Stage 1. Initial Exploration

It starts for many different reasons. Some come asked by their boss either to see what is going on here or because they have a virtual office in-world, some others because they read of it somewhere, others by recommendations by friends and in that way we come for many different reasons.

I came in because I gave myself a free afternoon and decided it was time I checked this place that had heard so much about. A guy by the name Negroponte was giving a speech at an important venue and he said: "Just check what is going on on virtual communities like Second Life..." Oh boy I bought the trap.

It starts awkwardly, in my days just under a year ago, you could choose an initial form of many types, human, furries and some strange like space ghost with no face. After that you visit some sort of "island" or area that serves the purpose of training and when you feel ready to use your new body you start your voyage into the virtual world or metaverse, the areas are divided by island, surely to be operated by servers but who knows.

I was one of those nerds that actually read most of the TOS (Terms of Service), I knew I was going into something that had a strange taste of apocalyptic, or at least a bit dark as it was to be proven soon.

As a new avatars you don't have a house, some of the 1st places you visit have the attribute of being programmed as your starting point. Hence a place that offered a tour of the Linden Labs in world office and houses became my home, this is the way many of us make first friends, honestly all looks amazing, shiny, sometimes spectacular and sometimes magical.

Specially for those like me that were not familiar to WoW or on-line gaming -I used an on-line place for a few weeks years ago and it was only text back then (booooring)!- So this was a dream come true. Imagine meeting people, places and actually seeing them and interact using a virtual world!

The idea is great and this is why this places are so fantastic. We addicts are not stupid people, just fell unprepared to a wonderful thing. Truly a technical wonder. I don't have pictures of this very first days and thankfully so because my creation or my on-line "persona" had square head and very ugly hair.

After a nice person helped me with my shape, hair and directed me towards some of the freebie places, clothes and basic items that you need not to look too goofy. Then as I started exploring using the map, that's when I feel trough the rabbit hole but I was already hooked badly.