The Alphaville Herald

Avatar of the Year, 2nd Place: The Unverified

by Pixeleen Mistral on 31/12/06 at 1:59 pm

As we ice the Veuve Clicquot in preparation for this evening’s revels – none of the Moet crap for us – the Herald Editorial board continued our deliberations about whether the Scottish smoked salmon should be placed in cat food bowls on the floor for the Neko or on plates on the table for the people – and what if the Goreans show up again? Denise Levertov – one of the interns – suggested we split the difference and serve champagne in bowls on the floor for everyone. Knowing how this crowd laps up the sauce that is probably the most sensible choice – and Gideon Television will certainly feel more comfortable on the floor once the new year’s gunfire starts. Gideon? Remember to wear your formal flack jacket outfit, OK?

After circumventing this culinary crisis, we returned to our word processors as the champagne chills, taking a few minutes from vital end-of-the-year preparations to to acknowledge the runner up in our avatar of the year competition.

Last year, Anshe Chung took second place in the highly regarded avatar of the year awards – setting the stage for her triumphant modeling career with appearances on the cover of noted fashion magazines such as Business Week. We understand Anshe also continued dabbling in virtual real estate between her modeling gigs. Still, the question remained – who had made the second most significant impact on our world this year? The choice was obvious to the judges, as we name the Unverified residents the winners of second place in the Avatar of the Year awards.

The Unverified saga started when Linden Lab changed its account creation policy on 06/06/06, dropping requirements that established a connection between a real world person and a Second Life account. Accounts without billing information on file – or unverified accounts – appear to have been a key to Second Life’s increased growth since June because these accounts required little commitment from metaverse tourists – an important feature for a game that has a steep learning curve and at best a 10% retention rate. However, many paying customers wondered why they ought to subsidize the tourists who have very limited ways to earn money – yet consume server and bandwidth resources all the same. With around 40,000 subscription-paying “premium” accounts at year end, class wars continue between the Unverified masses and the subscription fee paying elite.

Interclass strife is partly caused by suspicions that trouble makers are using throwaway accounts for griefing. These accounts became trivial to create in the unverified era. Still, the metaverse’s merchants smile as “new” alt accounts accessorizes avatars with appropriate arms – and repeats the cycle again after being abuse reported and banned from Second Life. An ugly meta-game for some residents is claiming to know the identity of unverified alternate accounts of other players – and using these claims to punish the alleged owners of the alt accounts based on evidence that consist of intuition or suggestions of secret evidence provided by Linden staffers. In many ways the free unverified accounts have taken the masquerade ball drama of Second Life to the next level as hearsay-based witch hunts move through communities under the guise of “punishing griefing”.

Beyond concerns about griefing, those who indulge in cybersex – particularly ageplay – experience an added frisson of excitement as they wonder if they might perhaps be dealing with the real thing – rather than an adult pretending to be a child. This issue led to demands for ways to differentiate between different classes of residents.

In response to citizen concerns, Linden Lab added several new features to the the world to make it easier to automatically script discrimination between avatars based on their billing status – but in spite of strong resident sentiment against continuing the Unverified “experiment”, Linden Lab seems happy with the course it has chosen – so resident quantity seems more important than quality.

Ironically, because of poor customer database design – with the help of some hackers – Linden Lab encouraged even more unverified account creation in early September when un-named hackers gained access to the customer database requiring all users to choose new passwords – and possibly threatening the security of the billing information on file for the verified accounts. This episode lowered confidence in the Lab’s security and was unlikely to inspire many to share their credit card with Linden Lab.

an Unverified ex-governor and ex-presidental candidate

Despite the PR handicaps they labor under – the Unverified residents have made many important positive contributions to society – as a source of low cost labor, camp chair sitters, and as a vehicle for politicians such as Governor Mark Warner to show themselves as the salt of the earth which he did when appearing in the metaverse running an unverified account. Perhaps most importantly, the Unverified distinguished themselves early on by serving as caddies at golf courses around SL, an indispensable service for duffers such as Philip Linden – though we hear Philip tips poorly.

So while they are sometimes greeted with scorn, tonight we at the Herald will raise a glass – or lower a cat food bowl to the ground – in celebration of the Unverified accounts. Now will someone get that Neko off the table and away from the salmon, please?