The Los Angeles branch of ABC ran a story on the romantic relationships people have in Second Life. Second Life is a video game experience where much of the “experience” comes from the development of the players. Thus, there is a whole second virtual world linking many people who never would have met otherwise inside a Linden Lab’s servers.

Some, like Michael Rossi, fell hard for someone, but the relationship was never made fruitful. At least one person (and I’m sure there are many more stories like this) managed to come out wonderfully:

In Detroit, Teasa Coprue got engaged for real. “You can be more you because, who cares? They can’t see you so a lot of people can be more honest.”

Dr. Julie Albright has been researching on-line relationships for the past 12 years, and she says one of the main problems is this:

A fantasy that can burst after you find your digital soul mate is married, or … “Gee they have an anger problem, I didn’t see that online,” says Albright.

Interestingly enough, the article also said that Second Life could keep current relationships together if the couple was separated by something like the war in Iraq.

In my opinion, these things could go either way. Yes, you could be hurt, but yes, you could also find your soulmate through a rather unorthodox mean. I’m interested to know if any of you have met someone they love over Second Life, or had an awful experience. Please e-mail me about it.

Posted on November 10th, 2006 by Joy
Filed under: Love, technology