Virtual money, practices and moral orders in Second Life

Abstract

Virtual monies present a limit case in debates about money's moral and political entanglements between sociologists, anthropologists, and economists. Digitized virtual monies seem ephemeral, almost ideal typical examples of money as a pure medium of exchange. This paper begins with the premise that virtual monies are as value-laden and morally entangled as any other form of money. This assertion is demonstrated by exploring how one type of virtual money, the Linden dollar (L$), and some of its associated practices are bound up with research participants' moral categories and judgments in the virtual world of Second Life (SL).

Participants' accounts of virtual money practices are linked to moral attributes, sometimes in stark ‘good’ or ‘bad’ dichotomies, but also in more nuanced terms. These framings reproduce classifications of people and practices along a continuum with virtuousness at one end and maliciousness or harm at the other, passing through various states of possible moral dubiousness. For respondents, these two judgments go together; people are what they do with money. As a result, respondents decide what ‘people like that’ deserve. Evaluating someone's money practices means assessing the person. Participants' accounts of Linden dollar practices overlap with explanations of what SL is and how residents should live there. In SL, money is a form of material culture through which appropriate ways of being in the world are debated and reproduced.

Keywords:

• moral boundary drawing
• moralities
• Second Life
• virtual economies
• virtual money
• virtual money practices
• virtual worlds

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Keith Hart, who encouraged preparation of these materials for publication in 2011. This paper expands on part of a dissertation chapter that benefited from Nigel Dodd's money expertise and Don Slater's insights on Second Life. Constructive and thoughtful feedback from peer reviewers was very helpful, as was support from Distinktion editors. Special thanks also to Reuben Flores, who sent me the call for papers for this special issue.

Notes on contributor

Sandy Ross is a Sociology Fellow in the Laboratory for Studies in Economic Sociology at the National Research University – Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russian Federation). Her research interests include money moralities, materialities and iconographies, economic lay theories, and valuation. In addition to ongoing work on cross-cultural consumption, she is currently researching material engagements with rubles by expatriates in Russia and Moscovites, and is developing a project on Canadian monies, iconography, and colonial imaginaries.

Notes

1. Emphasis in original.

2. Residents use SL profiles to assess others' virtual social positions and identities (Boellstorff 2008, 184). Profile-stalking, or checking the profiles of people nearby or owners of virtual objects and businesses, is normative, especially amongst entrepreneurs. Newer residents are also identifiable by their embodiment(s) and how they interact with others (Martey and Consalvo 2011, 173)

3. Business owners previously offered money and prizes for campers to boost traffic to their virtual land, which increased their visibility in the Second Life search engine. This practice is no longer permitted.

4. Transhumanism is a deeply problematic movement whose Orientalized, racist, and often sexist tropes are beyond the scope of this article, but it would be remiss not to acknowledge them.

5. The intriguing possibility of a tyrannical economic Singularity, resembling HAL-9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey rather than the popular (mis)interpretation of Adam Smith's benevolent invisible hand, was not considered by IntLibber or other interviewees with similar views.