1. Eloise said on February 25th

   Speaking as someone who went the other way, I found the WOW limitations for control, movement, and especially camera control intensely frustrating. I also have to wonder how many hours your gamer friend spent trying SL before making these judgements?

   I agree, all of these can appear to be a barrier to immersion if you’re not used to them, but equally the ability to move the camera is immensely useful, and the rest of the options simply require a willingness to engage with the rules as they are in world. Second Life is, for many, an incredibly immersive experience. Whether that is despite, irrespective or because of these factors I don’t know, but saying “SL isn’t immersive” is clearly not true for all.

   World of Warcraft, to use your main example, doesn’t create a real world: it creates a fantasy world where, to a large extent RL physics applies, but magic works, dinosaurs lurk around the corner, and people routinely go armed and armoured. Your friend is willing to buy into this (perhaps after some time), but if you find a complete newbie to WoW and gaming, I wonder how instantly immersive they will find it? I know I didn’t, it took me time to get used to the world and it’s tools.

   Second Life, on the other hand, I wandered into and was instantly comfortable and hooked. Part of that was the interface, which, whilst clunky, works for me and always has, part of that is other factors: I immerse in places where I feel comfortable and emotionally engaged. WoW never did that for me, and after 1 month, didn’t engage enough for me to want to pay to continue. Second Life does engage me, I do immerse, because of the relationships I’ve built up and continue to build within the environment. I’m still a gamer (IRL) and online games fail to engage the characterisation and role play I enjoy in their RL counterparts. SL is, if you like, for me, a deep, fully immersed role-play experience: to the point that I am intellectually and emotionally congruent between SL and RL “selves” (if the plural is even meaningful).

   Can you please all of the people all of the time? No, absolutely not. It would be interesting to see, if you did ban flying and remove the ability to tp etc. what the reactions of new users would be. I would suggest, since SL’s churn is similar to that of the gamer worlds, you’d not see much change except a change in which 10% of users become long term users.

2. Rick van der Wal said on February 25th

   Great reply Eloise, thank you.

   To start with the first. Wow’s limitations might be frustrating, its closer to real life than being able to pan and look anywhere you want. Trough, in and behind walls, on top of skyscrapers etc. This is exactly the struggle I am talking about, of features and usability and immersion and just noted how he looked at this differently than I did after about 1.5 years of SL.

   Secondly - I don’t think its fair to say the ‘dinosaurs’ and armed figures are an obstacle in immersion or create a world less ‘real‘ because of it. Second Life has its fair share of angels, demons, furries, guns, and other fantasy figures and buildings. This is all part of the immersion you have to allow yourself to get into, not part of the tools supporting or facilitating the immersion I am talking about.

   Furthermore, I certainly don’t think the removal of light or access to environmental settings will change the userbase as you describe it - the worlds content is still the same, still people socializing (and flight is already disabled in a large amount of area’s). The camera options and teleporting might, though I think it’s not very likely to affect the userbase as such, but more the content of the world which *might* eventually draw in or exclude certain groups because of this change.

3. Eloise said on February 25th

   I think you’re reiterating both of my points wonderfully, if inadvertently.

   All systems take some “buy in” time - I would include RL there. Did you friend give SL that time before saying “It sucks, because…”? What proportion of other MUVEs has he tried and left? Is SL the only one he doesn’t like?
   What makes or breaks immersiveness is different based on the person. The first time I walked around the corner and saw a raptor in WOW it certainly killed any sense of immersion I had. The things you highlight as breaking your immersion, and your friend’s, in SL, I regard as largely invaluable tools, and tools that have no effect on how immersive SL is for me.
   I might be in a minority here, but SL does work to immerse some proportion of its user base very deeply - for whatever reason. If you were LL, would you change everything and take a significant risk of alienating some proportion of your current users, plus changing the nature of the people from the new influx you keep?

4. Rick van der Wal said on February 25th

   1) He never said he didn’t like it, he found it hard to place himself inside the ‘game’ because of the 5 reasons as mentioned above. That it itself is not what’s remarkable, I just wondered why and we got into the debate what would trigger a better immersion. Overall I think he spend about 20 hours online. The issue is not just with his findings though - as its very, very subjective as you point out, but more with implementing RL restrictions to strengthen an online experience.

   2) I am just talking about the interface part, the things that the client affects. There are a lot of other factors involved in the immersion into a game. The most important one is the content - the people - on how it triggers your willingness to let yourself be ‘immersed’ by the environment. This is just about the facilitation of that experience and how and whether it can be improved by the suggestions above.

5. Carmen Villadar said on February 25th

   Rick, Eloise, I found this topic and the replies that followed quite engaging to my brain. I’ve been a citizen of SL since 2005 and although I have never been a ‘gamer’ per se in computer environments, I find myself agreeing with the both of you. After all, isn’t real life a game in and of itself, more or less? Don’t we all have a variety of roles we play i.e. employee, citizen, mother/father, daughter/son, husband/wife, sister/brother, neighbour, friend/confidante etc …

   In whatever environment we find ourselves placed in, there is always a certain degree of adaptation skills one needs to acquire in order to feel ‘immersed’ and ‘comfortable’. I should know. I’ve been living in 4 countries over the span of my life and each place required an acclimating period, to say the least. I had to get use to different transportation systems, language lingo, culture, behaviour, geography and what have you.

   If I were to compare Second Life to Real Life in all honesty, leaving out the physics and certain non - realistic representations (you find in BOTH worlds) I would have to say that the ONLY REAL difference between both platforms is the omittance of TOUCH and SMELL (in its most general of observations).

   I do agree with the both of you on your points of ‘camera view’ both being unrealistic and yet, affording another perspective from the 1st person, hence advantageous.

   But despite all the good and bad that these Virtual Worlds hold - I have to wonder what IMPACT they will have to future societies?

   If the future is moving towards a more computerized/impersonal/non contact arena then great - because the children who have grown up with this technology will be fully prepared to steer mankind into whatever ….

   However, there is something odd about being involved in a Virtual World, no matter how therapeutic it may be for an individual and no matter how advantageous they may be for companies, education, etc ….

   NOTHING takes the place of REAL LIFE. Nothing takes the place of one to one interaction with direct eye contact and direct observance of body language. Nothing takes the place of ‘nearness’.

   Yes, I do believe that people can sincerely ‘connect’ in these virtual worlds however, for how long? I feel that these virtual worlds (i.e. SL) are great for forming new network relationships and even ‘personal relationships for that matter’. I should know. I met my boyfriend in Second Life and after only 4 months of SL dating and being on Skype, I moved from Houston, TX to Germany to live with him - so believe me, I should know.

   Despite that fact, I still sense a ‘danger’ lurking. I cannot explain it but I have been thinking about it on and off and once I can formulate my thoughts in an eloquent and concise manner then I do intend to share it. Intuitively, ( I am going out on a line here but I don’t care ), I sense a real danger to our society and to mankind as a whole.

   Yes, yes, I am aware of the great benefits virtual world platforms can offer in terms of bridging the digital divide blah blah blah .. however there is also such a fine line of conduct whenever new technology arises. There is always the good and the bad and what can be good can be very, very good and what can be bad - can also be very, very bad.

   Just think, “Atomic Bomb”, Internet Chat rooms - for dating and meeting new people that also become platforms for pedophiles and crazy maniacs. We live amongst these sordid characters in real life anyway, whether we realize it or not, it is just that now, they too have yet another platform to operate in. Enough Said.

   You can best be assured that I am carefully observing and noting the behaviours of people as a whole and myself in these virtual worlds.

   Second Life was very therapeutic for a burnt out nurse who found a way to channel her creativity - it actually made me a better nurse because it appeared that I became more balanced. Second Life also allowed me to meet someone very special - hence I left a life in the U.S. to start a completely new one. Second Life has made me realize so much of what I always knew I could be - and now.. I am that in Real Life.

   I no longer spend too much time in Second Life. It has served its purpose for me very well and now I can continue performing in Real Life, being much more aware of my limitations as a person and my abilities as a talented, open and skilled citizen of this planet.

   Perhaps, I often feel that for those people that continue to spend countless hours in Second Life and in Virtual Worlds, obviously something is missing in their Real Life. That is how it was for me, and now that I have found what was missing, I can now implement these findings in Real Life. I am just concerned that for those people - that continue to spend too much time in these platforms (and then again - what constitutes too much time?) perhaps they need more assistance in Life Planning or some form of Therapy or Group Forum sessions. The funny thing is, they can now find these things in Second Life too. Weird. But who really is the person behind the avatar?! That is the question. How far deep does one choose to engage in Role Play? How easy is it to deceive and to be deceived?

   *Sigh* I love this planet. I love humanity. I just don’t want to see it become any more ‘dis’ eased than it already is.

   I’ve even gone so far as to wonder if the creation of these online games / virtual worlds is not some *hidden* global power agenda to minimize the expansive reach for creative minds that would normally impact the world on a more positive note - while and when engaging their creativity in REAL LIFE.

   Yes, I am aware that there are groups and organizations that are empowered by the meeting and *collaboration* on a 3D platform that transcends all time zones blah blah blah .. however .. I cannot dismiss this *danger* feeling that I sense intuitively. Only time will tell.

   I hope in all sincerity that the future of our societies, the future of mankind as a whole will definitely grow towards the path of “healing” and not destruction, responsibility and accountability and not insensitive, distant , unattached lack of compassion for even our next door neighbours. Think about it. We can care about people in other time zones and connect with them when we cannot even FIX the problems of our local communities. i.e. OUR FAMILIES.

   THINK PEOPLE THINK! If the family unit is the foundation of a functioning and healthy society then lets all be responsible for creating and fostering healthy family relationships before thinking of even fixing Foreign Trade Policies with other countries.

   If we cannot even empathize, understand and hold compassion for and amongst our own family members then how in the world are we expected to hold the same thoughts for different cultures.

   Uh oh.. I went off in a tangent.. but you get my drift. Thank you for allowing me to share my opinion. This is only my opinion. Please refrain from sending “hate mail”. *smiles*

   - Carmen

6. dandellion Kimban said on February 25th

   You’re on the wrong track here: WOW is a game, SL is not. SL is a platform, thus it needs and requires more flexibility.
   But, let’s go one by one….

   1) Teleportation vs. walking. Ask older residents, SL really was like that once upon a time. There were places called telehubs. Those were the only points you could TP to, the rest you had to walk or fly. That was good for community and market, but it was very annoying most of the time. Just imagine you are building something so you need textures. You don’t want to walk around and chat, you want to rezz in front of the vendor, do your shopping and get back to work. Ten minutes after you might need to go to the different location and do the same. You would pray for direct teleports. So, the Lindens opened teleporting to the any location. If you want to walk, you’re free to do so. Similarly, if you want your land to be with more people that walk around, you are free to set landing point.

   2) Flying Same as before. You are free to set your land with no flying options. I am not going to tell you that flying is very useful sometimes. Not to mention all the dragons, fairies, birds and other creatures that have wings and whose nature is to fly.

   3) Display (or better weather) settings Try building at midnight and you’ll know why this is great. Nobody forces you not to use default settings. Great thing is that nobody else is forced to use them. Actually, there is a way to enforce your weather… go to Toxian City and see how they made their dark afternoons.

   4) Opt-in physics Having all the physics enabled would destroy the world in a second. Do you really think all the builders can, know how and should do the counts of static to make their things stay in place? This is a computer graphics, not a RL simulation. And, beside that, physics is very expensive in the terms of the processing power.

   5) Altcamming Well yes… two things about this: One you can limit your view/drawing distance. Keeping it low reduces lag not only for you but for all the avatars around you. Beside that, it makes some places better looking, especially on the mainland. Second, you can see the distant things, even on the nearby sim. Yes, you can. Don’t do that if it breaks your immersion and feel of the world. But don’t tell that is an useful thing. And you have first person thing view that is useful though it could be better done and give some more control and options. More than a half of options are not accessible in 1st person view.

7. Carmen Villadar said on February 25th

   “WOW is a game, SL is not. SL is a platform, thus it needs and requires more flexibility.” - dandellion Kimban

   Oh! Good point there. I had totally forgotten to even mention that. But did you know that sadly, there are still countless SL residents that still claim that SL IS a GAME and still have not seen the potential of this platform?

   For whatever the SL Platform is to different people - the fact remains, people do have the choice on how they want to experience SL and how much of themselves they want to share with others. - Just like RL.

8. Rick van der Wal said on February 25th

   @dandellion Kimban - I am not on any track, thats what this post is about, but thank you for joining the discussion.

   I am well aware of the distinction between WoW and SL as a platform, but thats not to say the two won’t learn from each other, and very likely even merge in the future (not these 2 specifically, but look at cross over worlds like Entropia - which uses elements from both worlds). You summed up many of my thoughts pretty well on sacrificing usability for better immersion, which is exactly my point, however, to illustrate how someone might feel differently about it - here are some replies to your somewhat practical approach:

   1) I know it has been done before, but the implementation could have been a lot better by using main routes (big teleporters across large distances) and small teleporters to ‘local’ zones. Teleporting removes the sense of physical distance completely - travel, urban area’s and focus points of ‘cultivated’ land seem pretty realistic to me.

   2) Opt out isn’t the same as disabling. For the immersive experience I am describing it needs to be a hard limit otherwise its not really a limit at all.

   3) I know all this, thats not the point. Its the illusion of time and consistency to the build - which is distorted the moment you can just switch the sun on and off.

   4) External builders and importing would quickly fix the building problem - though this one is more theoretical, a what if - the point is would the immersive experience be better if it was.

   5) Again, opt out or in is not a hard limit to create this experience - which is what this is about, and yes, usability will suffer, which again, is exactly the point of this post ;)

9. Rick van der Wal said on February 25th

   Hi Carmen Villadar, thank you for your elaborate comment.

   Carmen, though somewhat off topic and philosophical, you ask one of the questions that has yet to be answered. Ray Kurzweil predicts the ‘experience economy’ - where we simply ‘plug in’ and experience anything as if its real, even closeness - because it no longer manipulates our individual sensoring tools such as eyes for seeing etc, but we are able to program this directly into our brains. In a lot of ways, exactly the same as reality does by triggering our sensory system only at the core.

   I am sure the debate on defining reality will spark long before that, and questions like yours will be answered. In the short term, escapism is only part of the reason why people join virtual worlds. Its a tool for one of the most basic human needs, communication. That didn’t change, but the way we communicate evolves constantly - personally I see no use in fearing the process of media reinventing itself.

   To learn some more about the long term, philosophical advancement of Virtuality, visit this link: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/38

10. Carmen Villadar said on February 25th

    Thank you Rick for your thoughtful reply. I will visit the link you posted. I did read Kurzweil’s book, “The Age of Spiritual Machines”? awhile back and it was this that started my brain looking at technology in yet another light.

    I love your site by the way.

    ~ Carmen

11. Rheta Shan said on February 25th

    Ah well, I suppose it all depends on what kind of expectations you bring tot the table. As Eloise pointed out, someone used to « immerse » under certain conditions quite different from Second Life will probably find the whole experience troubling and non-intuitive, but then, the reverse is true, too.

    SL is highly immersive as its stands, I don’t think anybody can seriously contest that. The ways it departs from paradigms of the atomic world (continuity of space, time, and physics) might make for a steeper learning curve, but to me it is in fact part of the platform’s immense power and potential. Curse and blessing meet in one sentence : nothing in here has to be the way you are used to.

12. Nevamonde said on February 26th

    As a world I wouldn’t say SL is all that much of an experience at all unless you meet people to take you into the fantasy. The learning curve as Rheta is very steep and I think any of the 5 options above would be a way to ease the way for gamers, but also people new to virtual worlds, in the virtual world. They who often wonder about these features - explicitly mention them when asked about their experience - sometimes they describe flight as being fun and good, sometimes it immediately turned the world into make belief while expecting realism.

    I think the people with over 1 year of Second Life are often forgetting the ‘could be’ scenario and looking to much at the ’should be’, mostly related to their knowledge of the platform and getting a little to caught up in the system. The way SL works now is fine if you’ve spend there that long, but in order to get accepted more widely, these ‘links to real life’ would certainly benefit those having trouble adjusting to this new virtual world.

    The ’sim structure’, the Teleporting, and flight are all features as designed by Linden Labs - I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see this be done different in the next big Virtual World, whichever one that might be.

13. » Realism Doesn't Make A Good Immersion - Living in the Metaverse said on February 26th

    [...] van der Wal has shared some thoughts on how second life could be more immersive. Discussion there is going nice but it also provokes [...]

14. Rick van der Wal said on February 26th

    @Rheta Shan - I really understand your summary ‘nothing in here has to be the way you are used to‘ but I can’t agree completely. Of course nothing has to be the way it’s in real life, and yet a vast majority of people choose human, or human-looking avatars.

    Why? Because it helps the immersion, makes them feel more in place. Its a link with real life - same as using clubs as social places (there is really no need for this, yet it happens everywhere), RL activities, RL architecture (a floor, 4 walls and a roof) still dominates the majority of Second Life . Its these ‘affordances’ that make you experience the warmth of a Virtual fire or know you should be able to sit on a virtual chair.

    @Nevamonde - I don’t really understand your point - the ‘could be’ or ’should be’ scenario? You mean stay stuck in the world as Linden Labs created it instead of thinking outside the box or…?

15. Eloise said on February 26th

    Sorry, but do you have any evidence that vast majority of people choose human, or human looking avatars because it helps with the immersion?

    There are a number of people who aren’t especially bothered about the immersion who choose, deliberately to look as close to RL as possible. That would tend to run counter to your assertion.

    There are a fairly large number of people who choose to look like a member of the opposite sex - surely breaking down that immersion of the familiar.

    There are a number of people who, even though of the same gender, are radically different in appearance to their RL selves. I know of several short people IRL who are enormously tall in SL, even by SL terms. I know of a tall RL person who is short in SL. There are RL wheelchair users who love the fact that they’re able to walk and fly in SL and go nowhere near a wheelchair in SL. Surely all of these things ought to cause a cognitive dissonance and decrease in immersion if your theorem is correct?

    There are a fairly large number of people who change their appearance radically on fairly frequent occasions. I’m not talking a new hair style, I’m talking height, weight, skin colour, gender etc. None of these are things we can do IRL, so how are they choosing human looking for immersion?

    To look appreciably non-human can be done, I have a dragon avatar that is quadrapedal and winged for example, but when you sign up for an account you get offered human(ish) male and human(ish) female. No option to be a quadraped, hexapod, cephalopod etc. (all of which I have seen people do in SL). You seem to assume people stay humanoid because it helps their immersion. I’m far more inclined to believe that, whilst this is true for some, it’s more a matter of laziness. “This is easy to do, being a giant squid is hard, so I’ll stay human.” Choosing to upgrade to a more attractive human is still a lazy decision.

16. Pavig Lok said on February 26th

    When it comes to immersion you will always have those in the augmentationist camp, and augmentation is one of the strengths of the VW platform. In order to _do_stuff_ augmentationists seek to bypass arbitrary rules. I certainly don’t want to be late for a business meeting due to missing a train… in VR.

    Immersion can only be created by consensus - on the mainland in SL there is little of it, but in places like Caledon it is created by the community, predominantly via social convention. Within stronger roleplaying communities in SL it is done so both through technical restrictions (such as switching avatar flight off) as well as rules of conduct. In this way there are communities in SL enjoying a more immersive experience than some folk in mmorpgs with higher technical restrictions yet less social convention. In WOW of course the builders and administrators set the rules.

    Immersion comes from the folk in worlds and is not always tied to physical restrictions within the world. Unspoken rules of conduct play a high part. Visiting a lecture in world is a prime example of this behavior. One enters a large hall and wishes to be seated but there are many people present and the speaker is talking. One could stumble along and walk to their seat, quite possibly making a spectacle of ones self in the process. One could expedite their seating to avoid interruption by breaking the rules slightly and flying to a spare seat. Or one could break the rules completely and sit target straight to the empty chair (appearing instantly and discreetly at the location as if they’d always been there).

    Amongst older SL folk the third solution is usually taken, because whilst it breaks immersion most completely, it also minimises the disruption to the immersion of others - it is the closest thing we have to discreetly sneaking off to the empty chair with a minimal amount of fuss and disruption as we would in real life.

    I must point out that most of the solutions you suggest (use of oldschool telehubs, control of physics, scripting, flying, restricted tp destinations, point to point tp etc. ) many exist already within the SL system. They are simply not often used except by estate managers - the land rental industry in SL denies this control to most renters so one doesn’t often see it thus on the mainland.

    We’ve played with estate restrictions in aid of immersion on the rezzable sims quite a lot though, and in that we aren’t unique. Whenever I’ve visited Gor (no fly, sim entry always via boat at port) I always seem to fall off the boat and spend ages finding somewhere appropriate to crawl back out of the sea. I guess you can say I’ve been fully immersed lol :P

17. Carmen Villadar said on February 26th

    Eloise, obviously there are different levels of ‘immersion’ or ‘immersive experience’ - that is obvious. But the two questions that seems to stand out here when talking about an ‘immersion’ experience are:

    1. WHAT KIND OF IMMERSION EXPERIENCE?
    2. DOES SKIN Really Matter?

    Also, an important point to note is, that while virtual worlds have been around for over a decade with studies and research having been already conducted on their possible effects etc … the fact that Second Life, Active Worlds, Entropia, Hipihi, and other more media famous platforms that are currently forefront certainly opens many fields of discussion in many areas. To say one thing is better than the other at this stage of the game is premature. We can however engage in speculation. Intelligent speculation based on our own experiences. Here are mine.

    WHAT KIND OF IMMERSION EXPERIENCE?

    If we are talking about, Real Life and a simulation of it, based on *human experience* then most of what Rick brings up is fairly reasonable. Humans in Real Life do not fly (not without using some kind of apparatus), humans cannot yet teleport from point A to point B. Apart from binoculars, telescopes and what ever military vision gadgets are out there, our vision of our surroundings is still rather limited compared to what the ‘camera view’ feature in SL gives us.

    Humans whether they be tall, short, thin, fat, blue, yellow, flat chested, big breasted, bald, long hair, in a wheelchair, man, woman whatever … they are still HUMAN.

    If people DO choose human looking avatars, and they choose to be the opposite gender, another colour perhaps to signify a different racial experience (not too sure how valid this is), people walking around in SL WITH LEGS that do not have legs in RL or who cannot walk, pregnant in SL because they cannot get pregnant in RL, use child avatars for whatever reason, choose to spend time with BDSM whatever … all these still indicate a *human experience*. Therapeutic, non-therapeutic or fantasy role-play - whatever….

    I don’t think Rick ASSUMES that people choose to be *humanoid* because it helps their ‘immersion’. We are not even sure if people actually THINK about immersion on that level. But if they do choose to be human in a virtual world and they DO want to replicate as much of their RL with SL then I too would think that they would choose to be a human avatar.

    People generally would choose a human form because .. well, they are human.

    For whatever reason people choose to be animals or any other form - not human then that is simply a choice based on anything - your guess is as good as mine.

    I wanted to have a butterfly avatar to represent FREEDOM and the upcoming Metamorphosis of my life - I had one. It was nice. But try having sex with a human avatar when you are an avatar! I have a small white cat avatar that I run around with when ever I want to be funny. Being a cat is a lot of fun - it makes me feel cute. I have two main avatars both female and both with different personalities (both mine). I have one male avatar to roam SL with so that I don’t get *hit on* by men, only to find that my male avatar gets *hit on* by women - then again, it doesn’t matter. There are gays and lesbians in SL so it really doesn’t matter what gender I choose in order to be ‘left alone’ so to speak.

    But in all my experience of donning different skins and av’s I have realized this:
    I am indeed still ‘me’. I operate and express myself through all avatars and what people experience is still “me”. It doesn’t matter what skin or avatar I take on - I do not change really. Maybe the male avatar helps bring out the masqueline side of my ’self’ but then again, I have a female avatar (that I only use now) who is rather masqueline herself despite her enormous breasts.

    So.. when talking about IMMERSION - what kind of IMMERSION? IMMERSION of REALITY states? OR? Immersion of something - that represents a greater consciousness state?

    Oh and in regards to the fact the people cannot change their height, weight, skin colour, gender etc in RL.. yes they can! Height with shoes, heels, lifts, even hairdo, Skin colour? Yes they can! Tanning beds and tanning lotions offer a much darker complexion. There are even products that bleach the skin and in respect to gender? Yes they can. Sex operations!

    2. DOES SKIN Really Matter?

    I don’t think that skin really matters? In my experience, Skin and choice of Avatar does not really matter in SL but it does in RL. That is only MY experience. And NO, I have not done research on it. Like I said, it is only my opinion and experience.

    But, in all honestly, I choose to be the HUMANOID. I choose to design and build structures and cars that I would like to live in or drive in RL. I choose to wear clothes that I would like to wear in RL and of course, I always conduct myself how I conduct myself in RL - with honestly and integrity. The ONLY things that are NOT honest about me in SL are my avatars huge breasts, the fact that I CAN construct and build large buildings in 6 hours, the fact that I can build a car that drives and the fact that I can wear stiletto heels while walking on very sandy terrain or that is what the texture on my monitor makes me think.

    With regards to your ‘laziness’ as the reason why people choose to stay human is rather quite ummm lazy thinking.

    Have you considered perhaps that maybe they are not able to create their own avatars? Maybe they are not so creatively inclined? I have a friend who is a graphic designer and programmer. He introduced me to SL. I stayed he left. He said that SL had such an enormous learning curve that he did not have the time nor the patience to learn it. Does that make me more creative or intelligent than my friend because I was able to use the build tools? As well, I am a very impatient person. I know very creative people in SL that choose to be in human form and yet they create other avatar forms. They are not lazy. Do you mean “lazy” as in “Lazy to explore the potential of their inner being?” “Lazy because they do not think outside of the box?”

    “Choosing to upgrade to a more attractive human …” cannot be a lazy decision. Do you know how much Linden dollars and shopping around to find the right skin, make up, hair etc .. it takes just to be an attractive looking human avatar? A squid is just a squid - unless you have to position its tentacles in edit mode.

    Perhaps too, people don’t feel like spending money on ‘things that are unrealistic’ things for them - unrealistic avatars that do not represent what they COULD be in RL. Or, perhaps they have furry av’s and what not in their inventory that they just did not wear that day - of have not been wearing in awhile.

    As for being a GIANT SQUID - it is far easier to be a GIANT SQUID than a human. All that giant squids SHOULD do is to stay in the water and be a squid - that or be caught and eaten. Who ever heard of a Giant Squid that could live out of water and talk via voice enabled chat or type in IM’s! AH! But in a virtual world they can!

    To be human is a whole other experience in and of itself. I don’t see how being a Giant Squid could give anyone an IMMERSIVE experience that would simulate RL. - HOWEVER, if we are talking about something of the psyche or a “greater consciousness” topic, or an experiment in self expression etc .. then, okay, I’m all for that.

    Let us first DEFINE what exactly we are talking about here. “Immersion what? Immersion of RL or Immersion of a completely other realm. Remember, there are always different levels of seeing things, just as there are different levels of understanding and perceptions.

    I love WIKI: On Immersion

    Immersion: is the state where you cease to be aware of your physical self. It is frequently accompanied by intense focus, distorted sense of time and effortless action.[1] The term is widely used to describe video games, but it is not clear if people are using the same word consistently. The term is also cited as a frequently-used buzzword, in which case its meaning is intentionally vague, but carries the connotation of being particularly engrossing.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immersion_%28virtual_reality%29

    On another note, I am thinking that without the use of Voice Enabled Chat, all the typing I do in IM’s and Chat fields REALLY DO keep me immersed. I loose sense of time, place and often space. I sit in front of my laptop pounding away at the keyboard, intently gazing at the screen as I watch the letters form into words - often typos’ from just trying to keep up with the onscreen dialogue. My back hurts, my neck aches, my eyes are strained, I forget to pee, I forget to eat I have even forgotten to sleep. If I move I realize my legs or half of my body is asleep. The pins and needles kind of sleep. Yup - I was immersed - all from simply chatting while my avatar remained sitting IN a log by a campfire (IN a log because the pose ball was not positioned right), and my camera view was looking inside the next avatars ‘head space’ - literally. But it didn’t matter where I was sitting or what view I had - I was simply immersed by the conversation itself.

    Rick’s last words from his post are:

    “I think it will be interesting to see how far we’d be willing to go to place real life limitations into a virtual setting to create immersion, what will become the priority for Virtual Worlds, and I wanted to use this post to think about the implications if an environment like Second Life would focus more on creating an immersive experience.”

    Rick, for me, in all honesty, if Second Life were to focus more on creating an immersive experience as you suggested in your outline - I know I would dislike the notion of having my avatar walk across a sim to commute from my virtual home to my virtual office (which is on the other side of the sim). I tried begging my boyfriend if I could have the parcel next to my virtual office for my virtual home. He said, “no”. (He owns the sim). I would dislike the fact that my eye sight might worsen if I had a build deadline and needed to build when it was ‘midnight’ while finishing off important details. Also, I would dislike the fact that I would not be able to build high above the sky at 500 or so meters, in private.

    I’ve gotten use to the unrealistic physics, means of vision and means of transportation that Second Life currently offers. Will it immerse me even more - I am not sure at this point. I’ll have to experience SL without its magic. I would imagine though that if SL physics were similiar to RL physics then I would probably have to go down a few cup sizes. That or buy a really good underwire bra in Second Life ;o)

18. Rick van der Wal said on February 26th

    @Eloise, of course I don’t have evidence of this - and though perhaps somewhat poorly phrased in my initial reply - I don’t mean choose as deliberately seek out a human avatar, I mean use a human avatar to represent themselves. I think gender, shape or hair color doesn’t matter, its all taken as from the real world to help them with the experience, in one way or another it’s familiar ground and directly linked to RL.

    @Pavig - Thank you for the in depth response, and I agree with you/recognize your points very well. (and am well aware of the things already in place, but the point is consistency here - I think you got that).

    Furthermore, I made a distinction between interface related immersion and content relation immersion (people and the unspoken rules are part of the content) and I certainly agree the content is are perhaps the most dominant part of an immersive experience at this moment (when compared to interface and technology).

19. Eloise said on February 26th

    Rick, I’m sorry, I don’t see how your comments follow from mine. People don’t choose to be human (although they do choose to some extent what sort of humanoid to look like). To look non-human takes effort - you have to actively search for somewhere to provide a non-humanoid body and purchase it, or be sufficiently talented at several aspects of SL to create the look for yourself.

    I wouldn’t claim to be able to judge why each person that remains human chooses to do so - it could be all of the reasons you suggest and others. The fact remains that, with some effort, whether of creation or of search and purchase they could become non-human. Some proportion of people choose to do so. Many more do not. What proportion of those that never vary from being humanoid do so because they are only comfortable as a humanoid? What proportion can’t find the centaur/unicorn/whatever they want to be (or can’t afford to be a dragon) and can’t create it for themselves, and so give up? That would be being human through one form of laziness. What proportion never consider changing and aren’t willing to explore? Another form of (potential) laziness. I could carry on…

    Rick, I guess I also have an issue with your division into interface and content immersion. You clearly regard flight, for example, as an interface issue. But, it’s a content issue if you’re a dragon, or a butterfly and you remove the ability to fly. You say teleporting removes the sense of geography. This is true. But our fiction, both fantasy and sci-fi has plenty of examples of teleporting “Beam me up, Scotty” being perhaps the most famous (if never actually said). It’s a comfortable idea in the noosphere for most humans - perhaps that’s why it doesn’t disrupt immersion for most of them too. I could carry on with this, but frankly I’m starting to doubt we’re getting anywhere: you could be right in all or part, but our points of view are too different for good communication.

20. Rick van der Wal said on February 26th

    Eloise, I think we are going to have to agree to disagree on this one ;)

    I understand your point of view , but I do not agree people would not choose to be different because they can’t find it, are lazy or be more expensive than buying a skin and hair and what not.

    For the division I’ve used abilities facilitated by the client (or Linden Labs) and abilities facilitated by the users. Flight and teleporting are facilitated by the client so I feel they are part of the interface., while the ‘unspoken rules’ as mentioned by Pavig and the community are part of the content.

21. dandellion Kimban said on February 26th

    Teleporting (and flying) doesn’t kill the sense of space unless you allow them to. Come to Extropia to see. We do have teleports there, just as the rest of the grid, but so many times you can see people walking, flying or driving vehicles. Last night, i wanted to move to the other spot on the sim. I jumped over the fence on 240m altitude, a bit before I would crash the ground I PgUped and started flying in the first person view and went straight into the room I wanted. Then I TPed Argent to the place. (I was damn proud of my skills) That is a pretty nice pile of the things I will never see in “reality” but none of them broke my immersion. We could jump in my space flighter and drive there, but I am bad at talking while I drive so it would kill the conversation, so why doing it? It is the same as Pavig’s example with taking the empty seat at the event. It is against reality, but it is the least damaging to the immersion.

    Hard limit as opposed to opt-out is an unacceptable proposal. Sorry, but limits that you need to keep your immersion may be limiting to the creativity of some other residents. The same goes for weather settings. Just stop playing with those sliders and your sense of time will be ok. But some of us might need different light for the photograph, or for building or for playing the RP scene. And, last but no way the least, some residents are changing estate time according to the part of the day in their first lives. mostly because to support the immersion.

    I agree that external building tools would be a great thing to have. Still we need in-world tools as well.

    Nevamonde, I agree that some people in their first days can have a bit of hard time adjusting to world that looks a lot different than meatspace. But, that is the reason help islands and welcome areas are so alike the meatspace.

    About immersing in non-humans… it can be hard. I found it very hard recently to immerse in my developing male avatar. If I didn’t want (and I obviously didn’t) just to do the same story with a different mesh, I had to connect to the new avatar, to start thinking and feeling as would that black-skin young men who just came from a long trip. And then come squids… yes, they, as far as we know and can imagine, just dive in the seas of the planet Earth, but I guess that is not much for a creative resident of SL. Maybe checking myths of ancient Greeks could help giving some pictures about lives of squids that can talk and think. But that and our starting avatars deserves a whole post.

22. Rick van der Wal said on February 26th

    We are going to do this dance all the way trough aren’t we dandellion :P you saying I propose this, disregarding the fact I merely present the choices between better usability options or deeper RL connections or and ask whether this would result in better immersion. Its just a detail so I don’t mind that much, but it would help you understand my point of view better if you knew none of these suggested counter ‘rules’ would seem like either a good thing or a bad thing to me, its what my original article is about - the balance between immersion and usability.

    Also I didn’t suggest no Teleporting as I point out in one of the comments above (and I’ve been to Extropia more then once already, great sim!), I suggested a way of transportation (including teleporting hubs) which allows a sense of relative distance (traveling).

23. dandellion Kimban said on February 26th

    Sure we are going to do this dance. There is a nice discussion at three blogs and we are all (hopefully) gaining new insights.

24. Rick van der Wal said on February 26th

    Haha you know what I mean, I don’t mean the discussion itself, I really enjoy it and like how you’ve joined in - meant the point about making it seem like I specifically advocate these things to be implemented, which is not the issue whatsoever,but okay, back to your blog for a reply…

25. Immersionism and Augmentation | Digado said on March 3rd

    [...] inconclusive it, raised a number of questions I’ve been running into over the course of the Usability Versus Immersion debate as well. The Immersionists were given voice by blogger Gwyneth Llewellyn and Extropia Core [...]

26. Mistermr said on March 11th

    I find it weird that there are two seperate camps. its that american thing happening….this need to beblack and white. I dont think the article writer
    is expressing the views of a real gamer.. it just doesn’t sound like it..liar.

    Second LIfe is unfriendly and the navigation sucks.

    But baically, second life is unfriendly. I am a OG gamer AND an
    OG Vr dude and its only with second life do we see such
    a huge divergence…. the gays and the straights.

    i cant stand second life…. but Im kinda over shooting at everything
    all the time too.

27. Mistermr said on March 11th

    I think its truly geeky to define these distinctions. The Geeks are comingout…uhg.

28. Suzanne Aurilio said on March 14th

    Love your post! Gonna continue the conversation on our space. Any convincing you to change the color scheme of your blog, it’s amazingly hard on the eyes :).

29. Galatea said on March 15th

    I have to say, most of your suggestions for “improving” immersion would actually kill it for me. The fundamental premise that immersion vs. usability are antagonistic is not simply wrong, but actually the complete reverse of the way things are. One cannot be immersed in a world while struggling with the controls — one achieves immersion when all that fades away. Impediments to usability are impediments to immersion. Of course, having great usability doesn’t ensure immersion either, but a lack of it is an immersion-killer. Nor does any usability improvement necessarily improve immersion. But there’s no balance to be found, and no sacrifice to made in one over the other, one just needs to make sure you don’t step on the toes of immersion by making things difficult to use.

30. Rick van der Wal said on March 15th

    @Suzanne - Thank you! Color scheme stays until I find something better I’m afraid, I like how it’s a little different than the usual lay-outs ;)

    @Galatea - Interesting opinion. Are you saying you are unaware of concessions already in place to stimulate immersion by enhancing or enforcing affordances? The point is not whether these help or not - its how many we are willing to use in order to create stronger connections in our mind to actually ’shift places’, going under in virtuality.

    No one needs a a roof, yet 99% of the SL buildings has one. Why? Because thats how we recognize ‘private space’, personal, owned terrain, so our mind is able to translate this bunch of 3D objects into something meaningful in the immersion - though looking strictly technical - a roof in SL is just a clumsy limitation. It won’t rain, or keep thieves out.

31. Suzanne Aurilio said on March 15th

    Interesting conversation.
    I’m missing a grounding point akin to clarifying what we each mean by immersion. Rick is clearly talking from a design, interface design, HCI, built-system angle. His points are well formulated and I think right on.

    I heard from others, in so many words, what’d I think are the emotional, psychologically based angles. Yes I agree, SL is emotionally and psychologically immersive for the most part, that is for persons who want to relate to others in fairly unstructured (and sometimes structured) ways. I could even substitute the term “immersed” with “involved” and be quite happy. Being deeply involved with people renders the environmental flaws trivial. However, case in point, I’m usually deeply involved with people via texting, and the interface of texting, which is relatively unproblematic in SL.

    Immersion and involvement are both impacted greatly by the confluence of game/non-game structures and elements of the total environment. To compare WOW with SL is an apples and oranges thing. I’ve never been in WOW, and I find myself getting easily bored in SL at times too when it doesn’t fill the emotional need I go there with. Those are my entertainment-based 2 cents.

    My professional 2 cents: Formal Learning (institutions, curriculum, courses, etc) in SL is even more problematic because of loosely formulated understandings of these very issues. Few educators and only a few more instructional designers have hashed out these issues. This becomes apparent when you look at how and why SL is applied in the service of teaching and learning. The concepts get lumped into a generically applied one known as “engagement.” A lot of pedagogically important conceptual corners are cut as a result.

32. Rick van der Wal said on March 15th

    Excellent reply Suzanne -

    Virtual worlds have the ability to visualize information in rich presentations, accurately simulate processes and allow training/learning trough visualization and interaction with the information that would usually be hard to grasp (nano scale, distance between planets, molecular movement). Of course this is strictly speaking from the ‘education as a information tool’ point of view, while schools also provide a social service in interaction with other human beings.

33. Ceceliava said on March 19th

    nice work, guy

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