Nu Vibez and Roleplay Guide Magazine - October 2014 | Page 28

more than a game

keeping it

REAL
By HillarySwift Resident

Have you sought love online? Have you
sought love in Second Life (SL)? Has
real life (RL) love let you down too many
times? Well, you are certainly not alone.
If you joined SL to seek that elusive love
of your life, be assured the likelihood
is no better than real life. Though, it
does and has happened, the particular
characteristics of online environments,
makes it very tough to rely on the ideal
of “what you see is what you get” that we
tend to need when trying to figure out if
this man or woman is the one for me.
Just consider profiles for a moment.
While we have all seen the profile picture
from hell, most of the time, people put
their best face forward. Few people are

28 October 2014 - NuVibez Magazine

really prepared to post the picture of their
morning face, with bed hair, bleary eyes
and drool stains, onto any site where they
are seeking love. They know that first
impressions count and they need to show
off their assets rather than display their
frankly ordinary side (and we all have very
ordinary sides!).
This has been the case for dating sites
and social media hookup sites for a long
time now. Imagine now how tough it
can be in SL when the image a person
displays, their avatar, is by design,
an idealised version of personhood
(assuming the user is being human at that
point). There is no chance that viewers
of idealised humans won’t be impressed