This comment on Baudrillard could equally apply to virtual worlds such as Second Life. Perhaps Second Life is a virtual world within a hyperreal world…
Jean Baudrillard is best known for his formulation of the notion of hyperreality, and in particular hyperreality in the United States. According to Baudrillard, America has constructed itself a world that is more ‘real’ than real, and where those inhabiting it are obsessed with timelessness, perfection, and objectification of the self. Furthermore, authenticity has been replaced by copy (thus reality is replaced by a substitute), and nothing is “real,” though those engaged in the illusion are incapable of seeing it. Instead of having experiences, people observe spectacles, via real or metaphorical control screens. Instead of the real, we have simulation and simulacra.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Baudrillard
(On this “worlds within worlds” theme: Kit Kat (a British chocolate brand) had a clever ad where a Second Life avatar logs in to Third Life…)
