How to say “Good-bye” in Second Life

This article aims to analyze the act of closing a conversation in a virtual world—Second Life. The participants in the conversations are 64 avatars who produced 39 dialogues. The structure of the act of conversation closing comprises 4 components: pre-closing, insertion, terminal closing and after-close. The study results indicate that most players give a signal to pre-close their conversations to avoid face-threats whereas a few use an abrupt closing. Informing the other interlocutors of the need to leave and mentioning a future relationship are the most often used strategies to pre-close the conversation, and saying goodbye is the most commonly employed strategy for terminating the conversation. These findings indicate that Second Life participants, even though they are represented by their digital avatars, are concerned about “face” or “face-saving” in the cyber/virtual world.

► We analyze the act of closing a conversation in a virtual world—Second Life (SL).
► Conversation closing in SL comprises pre-closing, insertion, closing, after-close.
► SL players are concerned about “face” in the cyber world.