Feb 8, 2007 01:00 PM
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San Francisco, 4:11 PM
Tue Feb 9
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Wagner James Au asks just how much of Second Life commercial activity is sexual. Let's set aside — for now — the awkward ludicrousness of SL sexuality to entertain Au's notion that the vast majority of SL content is actually nonsexual, even in sexual venues. However, Au is so liberal in defining nonsexual content that his classification of the sexual becomes incredibly narrow.
For example, Au contends that in a Second Life strip club, only the dancers' bodies, costumes, and undulations may be construed as sexual. All the window dressing — the furniture, setting, building, even the improperly sized currency — could be used in Second Life for something else, and thus are not sexual in nature. This seems a little willfully naive, or else designed to make Second Life seem like less of a carnal bazaar by defining sex content down to a tiny category. It's not like anyone would wander around Stacey Sugar's Barbie Club if it was just a big room with some chairs and dollar bill graphics lying around. Au doesn't even want to give the genitals over to sexuality, as doing so assumes "that wearing genitals is only for sexual expression." What else would they be for? Reproduction?
There are numerous sexplay areas in Second Life, and even more escort services which have no function besides the prostiutional. Since SL areas can be sorted and classified by "mature" ratings, it would seem a simple matter for Linden Labs to simply track the total traffic (and perhaps Linden dollar exchanges) in such areas. Of course, perfectly innocent transactions might take place in such areas, but chances are the data would indicate generally how big of a commercial draw sex really is for Second Lifers. I doubt Linden would release such information though. I'm guessing the percentage would be substantial, and perhaps not the kind of press Linden particularly wants.
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