Joe Essid directs the Writing Center at the University of Richmond, where he teaches courses in writing and literature. He is a Richmond native who attended the University of Virginia and earned a Master's and PhD at Indiana University. His research interests include technology in the classroom and Southern literary humor. His academic writing has appeared in Computers and Humanities, The Writing Lab Newsletter, and anthologies about technology and writing. He is a contributor to Style Weekly and has appeared in Eighty One and RVA. Ignatius Onomatopoeia is the "avatar" who represents Joe in the game-world Second Life. Ignatius will be wandering the virtual terrain of Second Life while his creator writes here about what may be either "the next big thing" for the Internet or the latest darling of the cyber-hip... the reader can decide.
E-mail contact: jessid@mac.com | Web address: writing2.richmond.edu/jessid

by Dianna Defiant, Guest Writer
Location: Our Virtual Advice Desk

Dear Di:

What’s the etiquette in Second Life for letting your friends know that you are online? Should I keep that little box checked so friends get that notice when I come online or leave? Or will that be an annoyance?  I feel terrible sometimes when I fail to say hello to every friend on my list, because I know that they saw me come in-world.

Yours,

Guilt-Ridden

Dear Guilt-Ridden:

Wow - you must have way more friends than I do ...

Here’s the thing about SL. They can see you’re online & you can see they are online - so it’s a two-way street. Now let’s assume that not everyone is glued to their SL screen - a lot of people will not notice the pop up announcing your arrival, so they won’t even know you are on. And when you log on, unless you make the effort to look at your list, you won’t know who’s on either. The general rule of life (any life) is that people are WAY more concerned about themselves than they are about you. So if you don’t say “hi” to someone one day I doubt they will lose much sleep over it. Anyway - here’s my system in SL: I say hi to my online friends but I ALWAYS ask them right off if they are busy. If they say they are I say ‘ok IM me later if you want’. And if someone IM’s me and I am busy I also tell them.

And another thing - if you uncheck the box and never let anyone see when you are on, they might assume you don’t want to be contacted and that’s what you’ll get. Be honest with people and respect their time and others will do the same to you. Or - you can get friends in all different time zones so everyone is not on all at once

XXOO
Di

Questions for Di?  Iggy will forward them to her! E-mail iggyo -at- mac -dot- com

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