Mark Bell Lecture

Being an avid user of virtual worlds for a number of years now allowed for me to be aware of many of issues that Mark Bell touched upon. However, I think Second Life is a perfect example of a culture industry. Mark Bell argues that in Second Life we are “prosumers,” one who produces content as well as consumes it, but are we really? I have heard this argument before with inventions such as YouTube, not only can you watch videos, but you can also have a voice by uploading your own. People are given agency over media and they are no longer controlled anymore by the upper class’s ideas. But I think this argument is an oversimplification and has its flaws.

This term prosumer masks us into thinking we have control over content, but we can be a prosumer in real life as much as we can be on the internet. Just because you can write a blog with a different viewpoint, “the man” will still be in control over the general public, someone will always be at the top. In the past ideas could be expressed just through a different medium, say a “book”. Yes, it is true that it is much easier to publish a blog post then it is to write a book. But how about a note then, or letter to the newspaper, just as many people are going to see that then they are your blog, and if your blog is super successful you have just as much chances that your book would get published. I do not think this term prosumer is applicable, or at least more relevant than it ever was in the past.

In Second Life I am only a consumer, prosumer does not apply to myself and probably not to everyone else in this class. I attempted to build a skateboard and that was a technical nightmare, imagine trying to build a full simulation? This is basically limited to computer programmers and maybe just the select few who have spent months learning the Second Life building functions. And Second Life is the perfect place for a culture industry, as Mark Bell mentioned the process of selling items; you only need one copy of the data, and that same product can be sold over and over. There is no manufacturing cost that comes with this; it is the ultimate form of mass production, just without the act of production itself. Everything we purchase on Second Life is 100% a duplication; it might just be me, but I’m not getting duped into buying a dupe.

Another point that Mark Bell made that I found interesting was when that group found a way to retake his survey over and over in order to receive the $250 Linden bucks. Mr. Bell laughed at them for doing so, but this is more than a Canadian dollar. If they are transferring this money to real life, (He never mentioned how long the surveys were) I am sure they could do upwards of at least 15 surveys an hour, 15 x 1.23 (as of yesterday’s exchange rate), that’s $18.45. I do not think that is anything to laugh about, it’s more than a lot of standard paying wages. This money would be worth even more in the SL community, in RL is might be able to buy a t-shirt, but that hours work will pocket you $3750L which would buy you a lot of SL shirts. One thing he did mentioned was that he only lost a few dollars in real life; I don’t think this is possible, especially if a group did it, and they did it more than once. And these people are criminals, why would they all stop after doing it once if you can continuously loophole the system?

After rereading this I didn’t mean to come across in a negative tone, but rather offer some rebuttals to the points that Mark mentioned that are other things to think about. I wish I could have asked him a few of these points but they only came around after thinking about what to write this blog about. Overall it was a great experience; I would love to try it again sometime. At first the technology with the sound hindered the experience slightly but once it was fixed it flowed nicely. This was my first speech I have ever encountered with an avatar. It might have been better if it was more than just one way communication, as it is such a passive experience in a world that does not have to be that way. Second Life is entirely about socializing and it felt like I was listening to the radio even though I was the room he was giving the lecture. The avatar cannot truly express bodily signs, it allowed for myself to be easily distracted by other things going on. The slideshow was definitely a great feature which helped the speech. It was also weird because we were still in the classroom setting listening; I think it would be a completely different style of learning if we did this from our home. The benefit was that we could get a speaker such as Mark Bell; this might not have been possible to get him in person, so the Second Life version has to suffice. Second Life is definitely an application where learning is possible, but it is not the ultimate solution, or even the most beneficial environment.