My First Visit to Openlife

I spent some time in Openlife today.

Openlife is a virtual world built on OpenSim, the open-source version of Second Life.

Like Second Life, it’s free to join. Like Second Life, you can buy land and start building.

The Openlife client looks and feels like Second Life, but without all of the places and Inventory content of Second Life.

The top snapshot shows my avatar, the default female often called a “Ruth.” (I didn’t have much luck modifying her, other than putting on an Openlife t-shirt.)

I wandered around and found a nice art gallery on a place called Petrona (middle snapshot).

And I was able to create an object and put a photo of Trigger on it (bottom snapshot).

Overall, an interesting experience.

(I didn’t realize how I accustomed I am to the stuff in my Second Life Inventory and to freebie stores until I arrived in Openlife without anything!)

What struck me about visiting Openlife is the obvious point that when you leave Second Life and go to an open-source version, you have to “bring your own fun with you”: you have to build your own stuff, tell your friends to join, etc. You don’t have the context and resources of what’s already built in Second Life.

Of course what IBM and others are doing are using to OpenSim software on their own servers to create their own private virtual worlds.

The open-source movement will of course have huge implications for virtual worlds as it grows.

Tagged as: Openlife, virtual worlds