Second Life vs. Facebook- a Media Characteristic Face-off

“Computers are transforming work, and in some cases, lives.” (Kiesler, Siegel,& McGuire, 1994, p. 1123) Second Life’s media characteristics have transformed the norms for social networking. While participating in Second Life’s virtual work, you can communicate in a format similar to face-to-face with others. You can do this by having normal flowing conversations and having the resources available to use nonverbal cues, such as

waving, shaking your head or even blowing kisses. These attributes make Second Life high in media richness. While face-to-face interaction is at the top of the list in order of media richness, the researchers that made the media richness descriptions probably did not even imagine the new phenomenon of Second Life. “In Traditional forms of communication, head nods, smiles, eye contact, distance, tone of voice, and other nonverbal behavior give speakers and listeners information they can use to regulate, modify, and control exchanges.” (Kiesler, Siegel, &McGuire, 1995, 1125) Second Life has the capabilities that normal face-to-face communication has, including immediate responses and the use of non verbal cues, which in some cases is immediately responsive as well. For example, when you type in goodbye in Second Life, it automatically waves goodbye to the person you were communicating with.

Self-presentation also has a place within social networks. In Second Life you are creating a thought out image, which may be intended to attract a certain demographic or get a certain response to your image. The option to ‘edit’ yourself is also something that could be taken into consideration, even though your real self might not resemble your Second Life self, you have the option to choose what your Second Life self looks like, and that shows a bit about you, the user. Facebook, which is another social network which we will be comparing Second Life to, you make your own page for all of your friends to see. With this you can premeditated the responses you give, only showing a certain side of yourself that you want others to see, what you think will attract others to becoming your friend.

Comparing these to social networks, there are many differences. Second Life has become a sub-world, there are the options to travel to places, watch sporting events, purchase goods, go to libraries, and seek employment opportunities at a select number of businesses that are in the real world as well. Where Facebook is a social network more geared towards meeting people through profiles, combined groups and a common school or location.

The advantages of Second life compared to Facebook are geared more towards social aspects. Second Life lets you meet people from all over the world, you can see differences in the language being used, the groups others have joined and sometimes even with the difference of clothing being worn. Because Facebook started as a social network where the prerequisite was a college e-mail, it seems the majority of Facebook users are college-aged, who live in the United States. Second Life, as the title describes, can be a double life from your own, this means that there are things to ‘do’ on the network, the network is programmed to make the user interact with the site as well as communicate with others.

The advantages we stated can also be reviewed in a negative way. On Second Life you do not have to option to ‘browse’ for people that would be geographically close to you, you meet people from all over the world but do not have the option to just seek people that are closer by. Facebook lets you search for people, so you can find people that you go to school with, or look for people that you have things in common with. Because of this, you have a better chance of meeting someone through Facebook and continuing that relationship outside of the social network rather than you do with Second Life. Another disadvantage that comes up with second life is that you do not have privacy from other users, anyone can come up to you and start talking to you, saying whatever they please, whether it be appropriate or not, Facebook lets you have the privacy settings in your control.

While the two have very different aspects of social networking, they have joined together and there is now a Beta application available that integrates your Second Life profile into Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=10242435556). This allows Second Life users to find other Second Life users based upon region and other information, combining both worlds. It also allows you to add your Second Life character to your friend list, and add your real friends Second Life characters as to it as well.