ABSTRACT
Over the last decades, information and communication technologies (ICTs) have had an important effect on people’s daily lives. Today, many individuals view being connected to the Internet as something indispensable. Some Internet tech - nologies, such as web browser tools, instant messaging, blogs, and social network applications have acquired a more central role in spheres such as work, business, education, culture, research, public service, leisure, and interpersonal relations. This chapter examines a particular application: the Internet-based three-dimensional (3-D) virtual world (VW) of Second Life (SL). SL is an online environment where users located across the globe can connect, interact, and exchange goods and services created by them in this virtual environment, and it has proven to have applications and advantages that benefit many different fields. However, as a relatively new technology, it also brings with it numerous challenges to consider and to analyze. This chapter will review these aspects as well as different economic and regulatory issues affecting and affected by SL in a global context. Due to the novelty of SL and global interactions in it, many of these issues have not yet been researched. Interestingly, such issues have also become more complicated, for they increasingly involve a context wherein people from different nations interact together under various legislations.
