Fantastic, but unattributed quote [update – source]  from the ETech backchannel, picked up by (the other) Dan Dickinson.   

Supposedly, virtual worlds will eventually be our interface for everything online, a far friendlier and more fun and “easier” interface than, say, eBay. This is, when you think about it, a crock of shit; when I want to buy a shirt, I for sure don’t want to walk through a virtual mall. In fact, the reason I go online to buy a shirt is to avoid walking through a goddamn mall.

Give me quick access to your shirts and swift checkout, and I’m a happy puppy. Search and shopping cart in a web browser is what I want, thanks, not some high-concept notion of a high-touch universe. 3D worlds are lousy ways to find most of the things you want, precisely because they use the phenomenological universe as a metaphor.

Source: Dan Dickinson: The Primary Vivid Weblog: Rub The Felt: Looking Back At ETech 2007

This is interesting. There is much talk and effort going on with Second Life being the most apparent.  I have browsed a little bit in SL, and it struck me as particularly ironic, to find two people lining up at an ATM …. why!