Those of you who have become involved in the virtual world Second Life, possibly through the WTA's virtual community there, may have learned more about how that world operates, but also some of its problems. Participants intent on no good, generally called "griefers" (a play on "Reavers" from the movie Serenity), have been attacking the SL grid with "particles" (scripted objects resembling particles of light, typically enacting some sort of "magical" action) which self replicate incessantly, and assemble together to create beach balls which encourage people to pick them up (thus spreading the infection). The SL grid has been down on and off for most of the past two days because of repeated attacks of this nature.
Whether it is Bill Joy Killjoys staging a political protest to "teach" the public about the danger of nanotechnology (my pet theory), or just troublemaker kids out for kicks, or other business motivated hackers, is unknown.
I would encourage transhumanists with coding skills who are interested in Second Life to form a group to help shut down the griefers. Linden Labs, SL's owner, has been going balls out working to fix things, but it seems apparent that given the anarchic environment of SL, interested participants are going to need to work on ways of combatting this problem.
http://www.secondlife.com
