Second Life

Second Life is a virtual 3D world used for socializing, creating, selling, educating... whatever you can think of.

• visitors navigate the site through the use of a surrogate, or avatar, which represents them in Second Life's virtual space. Avatars can walk, fly (teleport), or move about in simulated motorized transport
• Second Life was launched June 23, 2003
• 15 million people have signed up for the service; the number of simultaneous users is around 68,000. (read interview with Linden Lab CEO Mark Kingdon)
• Second Life uses an internal currency called the Linden Dollar, which is convertible to real-life currency
  
• land is initially sold by Linden Labs, but residents can buy, sell, and rent land from each other. There is also a thriving business community on Second Life.

A promotional piece put out by Second Life that describes the educational possibilities of the site: Educational uses of second life

A real-life example of Second Life being used for training: Border Guard Training

An example of using Second Life for K thru 12: Global Kids Science

A video primer about commerce in Second Life: Doing Business in Second Life

My favorite YouTube video about Second Life: Thriller


Additional Resources:

Web:
Second Life Bookmarks on Delicious
Second Life Educational Wiki

Video:
What is Second Life? (has low production values, but is probably the best representation of what the user experience is really like)
Hong Kong PolyU (a site largely for teaching hospitality industry skills)
Second Life lawsuit (about a law suit six Second Life merchants are bringing against another vendor for selling virtual product knock-offs)
The L Word Promo (television interacts with Second Life. Also see CSI)
Virtual Sex in Second Life (a network news piece, but shows a side of Second Life that would also be available to young learners using the site)