Second Life is the coolest thing I've seen in a long time

Second life by Linden Labs is an online community where players can design their own world. It has many of the properties of "real life" in that you can make friends, chat with people, buy land, build houses, go to dance parties, create a business, take classes and play games. It goes beyond real life in that you can do cool things design your appearance, teleport and fly. You can create and do anything you can imagine. At the IGDA games conference I met two players who are actually making real $$$ off of their designs. One player created a pet shop and sells his pets. Another player designed a game called Tringo which is a blend of bingo and tetris. He just signed a contract to have Tringo produced in real life and he's making money off the royalties.