InformationWeek

Ida Keen showed me the house she created in Second Life. It's loosely based on a house her grandmother lived in, on a canal in Florida. Here we're on the screened porch of the house -- look at the terrific view through the screen. Ida is the Second Life pseudonym of one of the players -- they're called "residents" in SL. You're looking at her avatar.

Another view of Ida's house. That's me -- or, rather, my avatar, Ziggy Figaro -- with my back to the camera.

Another view of the screen porch.

The Nantucket area of Second Life. An area of Second life is called a "sim".

Anshe Chung, who claims to be the first real-world millionaire who made her fortune by doing business in Second Life. She made her fortune mainly by buying and selling land inside SL, and by designing and selling buildings on that land.

Interviewing Anshe Chung in her offices.

Another view of me and Anshe.

Times Square is another sim in SL. It's still under construction. This is me, walking toward the exit of a subway station. Notice that the creators have already added littter, for that realistic, Big Apple touch. That just cracks me up. I'm eager to see what the creators do with this sim once it's built.

Times Square. Notice the steam rising from the sidewalk vent on the left.

That's me, flying above Times Square. This is one of the last photos I took for this gallery. By then, I figured out that photos look better if you see the face, rather than the back, of the avatar. And I got some new threads, and fixed up my face and hair.

Aerial view of the Times Square sim.

Spaceport Alpha, a popular educational sim containing life-size replicas of real-life rocket ships and other spacecraft. That's me flying in front of a few rockets.

Notre Dame de Caffeine, a replica of a real-world French Cathedral that our sister publication, Doctor Dobb's Journal, uses as its in-world headquarters. That's me and John , a friend from DDJ, standing on the labyrinth. Underneath the labyrinth is an Olympic-sized swimming pool and a vampire crypt. Because no cathedral-slash -- office is complete without an Olympic swimming pool and a vampire crypt.

This outdoor tent, in front of the cathedral, is the Doctor Dobb's laboratory, where the staff is testing the properties of virtual objects.

Elf Harbour, a fantasy sim in Second Life for fans of Lord of the Rings and books and movies like that. Once, when passing through a sim like this, I overheard a scrap of conversation: "By your leave, my lady, I must away to Real Life."

IBM has a large, elaborate area in Second Life. It includes the yacht Palmisano.

A collaboration project in IBM. The thing behind me, that looks like a molecular model, is a three-dimensional diagram of a business workflow. Business managers (or their avatars) can fly through the diagram, examine and discuss in realtime.

Amsterdam, one of the biggest, most popular, and visually most beautiful areas in Second Life, sold this week on eBay for $50,000 US.

Amsterdam is unusually cohesive for a such a large "sim," or area in Second Life. Often, sims that large are created by many people in a patchwork of conflicting styles.

Sex is the business of Amsterdam, with streetwalker avatars soliciting business. They hang around near the train station.

Second Life -- Amsterdam

Second Life -- Amsterdam