Talking, looking, flying, searching: A research report on information seeking in Second Life Margaret Ostrander (Testy Outlander) 22 April 2008 Info Island International, Second Life LIS8010: Users in Virtual Worlds, Dr. Michael Stephens Dominican University/College of St. Catherine MLIS Program © Margaret Ostrander, 2008

Overview Methodology Information seeking themes Implications for libraries Discussion

Methodology

Information seeking themes

Implications for libraries

Discussion

Methodology Ethnographic approach Grounded theory Interviews + observations Data analysis

Ethnographic approach

Grounded theory

Interviews + observations

Data analysis

What were they seeking? Looking for Cities and countries that mirror RL places People to share RL troubles French classes at SL university Opera music & performances Land parcels by name Experiencing Interactive art exhibit ChatBot conversation Intercultural conversation Stumbling upon A music concert Info about SL on a T.V. drama Places through ‘picks’ in SL profiles Info about SL as a corporate training aid

Looking for

Cities and countries that mirror RL places

People to share RL troubles

French classes at SL university

Opera music & performances

Land parcels by name

Experiencing

Interactive art exhibit

ChatBot conversation

Intercultural conversation

Stumbling upon

A music concert

Info about SL on a T.V. drama

Places through ‘picks’ in SL profiles

Info about SL as a corporate training aid

Themes Fig 1. Categorization of 12 instances of information seeking from interview data

Fig 1. Categorization of 12 instances of information seeking from interview data

Sociability “ on google you can’t interact with other people looking at what you’re looking at” - SL resident on visiting a SL art exhibit

“ on google you can’t interact with other people looking at what you’re looking at”

- SL resident on visiting a SL art exhibit

Visual & mobile info “ i took a gondola ride through venice and walked around paris with a friend” SL resident on finding information in SL “ it’s quite different because I feel like I’m ‘virtually’ standing,,,ha ha pardon the pun…in front of people” SL resident on SL versus the web

“ i took a gondola ride through venice and walked around paris with a friend”

SL resident on

finding information in SL

“ it’s quite different because I feel like I’m ‘virtually’ standing,,,ha ha pardon the pun…in front of people”

SL resident on

SL versus the web

Serendipity “ [i] came to this sim through the secondlife showcase thingy. thats how i found out bout this mexican ruins place.. and stumbled into the concert” - SL resident on finding a concert in SL “ I happened onto that when I was looking at my account settings.” – SL resident on finding out about corporate training in SL

Search mechanism “ This falls under ‘wouldn’t it be cool if…….’ It’s not unusual, when searching on a website, to find that the search function is ‘powered by Google’. SL might be served well by taking that approach. Just a thought :)” - SL resident on SL search

“ This falls under ‘wouldn’t it be cool if…….’ It’s not unusual, when searching on a website, to find that the search function is ‘powered by Google’. SL might be served well by taking that approach. Just a thought :)”

- SL resident on SL search

Play & humor “ ALICE is the artificial linguistic internet computer entity... It sort of tickled my fancy that I’d be able to talk to computers…The first question I asked her was ‘is there a god’…” SL resident on a humorous conversation with a ChatBot

“ ALICE is the artificial linguistic internet computer entity... It sort of tickled my fancy that I’d be able to talk to computers…The first question I asked her was ‘is there a god’…”

SL resident on a

humorous conversation with a ChatBot

Library Use Real Life Library Use 100% Second Life Library Use 0%

Real Life

Library Use

100%

Second Life

Library Use

0%

Library Use “ information should be open to everyone really. see here in my country we don’t really have public libraries, so we tend to just turn to school libraries and the internet when we need something. as an adult you have to buy these books to be able to read them” – SL resident

“ information should be open to everyone really. see here in my country we don’t really have public libraries, so we tend to just turn to school libraries and the internet when we need something. as an adult you have to buy these books to be able to read them”

– SL resident

Info seeking factors Sociability Sociability Sociability Sociability Visual & Mobile Serendipity SL Tools Play

Questions? Margaret Ostrander (Testy Outlander in SL) [email_address]

Questions?

Margaret Ostrander

(Testy Outlander in SL)

[email_address]