Since I have written about 2nd Life in previous blogs, I decided to actually enter and explore 2nd Life for this assignment. First I had to choose a world to join. Some choices were “CSI:NY, Ben & Jerry, Frankfurt and Anshe Chung’s Dreamland”. I decided to enter Anshe Chung’s Dreamland because it pretty and serene. Within the Dreamland there were many different regions you could explore. After teleporting from region to region and not finding many people to interact with, I finally arrived to a region that had a lot of people. The name of this region was “Money Tree Island”. Before I tell you about Money Tree Island, let me describe my avatar.
My avatar’s name was Veronica Saunders. She was a young brunette female who wore jeans and a long sleeved purple shirt. This was the default character that is given to you when you sign up for the first time. Never having played any type of online game before, I couldn’t figure out how to change my avatar from the default avatar, so I just decided to go with it. My avatar looked like an innocent, girl-next door type. Her newbie cloths also gave her away that she was a recent member of 2nd Life. Not all of the avatars were people, some were cats and other animals.
When I first got to Money Tree Island, I did not know what it was, nor what to do. I began saying “hi” to a few people but they weren’t too responsive. Then I met a guy who seemed friendly but he ended up not being able to speak much English, so I moved on. He spoke Portuguese. As I was speaking to this Portuguese man, a women sitting at a nearby bench began chatting with me. She was very friendly and nice. Her name was Dotro Beattie. Dotro was young and she had short brown and was not wearing much clothing. Nevertheless she seemed nice and was the only who seemed to be in a helping mood. She explained to me that in Money Tree Island, you simply sit on a bench and wait for money to fall off a tree and onto your lap.
From my clothing, Dotro immediately recognized that I was a newbie and took it upon herself to teach me a few tricks about playing 2nd Life. At first it was obvious that my lack of skills frustrated her but she never gave up and continued to help me. I found this extremely generous.
[16:12] Dotro Beattie: omg ... you ARE a newbie ...
[16:15] Dotro Beattie: somebody kill me ...
[16:15] Dotro Beattie: great
[16:15] Dotro Beattie: stay here ...
[16:15] Dotro Beattie: Let me explain
She helped me sit on the bench next to her so that I could also receive money from the tree. She also explained various other useful tricks to, like how to move the camera angles and such. She even gave me $10 in the beginning. At the end of our conversation she gave me more money. $100!! I told her I couldn’t accept but she insisted and told me not to worry about it. I tried to give the money back to her but I couldn’t figure out how. Then she told me of a place I could go to buy new cloths. Further, Dotro showed concern for me. She warned me that 2nd Life could get addictive and that I should not spend too much time playing.
[16:30] Dotro Beattie: SL (second life) is really weird.
[16:30] 1Veronica1 Saunders: why is that
[16:30] Dotro Beattie: You might get into it...and waste a lot of RL(real life) time
[16:31] Dotro Beattie: I must warn you.
[16:39] Dotro Beattie: are you ok w your rl?
[16:39] Dotro Beattie: most of the people here are a bit ... wrong.
[16:39] 1Veronica1 Saunders: yes it is fine i was just curious to see what this was
[16:39] Dotro Beattie: Imagine that they spend hours in sl ... every day
[16:40] Dotro Beattie: I was too ...
[16:40] 1Veronica1 Saunders: now u are addicted?
[16:40] Dotro Beattie: not anymore ...
[16:40] Dotro Beattie: or ... who knows.
According to Yee & Bailenson (2007), how our avatars look (their self-representation) changes how we behave online. This is the Proteus Effect. I believe that my avatar looking like an innocent newbie did impact the way I behaved online. Since I new that people could recognize me as a newbie, I played that to my advantage. If I bumped into another avatar, sometimes I would apologize and other times I wouldn’t. The other avatars didn’t get angry with me because they could clearly tell from my clothing that I was a newbie and couldn’t work the controls yet. I talked to more people without fear, since my avatar was a newbie. I asked for more help than I would have if I had not looked like a newbie or if I was a less attractive avatar. Further, since I was a newbie, Dotro did not get extremely angry with me when I would ask her questions about her real life (RL). I know that in most games you are supposed to keep your RL and your virtual worlds somewhat separate, but playing up my newbie card let me get away with a few inappropriate questions. Some questions she wouldn’t answer but other’s she did. She said she wouldn’t answer questions about her RL. But eventually she did tell me that she lived in Eastern Europe. Since my avatar looked like a newbie, I did not behave aggressively. I was timid with Dotro, and I apologized and thanked her a lot. If I was a large male with non-newbie clothing I would have acted more aggressive and would not have played up my newbie status. Rather, I would have downplayed it as a male avatar.
In addition to The Proteus Effect, behavioral conformation took place. Behavioral confirmation is when the expectations of the perceiver (Dotro) causes the target (me) to behave in ways that confirms the perceiver’s expectations. Dotro treated me like a newbie and even stated that she like helping out newbie’s. As a result I acted even more ignorant and even more appreciative towards her.
[16:24] 1Veronica1 Saunders: ur very helpful
[16:24] Dotro Beattie: you're smart ...
[16:28] Dotro Beattie: I shall offer you a newbie guide.
[16:38] Dotro Beattie: I like helping a newbie :)
In the words of Dortro “have fun on SL…but control yourself.”
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Dina, your experience on Second Life was a lot different from mine. I also considered going to Dreamland, but I went to Orientation Island instead; it looks like I should have gone to Dreamland if I wanted a better experience. I was surprised that Dotro took so much interest in helping you out. You brought up a good point in mentioning how Dotro’s perception of you was important in terms of how much she was willing to help and self-disclose. Yee and Bailenson do not touch upon how one’s perception of others affects how one acts toward them, but your insight in mentioning that point was great. If Dotro had not known that you were a newbie, she probably would not have been so accomodating for you. Really interesting post!
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