Jorge Luis Borges, writing in “On Exactitude in Science”:
In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guild drew a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, coinciding point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of Cartography saw the vast Map to be Useless and permitted it to decay and fray under the Sun and winters.
In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of the Map, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; and in all the Land there is no other Relic of the Disciplines of Geography.
Yet in Arlington County, there remain Bureaucrats to Permit or Deny economic Requests for the Governed from across the real and mapped realms.
The Washington Post reports on quirkily meta Arlington County, which has established an office in Second Life. There you may go “in” and conduct various modes of business that you might with more difficulty, or at least more person-to-person contact, in Arlington County prime. Says one John Feather, who has volunteered his time to man the virtual Arlington County desk: “If we are at least here struggling with everyone else, that kind of says something about us.”
It most certainly does.
Since opening a business in Arlington is a venture that will appeal to a naturally limited audience, Arlington County’s online economic development presence will necessarily be lost on some users. Sign me up for the National Library of Medicine’s Tox Town, though. This effort is very close to a hypochondriac’s cyber fantasy land. If only the game (game?) offered Bladerunner-esque graphics to match the presentation — picture dark visuals displayed in startling detail all the horrible things that can happen to you no matter where you go, from the potential toxic hazards of the Port to the unseen chemical threat of the Town — and you might have the most entertaining Internet in years.
A thought: Who are these people who are so competent so as to manage lives two lives? Is anyone’s life in the meatosphere so uncomplicated that they are actually able to claim further responsibilites, to pay to take on further responsibilities, in a virtual world? Because I’m having trouble enough with First Life as it is. Why don’t I know anyone who plays Second Life, given all the media attention* it receives? Could I pay someone to manage my “life” if we agree to do it all via the Internet? Meanwhile, it only goes to show, there is not a facet of life — even dealing with bureaucrats — that someone does not enjoy disproportionately well.
* Present attention excepted
