Customer Reviews

The Second Life Grid: The Official Guide to Communication, Collaboration, and Community Engagement

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Anyone serious about doing something serious in Second Life really should read this book. It's thousands of dollars worth of consulting for the cover price!

Virtual pioneers from industry, academia, government and non-profit institutions who may be fighting an uphill battle for funding will find plenty of evidence here that others are doing cutting edge research, development, experimentation -- and even communication, collaboration and community engagement in the serious sectors known as The Second Life Grid.

Unfortunately you often see a new organization setting up in Second Life with unrealistic, uninformed project plans... and then they wonder why their wonderful creation is not living up to expectations. The best advice for anyone developing a project in SL is to get an account and log in, explore around. Understand the medium, if only as a semi-competent user. The book is an excellent tour guide to the interesting areas on the grid. After you've done at least that much, the fine points, funny stories and excellent practical advice will make a great deal more sense to you. It's the essential guide to making a success of your serious project.

Just to be clear, being serious does not mean you're not supposed to have fun. If you're not having fun, you're not using the platform right. So, if you are contemplating spending my tax dollars or non-profit donations to develop a project in Second Life, please read this book!

The book is touted as explaining how to use or function in Second Life. Careful readers who have been following Second Life for several years, and have read other books on it may note the following. This book doesn't play up [much] the use of Second Life for doing business. The sections about it are relatively restrained compared to books of just 2 or 3 years ago.

The bloom is well off the Second Life rose.

If you want to use it for an educational context, then the book can have some merit. But just don't be a company looking to set up a storefront. The book's advice about how to do this is accurate, but the business rationale is now very dubious.