governments, i.e.; the only ones that matter, will become very interested indeed and will step in to "set the record straight" as to exactly what government is relevant.

This will be very interesting. Good story. Would never have heard about it otherwise. Many thanks!

[Morris Vig]

Hope he's ready to talk taxes, because that's all I see Congress caring about.

[Harper Ganesvoort]

Ham, do you have the time straight? The schedule you link to says 9:30; and I think you brought the time forward instead of back, so that it would be 6:30 Pacific/SLT, instead of 12:30.

If I'm wrong, just delete this comment.

[Marianne McCann]

Why do I see "Casinos" "Internet predators" and "SL Banks" as being the big issues here?

[anomouse]

Taxes taxes and taxes O and face time for these guys.

[Hamlet Au]

Good catch, Harper, thanks; fixed forthwith.

[Rusalka Writer]

We're at war, the economy is in the dumps, and the dollar is now worth sixty cents. And the Congress is doing what? Looking into virtual worlds and deciding whether steroids are (obviously) being used in baseball.

Why do we vote for these clowns?

[rikomatic]

Well the fact that Glitteractica Cookie of Techsoup.org and Larry Johnson of The New Media Consortium will be testifying along with Philip is at least some indication that the line of inquiry might venture beyond just taxation matters.

And Ed Markey is a known defender of internet freedom.

So I've got some confidence that the hearings will be more than just a virtual world witch hunt.

[Alan Levine]

Mr Pixel is going to:
http://sl.nmc.org/2008/03/31/mrpixel/

His remarks are posted now in CommentPress format:
http://wp.nmc.org/mrpixel

[Ann Otoole]

good hearing. the "in world" survived.

[ruthdabu]

it doesn’t make any sense at all, the world is experiencing financial crisis yet the government is doing nothing but to just talk on senseless things.

[Angelle]

Does anyone have a link to this happening in RL?