Virtual Worlds News

Speculating on Second Life's Virtual Economy Woes

After a user with admin privileges bilked the World Stock Exchange of $12,000 last week, Second Life's seasonal slump is turning into an economic downturn. Almost immediately prior to the theft, Second Life announced that it would be banning all forms of gambling and prompted a rush to sell off land that had been used for casinos. Then Second Life bank Ginko suspended withdrawals due to insufficient funds and investigated and then abandoned a scheme to fund a purchase of AVIX, another stock exchange, with an IPO held on AVIX. Combined with severe weekend tech problems, Second Life has been having a rough week. Reuters showed a million-dollar drop in spending over the weekend that's just now picking up.

Japanese Aware of Second Life, But Not That Excited

63.9 percent of respondents were aware of 3D worlds, announced iShare yesterday in the results of its survey of Japanese awareness on virtual worlds. The number is even higher when asked specifically about Second Life. However, 76.4 percent of respondents said they had no interest in participating in the virtual world. The survey was conducted online with 585 respondents, 51.3% men and 48.7% women. For those who had used Second Life, more than 50 percent weren't sure what to do and felt that "movement was heavy." Interestingly, more people (52.4 percent) logged in because they heard about it in traditional media. Only 42.2 percent learned about Second Life online. It should be noted that despite the current lack of interest,  "future expectation exceeds 65 percent." [Thanks to Paul Cohen for the heads up and translation.]

Terrorists in Second Life? The Australian Thinks So, Too

Earlier this month, we reported that The Economist was citing unnamed experts to explain that jihadists will inevitably use Second Life as a training ground. Now The Australian is quoting Rohan Gunaratna as saying, "They are rehearsing their operations in Second Life because they don't have the opportunity to rehearse in the real world. And unless governments improve their technical capabilities on a par with the terrorists' access to globalisation tools like the internet and Second Life, they will not be able to monitor what is happening in the terrorist world."

VirtualWorldsNews Feature: Do Avatars Need Virtual Worlds?

People spend over $1.5 billion every year on virtual goods. That's not all going into virtual worlds. In fact, the "world" aspect of the virtual platform might be among the least important right now. Last Friday, Mashable reported that Allen & Company had acquired a minor equity interest in Cartoon Doll Emporium, an avatar creation site.  In June the New York Times reported that Stardoll, a 2D avatar site, had 1.2 million visitors. According to CEO Mattias Miksche, that's low by over 4 million. He sees "a lot of potential" in the virtual world approach, but says the company isn't ready to move there yet.

Doppelganger Users Online Over an Hour a Week

In the wake of Doppelganger's announcement that it would expand The Music Lounge with multiple real-world locations, it has announced that it will rebrand the entire platform as vSide. Now there's the East Side, West Side, and Virtual Side. In an interview with Worlds In Motion, CEO Tim Stevens outlined some basic figures for Doppelganger. 150,000 registered spend 9.5 hours in-world per month. In June, the average in-world session was 1 hour, 11 minutes (up from 51 minutes in April). Stevens aims to build "a business that will engage users 10-12 hours a month or for an hour each time for 4 to 5 years," he said. "I want ‘em from 14-15 all the way to early twenties." We'll be checking out vSide next week to see if it brings that extra half hour of entertainment per month.

IBM's Virtual World Employee Guidelines

IBM released its employee guidelines for virtual worlds today. The seven-page PDF outlines basic principles governing how to represent IBM in the virtual arena. Some, myself included, wondered about the need to codify what, in many cases, is common sense. IBM Developer Jo Grant explains that "Down the road the virtual world guidelines will probably be folded into our normal business conduct guidelines. But for now publishing them explicitly and prominently also draws attention to the fact that business can and is conducted in these environments. It gives a model for other companies to consider following." The 11-point summary is below.

Who's New to Second Life - July 27, 2007, Wrap Up

Italian soccer club F.C. Internazionale Milano opened a franchise-themed venue, reports KZero.

Telecom Italia opened four islands, one of which will feature fully animated soccer games, reports SLNN.com.

The city of Boston is planning a virtual city hall, reports The Boston Globe.

The University of New Orleans will begin offering classes in Second Life as a potential alternative during floods, reports The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Insurance provider Europ Assistance now provides teleportation insurance as well as real in-world support, reports KZero.

Kelly Services, an Australian recruitment firm, opened an island where for residents to take part in a range of job scenario adventures" in addition to looking for real-world jobs. More info. 

The Portuguese Ministry of Justice is launching a virtual arbitration center, just in time for all the llawsuits. More info.

The Jesuits released an article suggesting they extend their missionary projects to Second Life, reports  The Financial Times.

NGI Group Announces 3Di.jp, An Asian Virtual World Software Development House

The NGI Group, formerly Netage Capital, announced a reorganization in June to reposition itself as a tech holding company and better take advantage of emerging media markets such as virtual worlds. A subsidiary group, 3Di.jp, was created to address virtual worlds, looking at " 5 primary lines of business related to Virtual Worlds development and services that will effectively represent the company's charter." On the technology front,  3Di has developed and announced a Web-based Second Life browser. From the screenshot, it looks like the company is avoiding the avatar approach, but instead allowing users to chat, search, access information on their friends an groups lists, and work with their inventory. It will also display the user's location on the map. The browser is accessible from PCs and certain mobile devices

IBM and Intel Create Guidelines for Second Life

This week IBM will release a set of rules for its 5,000 employees who use Second Life and other virtual worlds. Intel is working on a set of voluntary classes and guidelines to follow suit. IBM hopes that its policy will establish it as a trend setter and lead to a consulting practice. Executives report that other companies are already approaching them for help. [via USA Today]  Both companies will be speaking at Virtual Worlds For the Enterprise, which focuses on best practices for large scale enterprises interested in adopting virtual worlds platforms. The conference track takes place at the Virtual Worlds Conference and Expo on Oct. 10-11, 2007 in San Jose.

Second Life Clears Up Gambling Ban

Linden Lab posted a clarification to its policy on gambling yesterday, with language that finally makes it clear what the company's stance is. The company discussed the issue in April, but only to say it would "not accept any classified ads, place listings, or event listings that appear to relate to simulated casino activity." Now banned are any games that "(a) rely on chance or random number generation to determine a winner, OR (b) rely on the outcome of real-life organized sporting events" and provide a payout either in Linden dollars, real-world currency, or objects of value.