Sarah Watson , a 19 year old at the University of Central Florida, goes by the name of Rosa Willful, a virtual world on the internet. While sitting in the comfort of her home, her character or avatar, traveled the UCF digital landscape to learn what to do as a real- life volunteer poll worker in Orange County.
Last year, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission awarded a two year, $75,000 grant to UCF to develop the second life program
Officials will be watching to see how effective the the poll watcher program is and will compare the second life- trained with those who received the traditional face to face training.
The "Virtual World" has also extended over into the domestic and military worlds.
Health care facilities have discovered the benefits of the virtual world in real life.
Dozens of hospitals, medical schools and health foundations have staked out space in the online community Second Life, where participants can build their own virtual clinics. ER nurses log in to the virtual world where each assumes control of an avatar- a cartoon rendering of a nurse wearing crisp blue scrubs.
In a drill, which lasts three hours, the nurse-avatars must create a triage system, assess each patient and figure out how to isolate the most contagious.
Virtual training also typically costs much less than a full dress drill with hired actors. It costs $1000 to buy virtual land in Second Life from Linden lab and about $300 a month to maintain control of it.
Finally, in the military area, we find Stephane Abrial, the commander of NATO’s Supreme Allied Command Transformation. He is the first European to hold a strategic military position since the creation of the Atlantic Alliance.
In an interview, he stated that the enemy no longer uses only classical military means, but also propaganda and terrorism. He believes that another challenge that the new NATO faces is "cyber war", attacks on the virtual world.