Thanks to the efforts of David de Nood and Jelle Attema of EPN, as reported by Adam Reuters, we can chalk up some more media myths about Second Life. Gregarious people with good educations, do well in Second Life, as do those with few Real Life friends and some social impairment. 'Sadville' it isn't.

Pakka's virtual world signal/noise rule-of-thumb says that noise (or unnecessary drama, if you prefer) comes from about 1 in 5 of any population, real or virtual whenever something changes, or has the opportunity to change but doesn't (and also that 1% generate it constantly). That certainly accounts for El Reg's perception of Second Life as 'Sadville'. Now, really, Andrew. Didn't we chat about that sort of thing some years ago? :)

It seems that the majority of us are a fairly happy lot in both our lives, although those of us that are handicapped are happier for having Second Life. There's lots of good eating in that report -- we'll focus in on some tasty tidbits later on. In the meantime you can (and should) go read Adam Reuters' summary, and then the report itself.

[UPDATE: The Reuters SL article page is http://secondlife.reuters.com/!]

This is huge! Reuters, the respected RL news service, will be opening an SL branch office, offering RL articles to in-world residents, and debuting a special service covering SL for the rest of the world! They'll also provide a wearable object called the Reuters News Center, which will provide links to Reuters stories. Additionally, they plan to offer an Atrium which residents can occupy to discuss the latest news.

Coverage from the outside is nice, but this is a major step for a news service, and I can't help but think that it's a good one, especially with the implied interaction between worlds. Adam Pasick (Adam Reuters in-world, continuing the trend of RL services being granted equivalent in-world surnames) will be heading up this development, and I'll try to get an interview with him, so keep your eyes peeled!