We have entered a new era. Technology has become an integral part of society, and the Internet is no longer just an infrastructure used to book a flight, buy a book or send e-mails. We watch videos on YouTube, keep in touch with our friends via social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook or follow our professional contacts via LinkedIn. We download music and movies via Torrent-sites such as The Pirate Bay and other P2P (peer-to-peer) networks, and get the latest news via Twitter. All the above services are delivered via the Internet. In at least two ways, developments such as these contribute to the importance of technology-enhanced dispute resolution, in particular Online Dispute Resolution.

Firstly, they illustrate that many daily activities shift from the physical to the online world. Indeed, virtual communities and virtual worlds have become popular places on the Internet, with some visited even more than Google. The most extreme exponent of this development is the notion of virtual worlds: such as World of Warcraft, Lineage and Second Life. Each of these is visited by millions of participants from all over the world. They spend many hours daily in this online environment which they sometimes consider as ‘the real world’.

In three-dimensional virtual worlds of which World of Warcraft and Second Life are the best-known examples, humans use virtual identities called avatars to socially interact.