After joining Second Life nearly a month ago as a poor citizen with the name of Duderino Doobie, I have spent almost zero time on it. And it's not because I've been so busy that there is no time to explore my second life, but rather that I don't think it's very entertaining. Okay great, I can fly around and mingle with people. But frankly I think it's kinda stupid and clunky from a user's perspective.
With that said, I'm still very fascinated by everything that goes on with second life and other global online communities. Whether it's the bank runs or the severe drop in Second Life's USD spend - I'm hooked.
That's why I was quite entertained when I flipped through the ODNI's (Office of the Director of National Intelligence) declassified report on data mining to Congress earlier this February. Most notably the sections on their project named Reynard which is designated with the goal of "automatically detecting suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world". My favorite part:
The cultural and behavioral norms of virtual worlds and gaming are generally unstudied. Therefore, Reynard will seek to identify the emerging social, behavioral and cultural norms in virtual worlds and gaming environments. The project would then apply the lessons learned to determine the feasibility of automatically detecting suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world.Wow. An economy. Bank runs. Terrorism. Who would have every guessed that something like Second Life would have ever taken this turn?
