Last week, the virtual world Second Life was contending with a rogue program that copies all it touches; this week parent company Linden Lab has to fight back against golden rings that do damage to your computer if your avatar touches them. Yesterday the official Second Life blog reported, “An attack of self-replicators is causing heavy load on the database, which is in turn slowing down in-world activity. We have isolated the grey goo and are currently cleaning up the grid. We’ll keep you updated as status changes. ” As a Slashdot reader noted, “Linden Lab had to invoke martial law and lock out all logins by users except their staff as they began the task of cleaning the servers of what they began to term ‘the grey goo.’” That might have been a bit dramatic, as it appears as if the problem was solved within an hour. As we wrote here last week, the popularity of Second Life has made it a tempting target for troublemakers and worse. Even with “martial law” on their side how long before Second Life residents begin to feel that their virtual escape looks depressingly like the real world?
—Virtual games have to deal with bullies and creeps even when they’re not yet superpopular. Back in 2003, when I was editing a short-lived newsletter for videogame executives, I spent some time with Linden Lab founder Philip Rosedale. He had just learned that one particular player was harrassing others, so he found that player in the game, trapped the player in a ball, and wouldn’t let the player out until he received a promise that the player would play nice from now on. That approach worked when Second Life was new and young. Will Linden Lab be able to maintain control now that it’s big business?