Today I was suppose to hang out with an amazing guy, Simon, at his aikido BBQ. I thought I had lived extremely modest the last days but still, I got only 20 euro left on my bank account, so I hadda skip out on that one – which still gnaws at me, because, yanno, my primary has this really amazing chemistry with the guy. It sucks really bad.

So I was photoshopping (I have this tiny assignment for a girl Mo) I ran across IMVU and made a quick snapshot ahh ‘while it is still there’. I guess IMVU works. It is a filthy money grabbing business and they can die and go to hell for all I care, but well, yah it works. Whereas SL seems to still be on a trajectory where people join, invest and play in a constructive sandbox environment, IMVU seems to be the cutout for the coming generation of chat graphic/3D windows. I think IMVU will survive (dumb under 15 kids will eat this superficial bling up) but not anywhere near in the same capacity as SL. They are clearly branching away into seperate directions, which is a very good thing. I think we will soon see IMVU pop up as a platform for something like facebook – create an avatar and have it emerge as a facebook (at.al) chat frame. That is, you dress up your nanobarbie in IMVU and then port it to a browser based marquee. Could be Myspace (*gag*) or Facebook or justabout any such platform.

Having looked at IMVU let me give you my .02 cents and launch what I call ‘khannea’s 17th law’.

In any new communicate medium used by third parties the creative agency will only succeed if they facilitate (and not ban) erotic communication in the end product.

IMVU did not escape this – designers saw it prudent to include a pose for atoon to be sitting doggystyle eating from a dog bowl. This is fetishism, and it is kinky and it is simply tapping into Khannea’s 17th law.

I will in the near future speculate in this blog where that will lead. Think with me – virtual reality environments will be places where people, and young kids, will spend quite a bit of time forming ideas. And apparently fetishistic behavior (making an avi eat from a dog bowl in a sexually enticing position) is inescapable in marketing the product. Especially if the designers are geeks working 60 hours a week behind a computer screen. Mind you, I really like that, because, yanno, from day one I have been a perv, and a sardonic realist in human emotions, and obsessed with virtual world. Hey what can I say, I played with dolls.

I am now saying – this will have profound implications for sexuality in the coming decades. In plain terms – I can already see a youth subculture emerge where kids don’t engage in 1:1 relationships – but engage in couplings of Master/Mistress and Slave/Sub. I am not up to date with school culture, but I wouldn’t be surprised if not very soon you’d spot the occasionally girl (boy) leading the occasional girl (boy) around by a leash and collar. And no this is not merely wishful thinking – it is inescapable. Before the decade is over you will see this quite often in high schools. If not already.