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Trends in Virtual Worlds – an interesting perspective

December 17, 2007 By

There’s an excellent thesis put forward on 20 trends in virtual worlds over the past year. The ones of particular relevance were:

1. “Shedloads of virtual worlds will be launched in 2008″ – I think that’s a fair bet though how many actually make launch is doubtful.

2. “Teen-focused virtual worlds are huge” – Not surprising really – they’re the consumers who have an intrinsic understanding of the whole virtual world concept. That said Teen Second Life is a pale imitation of the adult version and most other options cater to the pre-teen market. Are there actually many virtual worlds who’ve achieved a solid teen audience? Corporations like Sony are certainly trying.

3. “Brands still get it wrong” – Oh yes they certainly do – it tends to be the native virtual world brands that have the greater success at this stage.

4. “There’s a problem with communication” – The author means the issue of communicating what virtual worlds are to those who have no concept of them. I believe this is the pivotal issue that needs to be addressed for the forecasted exponential growth in virtual world use to actually occur.

5. “There will be big growth in corporate use of virtual worlds” – Yes, but until real value propositions can be put forward to business, their investment in virtual worlds will remain firmly planted in the research and development are.

6. “Virtual items will be a big moneyspinner” – Nothing new there – people are happy to pay for virtual possessions and the more striking they are the bigger the business to be had.

7. “Governments are waking up to virtual worlds” – They’d better be because governments are already lagging badly in this regard. It may take a significant corporate legal action to prompt some serious legislative scrutiny, with the real risk of the main benefits of virtual worlds being crushed in the stampede to regulate.

8. “Virtual worlds need to become easier to use” – Another obvious one here – I’m yet to use any complex computer application that doesn’t require a steep learning curve. The company or person that cracks that one will be one wealthy entity.

The full post is worth a read.

In a similar vein, Clickable Culture reports on the issue of ad-creep in kid-oriented virtual worlds. There’s a sure-fire trend that’s likely to continue.

Thanks to Massively for the heads-up on the trends piece.

Filed Under: General News, Op-ed Tagged With: ,

Monash Uni: closed island?

November 16, 2007 By

In an article published in the Sydney Morning Herald this week, I was a little surprised at a quote attributed to Monash University’s Dr Melissa de Zwart: “our area won’t be open to the public; you will need to be on an authorised list to get in”.

I try to avoid real-world comparisons but it’s difficult in this case: this is the equivalent of putting a barbed-wire fence across the entrance of the local university. Doesn’t a total closed-door policy from a taxpayer-funded entity go against its purpose as a community facility? RMIT Island has blocked off most of its island from general access but it at least has a public welcome area. As Gary Hayes says in the same article, it’s not hard to prevent damage to a Second Life presence. So why the lockdown?

Perhaps someone attending this event can ask.

Filed Under: Australian News, Education, Op-ed, Virtual worlds in the media Tagged With: , ,

Is it a long-term slide?

October 17, 2007 By

I’ve had some interesting comments privately from people about the significant decline on active Australian Second Life users over the past two months.

deserted.jpg

So, I’ve created a topic on the SLOz forums to delve a bit deeper – why the slump? Wold love to hear your thoughts.

Filed Under: From the TMJ forums Tagged With: , ,

2.5 million SL users by 2010? Maybe.

September 19, 2007 By

Veteran aussie SL developer Gary Hayes (Gary Hazlitt) has postulated that there may be as many as 2.5 million simultaneous SL users by mid-2010. Guessing at numbers that far into the future is always going to be crystal-ball gazing but instinctively 2.5 million doesn’t seem out of the bounds of possibility – particulary with improvements in scaleability that should occur in coming months and years.

Such numbers would equate to around a couple of hundred thousand aussies in SL – that’s quite a critical mass.

One note: the 80 000 concurrency experienced last weekend was probably a glitch.

Filed Under: Australian News Tagged With: , ,

More than just the jitters? Australian business in Second Life

September 16, 2007 By

One of the most commonly reported aspects of SL is its relationship with RL business. A year ago, the reporting was predominantly rose-shaded and that continued up until recently when some US business reduced or ceased their SL presence. The mood change in the mainstream media was noticeable and to a large extent its continued. Even in the SL blogosphere there’s arguably a more sceptical tone adopted in relation to corporate presences – there were always sceptics but there’s now a wider acceptance of the pitfalls of doing business in SL. That said, corporations continue to set up shop – Peugeot are a recent example.

In an Australian context, Telstra and the ABC’s launches remain the largest to date with a few smaller presences either established or under way. Is it just our relatively small population that explains the state of play or a fundamental case of ‘wait and see’?

Filed Under: Business, Op-ed Tagged With: ,

SL Education vs Personal Beliefs

September 10, 2007 By

We have been tracking the growing number of educational facilities setting up presences in SL. Many have been active in setting up and conducting both courses and specific lectures in-world.

A recent email list posting amongst SL educators raised the issue of a student declining participation in the SL portion of coursework due to “personal beliefs”. The ongoing thread has covered a number of possible scenarios and reasons behind such a refusal and this may be a good thing given recent postings here about under-age content and use of “mature” areas when setting up a presence as an education provider.

Given the emergence of SL as an exciting and different medium for the delivery of courses and syllabus content the issue of not being penalised for refusing to participate in in-world coursework is a new and never before encountered tension that educators may have to deal with in a formal policy manner.

It has been discussed amongst educators that both strict Islamic and conservative Christian students object to graphic representations of the human body. As one educator stated, “In this case, SL would certainly be a religious problem.”

For SL based course-work it may mean requirign strict body and clothing forms for students when participating and locked areas for course particpants only.

A wander through either the Australian or Foreign Universities currently engaged in SL has shown most people in casual dress. But if a student were to choose the form of a furry or other such form, would it distract from the lecture, offend other students or in some way draw a code of conduct indiscretion under SL or the University’s guidelines?

Then again, maybe the term “hippy” may need to be rephrased to encompass fippies (furry), aippy (age-play form) or mippy (monster style students).

Filed Under: Education Tagged With: , ,

News.com.au – Terrorists in SL

July 31, 2007 By

Mainstream media reporting of Second Life in Australia has a mixed track record, and one of the biggest low points would have to be in this article on the news.com.au website published today. It can also be found on The Australian website.

The article starts off regurgitating the (never confirmed) accusation that the 22nd May issues with ABC Island were due to a ‘bomb’. Then it goes further downhill from there, describing how “landscapes are razed and residents are wounded or killed” after an attack by the SL Liberation Army.

It seems doubtful that the article’s author, Natalie O’Brien, has spent more than ten minutes in SL given the range of other factual errors contained in the story. Here’s one more example to get you worked up: “This terror campaign, which has been waged during the past six months, has left a trail of dead and injured, and caused hundreds of thousands of dollars’ damage”.

The sad thing is, the shoddy premise of the article overshadows the legitimate concern about the power of virtual worlds for use in criminal pursuits. Yes, terrorists groups COULD use streaming video in SL to broadcast propaganda or training. But why would you bother? I suppose potential terrorists may believe the misinformation about being able to wound or kill people in SL and decide they’ll register for some killing fun. My, how they’ll be disappointed.

Filed Under: Australian News, Virtual worlds in the media Tagged With: ,
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