Having been a longtime resident of the virtual world of Second Life I looked forward to see how a feature length documentary would treat Second Life and those that are a part of it. Too often in the past, the media has taken quick peeks at it and have featured the bad. Unfortunately, Jason Spingarn-Koff followed along with past media treatments and gave us yet another ugly-side-only look at SecondLife with content that could have been fit into a 10-minute Dateline segment.
The media treatment of Second Life is that it is filled with adulterers, pedophiles and con artists. Sure, there are many of each in Second Life however the average person is someone who enjoys chatting with friends, going to virtual clubs and exploring incredible spaces built by some of the most talented people in the online world. Do we get to see any of that? No. Besides most of the footage being extremely dated (how long was post-production?) way too much time is wasted exploring the fate of the few subjects portrayed and not enough on what is promoted as the premise of the film -- living in the virtual world.
Mr. Spingarn-Koff squandered a wonderful opportunity to explore the parallels and those things that are unique to each world. The content played into the hands of those who think any encounter online is evil and anyone who talks to you in the virtual world is either a loner or a criminal. Extremely disappointing.
