Bots in Second Life

Second Life is not your typical MMORPG or MMO. It is more of a virtual world, a metaverse, where people can start virtual lives and also run virtual businesses. Unfortunately, like most MMORPGs and MMOs, Second Life also has its fair share of bots. From land bots to copybots and everything in between. The most popular of which are camping bots.

One of the main difference between bots in Second Life and in most MMORPGs/MMOs is that in Second Life it's not illegal to have bots. In fact, Linden Labs, the developer and owner of Second Life, open sourced Second Life's client/viewer which means anyone can grab it and develop new and improve ones from it but most, if not all, bots in Second Life are not based from the open sourced code. They are mostly based from a reversed engineered version of Second Life viewer's code called LibSecondLife.

Bots in Second Life have good and bad uses. For example, some bots like LibSecondLife's Test Client can be used to copy other residents objects and textures bypassing Second Life's permission system. In other words, it can be used to steal other residents creation or content. An example of a good use would be, bots can be used as sales assistants, greeters and even models specially in shops and stores.

Another popular use of bots in Second Life is for camping. Residents get paid to camp in Second Life and many of these campers use bots to camp enlessly. Why use bots in camping? Well, bots use less CPU process and they are very lightweight unlike the Second Life viewer which is a resource hog. Because it's lightweight, campers can open multiple accounts and camp in many places earning them more Linden Dollars which can be converted to US Dollars by the way. Many residents are making money this way in Second Life.

Second Life's community is divided when it comes to bots. Some like them because they do have some legitimate uses but some don't like them because they can be used for stealing and sometimes it is the main cause of lag in a sim. Me? I'm neutral since Linden Labs don't have a firm stance against it but I would like for them to have some kind of control or guidelines in using bots in Second Life if they are going to continue to let residents use them.