Second Life has swept the world. As of 2011, there are more than 20 million registered accounts on Second Life. The online virtual reality is just that – virtually a 3-D reality. Residents socialize, explore, participate in activities, shop and trade virtual property and services with one another, according to the Wikipedia. Read more details about Second Life, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_life.

Many virtual worlds have what is called a virtual economic system with virtual currency. In Second Life currency is called the Linden Dollar. Residents are able to buy anything from clothing to cars to property. Anshe Chung was the first to become a millionaire by flipping real estate in the virtual world in 2007.

I became first aware of Second Life through an episode of the MTV show, “True Life: I Live another Life on the Web”. Check out a clip from the episode to see the extreme side of virtual realities, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THM16t5Cm_4.

Second Life dealt with child online security by making a 3-D virtual world just for teens called Teen Second Life. There is no beating levels or goal of winning in Second Life; it is more about social interaction. The Social Media Bible says the true intent of virtual worlds is for people to explore, learn, interact, do business, meet and make friends.

Companies like Dell, IBM, Armani, BMW, CISCO and Coca-Cola are doing business through Second Life. If big corporations have jumped on the Second Life bandwagon it is a logical conclusion that there is money to be had for companies in virtual worlds. A company merely having a presence in virtual worlds helps build a brands recognition.

The idea of virtual worlds has been around since the late 1960s. Virtual reality was introduced to the public by a system called SenSei was the first to be commercially available and was created to help severely disabled people access the environment around them. The original SenSei operating system code and hardware are credit as the first computer to save a human life.