In Cyberspace everyone can hear you scream

"Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by
billions of legitimate operators, in every nation … A graphic
representation of data abstracted from the banks of every computer in
the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the
nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. Like city
lights, receding."

In 1984 William Gibson invented the word cyberspace in his seminal novel Neuromancer
and today, nearly 25 years later, a growing and significant number of
people are spending increasing amounts of time and money inside
‘computer generated constructs’, whether they be perhaps the most
analogous to Gibson’s idea of cyberspace (Second Life), game-like
(World of Warcraft) or social (facebook).

Neumann is One

So a year ago this very day Jeremy Neumann set foot into a sparsely inhabited virtual world and planted a flag that implicitly said "The Penguins have landed." Since then he has spent plenty of time exploring, lots of time chatting and making new friends, a small amount of time building and dancing and pretty much a year annoying and ignoring real life friends and family:-( Oh yes, and emoticons have entered his day-to-day written vocabulary :-((((((((((

A year on much has changed – Second Life has experienced a full-on media furore and the world has grown from a population (registered accounts) of just over 200,000 to more than five-and-a-half million today. Other publishers have entered the world – in fact last weekend saw Second Life’s first Book Fair, following swiftly on the heels of the London Book Fair. Huge multinationals including banks, car manufacturers, mobile phone networks and, just last week, Coca-Cola announced presences inside Second Life, some with greater or lesser success than others.

Penguin’s Second Life strategy has been to take a measured and restrained approach to this exciting, baffling and rapidly changing online phenomenon. We began with the release of a special sampler of Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, the book that inspired the makers of Second Life, and will this week be following up with the distribution of the Penguin Virtual Bookshelf – designed to adorn any 3-D virtual home – and containing samples of 10 hot Penguin titles including Glass Books of the Dream Eaters and works by William Gibson. Later this year we’ll start bringing authors into Second Life for events including something that even now, jeremy neumann is hugging himself with excitement about. For information on any Penguin activities in Second Life keep an eye on this blog or join the Penguin Readers group inworld.

We also bought a small plot of virtual land under the gorgeous Hooper Bridge to develop for an inworld Penguin HQ.
So much Second Life architecture is banal recreation of the real world it would be great to do something different and special here – after all, what are the point of doors when in Second Life one can fly? So if anyone has any great ideas for a Penguin build let us know in the comments or contact jeremy neumann in Second Life. We’ll sort out a suitably otherworldly prize if we use your idea.

It has been an incredibly interesting, often fun and sometimes frustrating year in Second Life and one which has afforded us a good look at the ways that online communities develop and ways that we can involve ourselves and our authors in those communities. It is unclear what the future holds for virtual worlds, Second Life and, by extension, Jeremy Neumann – but later today he might be found under the Hooper Bridge, wearing his party hat and toasting his first birthday with a large glass of virtual bubbly.

Jeremy Ettinghausen, Digital Publisher

Virtually Publishing

I’ve been harrassing my colleagues about Second Life for months, and now that our first project here has launched I thought it high time readers of this blog were also exposed to my harrassment.

For those who don’t know, Second Life is a virtual world (a 3D MMOG in geekspeak), where the residents themselves create and build the world which includes homes, vehicles, nightclubs, stores, landscapes, clothing, and games. People also design their representation in Second Life, which can be pretty realistic, or totally outlandish (I met a Penguin author in Second Life whose avatar is a hippo!). In some ways, it’s a cross between myspace and collaborative virtual lego, though some see it as a possible future of the internet.

I’ve never really played computer games and have always been a bookish type, but Second Life has really interested me and I’m really excited to be bringing Penguin into such a fast-changing and creative environment. We’re starting small, with the release of a virtual sampler of Neal Stephenson‘s Snow Crash, the book that has inspired much of Second Life. Later this year we’ll be releasing the Penguin Virtual Bookshelf which will allow residents of Second Life to decorate their virtual homes with working samples of real books. (Perhaps you might have some suggestions for appropriate books?) And down the line perhaps we’ll bring appropriate authors into Second Life to meet with and talk to their virtual fans. All this is part of our efforts to connect with online communities and if you are confused by all this, imagine the fun I’ve had explaining this to people at Penguin!

If anyone reading this is already playing Second Life feel free to contact me inworld (jeremy Neumann is my avatar name) or join the Penguin Readers group.

Update: read all about Penguin in Second Life and other literary initiatives in this virtual world here.

Jeremy Ettinghausen is Penguin’s Digital Publisher

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