Is This Man Cheating on His Wife?

[<rms () computerbytesman com>]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118670164592393622.html

 

Is This Man Cheating on His Wife?

Alexandra Alter on the toll one man's virtual marriage is taking on his real
one and what researchers are discovering about the surprising power of
synthetic identity.

By ALEXANDRA ALTER
August 10, 2007; Page W1

On a scorching July afternoon, as the temperature creeps toward 118 degrees
in a quiet suburb east of Phoenix, Ric Hoogestraat sits at his computer with
the blinds drawn, smoking a cigarette. While his wife, Sue, watches
television in the living room, Mr. Hoogestraat chats online with what
appears on the screen to be a tall, slim redhead.

He's never met the woman outside of the computer world of Second Life, a
well-chronicled digital fantasyland with more than eight million registered
"residents" who get jobs, attend concerts and date other users. He's never
so much as spoken to her on the telephone. But their relationship has taken
on curiously real dimensions. They own two dogs, pay a mortgage together and
spend hours shopping at the mall and taking long motorcycle rides. This May,
when Mr. Hoogestraat, 53, needed real-life surgery, the redhead cheered him
up with a private island that cost her $120,000 in the virtual world's
currency, or about $480 in real-world dollars. Their bond is so strong that
three months ago, Mr. Hoogestraat asked Janet Spielman, the 38-year-old
Canadian woman who controls the redhead, to become his virtual wife.

The woman he's legally wed to is not amused. "It's really devastating," says
Sue Hoogestraat, 58, an export agent for a shipping company, who has been
married to Mr. Hoogestraat for seven months. "You try to talk to someone or
bring them a drink, and they'll be having sex with a cartoon."

Mr. Hoogestraat plays down his online relationship, assuring his wife that
it's only a game. While many busy people can't fathom the idea of taking on
another set of commitments, especially imaginary ones, Second Life and other
multiplayer games are moving into the mainstream. With some 30 million
people now involved world-wide, there is mounting concern that some are
squandering, even damaging their real lives by obsessing over their "second"
ones. That's always been a concern with videogames, but a field of study
suggests that the boundary between virtual worlds and reality may be more
porous than experts previously imagined.

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