The popular MMO Second Life has been featured in a number of stories recently on GamePolitics and in the mainstream media.

From the Mark Warner campaign stop to the establishment of a Second Life presence by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrationn (NOAA), wherever you turn these days, it seems like SL is the place to be. A number of corporations, including big media like Reuters (SL screen shot at left), have also set up shop inside the game.

But an investigative blog piece at Corante questions whether the current buzz surrounding Second Life is real or a marketing creation. Author Clay Shirky wonders aloud whether game publisher Linden Labs has juiced the number of actual SL users:

If you like your magic tricks to stay mysterious, leave now, but if you want to understand how Linden has managed to disable the fact-checking apparatus of much of the US business press, turning them into a zombie army of unpaid flacks, read on...

Linden’s definition of Residents, however, has nothing to do with users at all — it measures signups for an avatar...

They reported adding their second million Residents between mid-October and December 14th, but they also reported just shy of 810 thousand logins for the same period. One million new Residents but only 810K logins leaves nearly 200K new Residents unaccounted for...

Like a push-up bra, Linden’s trick is as effective as it is because the press really, really wants to believe...

Shirky cites mainstream coverage of SL's supposed population in the New York Times, USA Today, CNN, Forbes and Fortune. Shirky's piece also appears on ValleyWag. For some additional perspective, check out the comments about Shirky's article on Terra Nova, a site which dissects MMO's in a serious way.