3pointD.com

Journalist Noche Kandora, known in Second Life as Cheri Horton, has been on an interesting quest in recent weeks: to create an avatar that mimics her real-life appearance as closely as possible. “Users also have the option of purchasing ‘skins’ that can add an original dimension to an avatar’s image,” Kandora writes in this blog post (which is not necessarily safe for work). “What I plan to do now is replicate my real-life likeness and use it as my new avatar skin.” (Image lifted from Kandora’s site, apogeevr.com.)

Kandora’s quest continues here, where she ponders whether matching one’s virtual appearance to one’s real one may be “a wave of the future inside Second Life and other similar environments.” I think it definitely will be, not for everyone, but for a significant portion of virtual world residents. I’d even lay odds that that the fantasy element of Second Life — the fact that you can reify, or at least “virtualize,” whatever fantasy your heart desires — is something that keeps away as many people as it brings in. (One thing that’s interesting about Kandora’s self-appointed task is that she wants her SL avatar to be more real in order to better fulfill a virtual life many would consider a fantasy: “I think there’s a lot to be said for photorealism when you want to engage in adult sexual experiences in virtual surroundings, as well as other simulated activities that seek to evoke real-life physicality,” she writes.)

I’d wager there’s a large cohort of potential users who might feel the same way, who aren’t interested in becoming “someone else” online, but who would be very interested in being themselves — with their own name and their own appearance. It’s the logical extension of “immersion,” the state of being in which your avatar ceases to be an entity separate from yourself and becomes merely an online extension of your offline being.

When Linden Lab brings special guests like Richard Bartle into their world to give a talk or whatnot, they kit them out with avatars that resemble their offline selves and which bear their real names. It would be great if those of us who wanted one could get an avatar with our real name on it, and I’d argue it would drive adoption.