You should really know about "State of Play V: Building the Global Metaverse."  It's the fifth annual State of Play conference on the future of virtual worlds, organized by New York Law School in conjunction with Trinity University, and with the support of Harvard Law School, Yale Law School, and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

The conference will feature experts from around the world talking about:

+ Cross-cultural communication and avatar-to-avatar diplomacy
+ Strategies for understanding behaviors and values of virtual world residents
+ Regulating speech, property, and addiction
+ Building transnational businesses in virtual worlds
+ Using virtual environments to teach students of all ages
+ Space, place, and virtual world cultures

Plus new documentaries.  Plus lots of workshops. You should go.  They'll archive everything, but why not go in person?  :-)

(Thanks to Dan Hunter and Beth Noveck.)