Vodafone is beta testing a new virtual mobile phone service called InsideOut in SecondLife.

Vodafone InsideOut will allow users to communicate between virtual worlds and the real world via your mobile phone. This service may offer “virtual handsets” to enable users to make mobile phone calls (possibly free Voip??) and exchange SMS text mesages with people in the virtual world and the physical/real world.

Vodafone already operates an interactive island in SecondLife where you can experience features such as “photographic ice skating”, “butterfly flights” and a user-generated “sound garden”. The sound garden gives residents an “intense sensory experience” as they make their own music depending on the direction they are facing, the number of residents in the same space and the direction of movement, so that more residents co-operate the sound becomes richer and more varied.

As mentioned above, the service is in private beta testing and no further details are available.