Is anyone in Australia using Weblin?

Hey everyone, have you heard of weblin? I came across the service over at mashable and I’ve been playing around with it over the weekend.

No idea what I’m talking about? Think Second Life avatars bust out of the portal and start visiting the real web. Technically speaking, you download a small piece of software, create an avatar which follows you around the web on sites that support weblin, and you chat with people. You can even set your status, or presence, in the same fashion as IM & Skype.

The concept is bizzare, but at the same time makes sense as a logical evolution of what many now think of as the “live web.” At any given moment in time there have to be other people looking at the same web page as you - particularly when you’re on popular blogs, news sites, Google etc. So why not talk about what you’re all looking at? Gives new contextual meaning to the well-worn phrase “social media is all about conversations.”

But so far I’ve only seen one little Aussie flag next to a bunch of weblin avatars that popped up and started walking around at the bottom of the screen while I was using Gmail. (Which, btw, is a really bizzare experience. You’re reading email and there’s all these avatars on your screen. I’m presuming they can’t read my mail… ???)

Anyway, I tried to talk to the Aussie avatar but he disappeared before reading my IM chat. So, I’d like to know if anyone in Australia using weblin? What do you think about it? If not, visit weblin.com, get an avatar and look me up. I’m going by the name of “Ozman.”