Why Your Avatar Is Important [Part I].

What do the following have in common?

Business Week is getting twitchy over customer service. The folks over at NASA are using second life to develop open source projects. Barack Obama is using second life to podium-stand. Prim babies are being adopted without background checks and blingtard moms are on the loose. Stroker Serpent is a new-world porn king. (Second) London and (Second) Tokyo were ravaged by (Second) floods. Coldwell Banker, a very large real estate firm, is selling land in SL. And houses for US$20. Long-time SL resident Gwyneth Llewelyn talks a bit about audio.

What do these things have in common? Second Life, for one.

But these things all happened for the same reason Second Life happened.
They all employ what other media can’t: a body.

These things all have Avatars in common. Virtual worlds use a medium that can be visual, auditory, and textual while still including body language. Sure, simple pure-et-dure text is a great interface, and sure, we can use it, but not like bodies.

Virtual worlds such as Second Life continue to improve because of one single idea: The Avatar.