It was the ultimate in mixed reality reporting: last year, the esteemed Center for Arts Policy at Columbia College in Chicago invited me to profile a couple major cultural figures in Second Life for their Democratic Vistas series. These were interviews conducted not just in-world, but in person, at their real world locales. Which is how I wound up in the meat packing district of New York City, and in a small town (and recurring Sopranos location!) in New Jersey, to spend time with Aimee Weber and Baccara Rhodes, two of the key women who've made Second Life what it is today.
The subsequent essay is up now, lovingly formatted in Acrobat: get it here.
My thanks to Michael Wakeford of Columbia for his excellent editorship, and of course, to Aimee and to Baccara and her family, for letting me get a first hand glimpse at their lives in both worlds.