Infopirate.org

Gartner, of the famous Hype Cycle, released news out of their Gartner Symposium/ITExpo:2007 going on through tomorrow, that they are predicting 80% of active Internet uses will have some kind of a second life in a virtual world by 2011....

Europeans now make up the largest block of residents of the 3-D virtual world, Second Life, with more than 54 percent of active users in January ahead of North America’s 34.5 percent, according to new Linden Lab data.

Has the public hype about Second Life reached a peak, with a backlash looming?

Hate virtual worlds but want to increase your interactivity? Enter Lively by Google, a new social networking application and 3-D chat platform designed to integrate easily into websites, web browsers and blogs --and then some. With Lively even novice users can create virtual worlds or join another's habitat in the form of an avatar. Like most Google technology, Lively is relatively easy to learn and more powerful than it appears at first blush. Further, in this staycation economy, what better time for a little exploration of the new Google Lively virtual world?

AMSTERDAM, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Virtual enactments of child pornography in virtual worlds like Second Life may be a crime under Dutch law if it encourages child abuse, the public prosecutor said on Wednesday.Some Second Life users participate in “age play,” in which they can create child-like avatars and have virtual sex that would be [...]