What's Immersion In Second Life?

While billed as a virtual world, there's too much about Second Life that's not immersive.  That's the argument of Roy Cassini, who argues on his blog that "immersion is about limitations".  But when you can change the sun's location, teleport at will, even defy gravity, where's the plausible simulation of being in an alternate world? 

Responding on her own blog, Dandellion Kimban argues that SL is immersive, just that we're not being immersed in a traditional online world context (i.e. fantasy,  contemporary setting, etc.)  For her, "It is not the meatspace we are depicting here, it is our imagination."  It's quite possible that both of them are right, and in the near future, areas in SL will be made immersive in the classic sense, while others remain imagination simulators-- or as I call it, Bebop Reality, a place where physical objects and phenomenon are just part of a 3D melody to riff on. 

What's your preference-- closer to Cassini's, or Kimban's?

Comments

[ArminasX Saiman]

SL is a truly creative environment; indeed nothing would exist without the efforts of the residents to build -- their fantasy. I emphasize "their" fantasy, since it may not be someone else's fantasy. Almost without exception, the avatars I meet come to SL to escape from their RL situation in some way and do the things they cannot do in RL. We all role-play; it's just that some do it more deeply than others. That's why it's called "Second Life".