Aleks Krotoski built a laboratory in the virtual world of Second Life to do research for her doctoral thesis on social simulations. She slaved over the lab, she writes in an article in The Guardian: “I’d spent days lining up little planks of wood, straightening out the interactive books on the shelves and placing the windows just so.” But a software glitch destroyed all her handiwork in a millisecond: “Everything disappeared.”

A couple of days later, the CopyBot invaded Second Life, and Krotoski saw, in the reaction of the new merchant class, that something more than her little laboratory had disappeared from the virtual world:

The formerly libertarian landscape has been overrun by rampaging nouveau-capitalists. They want centralized governance and stern economic ruling. Everyone is a potential thief. Fingers are being pointed and, in some extreme cases, avatars are being attacked. The digital idyll has become a world of accusations, violence and bitter political dispute.

And so, once again, the real world comes crashing in. Sooner or later, most online communities reach this crisis point because the ideals of the founders are replaced by regulations demanded by the different types of people who interact in them. We shouldn’t be surprised; what we do when we interact online is replicate the social practices we are familiar with offline. Inspired by this milestone, I’m going to add a wing to my new lab. And inside will be a shrine to CopyBot, the little hack that transformed Second Life into a real world.

Lay a virtual rose on the shrine for me, Aleks.