Rheta Shan, Rest In Peace

Sometimes, the material world imposes griefs that the virtual makes real. I did not know the woman behind the avatar known as Rheta Shan, but through Second Life, I knew her acerbic wit, her talent as a designer, and most of all, her perceptive and eloquent observations of Second Life itself. If you knew even less about her than I, you should still read her milestone essay, "The World That Philip Made", because it's one of the best things written about the metaverse. (If you're wondering about the the strikethroughs in that post, there's that wit I mentioned: she did that in snarky response to a sudden and confusing Second Life trademark announcement issued last year by the Lindens' lawyers.) I say all this in sadness, because early today, a real life friend of Rheta's posted a message on her blog: the woman behind Rheta Shan is dead, victim of a traffic accident. Even more tragic, the message related, she was nine months pregnant.

Her in-world partner Thdast "Thaddy" Schwarzman confirmed this news with Ms. Shan's friend; Ms. Schwarzman had not actually seen her in Second Life since March 27th. "She was heavily pregnant," she told me. "We all assumed she was gone to give birth, and then we found out the horrible news today." An in-world memorial service is planned. As you can see by her profile picture, Rheta Shan officially listed Thdast Schwarzman as her SL partner. Thaddy tells me Rheta will remain listed as her partner on her own profile, in honor of her memory.

Comments

[Zoe Connolly]

Even a virtual life is not devoid of those days of real life anguish. This is one of those days.

My heart goes out to Rheta's RL and SL family & friends.

[Nyoko Salome]

:0 :(( this is such a terribly, terribly tragic loss. my very best to those close to her.

[CodeBastard Redgrave]

http://codebastardredgrave.com/2009/05/11/chere-rheta/

[A. Parisienne]

There was no accident in Paris, or anywhere else, on or around the date mentioned that fits any of those alleged details. We are being played.