Second Life is well past its prime on the hype cycle. Which makes it, of course, just the right time for the sluggish broadcast-TV networks to discover it. The producers of "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" have determined it's time to investigate the crime-scene-in-the-making of virtual worlds. Two college girls get sucked into a fantasy playscape — a fictional Second Life clone, Another Youniverse.


The plot, such as it is:14-year-old avatar Vixy Platinum is so popular in her Another Youniverse underage-vixen sex club that a fellow Youniverser can't resist meeting her in real life. She is, of course, actually in her 20s, and he is in his 60s. They don't hit it off, to say the least.

"Law & Order" isn't the only one trying to score viewers with virtual-world forays. "CSI: New York" is sending Gary Sinise on a rather hellish mission — to catch a killer residing in Second Life — on October 24's "Down the Rabbit Hole." CBS's attempt is more of a publicity stunt than public service announcement, though. It's participating in the fantasy by building a crime-lab funhouse in Second Life.

It makes sense, though, that the networks' crime dramas are now discovering virtual worlds. We've always maintained that Second Life was a killer app. Just not in the way its creator, Linden Lab, might have intended.