Psychotherapy in a virtual world has its advantages – particularly if the real world is what you can't cope with

BY MY fourth interview, I'd developed a checklist to use before each meeting. For starters, I would make sure I had grown some hair. I'd also check that I was fully clothed - I had learned the hard way about that one. Only then would I teleport to the interview, hoping that this time my avatar wouldn't materialise in anyone's lap.
Welcome to Second Life, a virtual world with almost 20 million players globally, where the avatars - digital stand-ins for the players - create everything around them. Every cobbled street, every tree swaying in the wind, even the wind itself, is the product of someone's imagination.
