second life

Building and keeping a community

March 13, 2007 By Dan Thornton

Not a day goes by without the launch of a new social site, or the relaunch of a brand with social networking as the new focus.

This isn’t a bad thing, but there seems to be some pretty big problems in between what website creators think is needed, and what website users actually want.

Personally, I see it as the chance to set up everything for the website users to build their own village. You can make the land flat, put a river nearby, or even plumb in gas and electricity supplies. But you can’t force the community to come and live there, unless they want to. (Spot the echo of Second Life in that analogy)

Myspace is often derided for being clunky to use, but it was the first place that community settlers found and made their own. Once it become a sprawling city, the early adopters started moving to the Bebo, Faceparty and Facebook suburbs. The business crowd decided to start commuting to LinkedIn.

If you think about these people moving around the web, you can easily see ways to create better sites. Look at urban regeneration for driving people back to cities (redevelopment/realignment of websites). Look at how cosmetic changes such as trees and flowers can improve an area (Small design changes). Think about consistent navigation (Ever been lost in a big city…the London A-Z is a site map)

With the Web 3.0 hoopla including ideas of a virtual ‘Second Life‘-style web you can walk around, it’s easy to get caught up in the primitive geek fantasy of virtual reality. But people already behave in a way that echoes human traits in real life since man first evolved

Second Life killer for Sony’s PS3?

March 8, 2007 By Dan Thornton

Could this be the virtual world that really takes off?

Sony has revealed details of ‘Playstation Home’ the virtual world for the PS3. It’s got all the usual virtual world hang-outs, apartments to show off your possessions, private chats, and simple online games such as bowling and pool. And you can invite any resident to join in Playstation Network capable games at any time.

Is this the kind of game which will draw in console owners? Generally they’re seen as addicted for first-person shooters and racing games, and anything more around lifestyles and strategy is seen as the PC domain.

Then again, the success of The Sims, Second Life, and even the likes of Nintendogs means there’s money there somewhere…surely.

I can’t wait for the PR agency to start spinning this one…

Online economies are changing…

January 30, 2007 By Dan Thornton

Interesting changes are afoot at the world’s biggest fleamarket and online auction site.
Firstly, the charges for a number of categories will change from March 1, 2007. Listing fees are being reduced and simplified, which is nice at first glance. But, if you’re one of the many, many people who sell comics, DVDs, music and video games, then you’re in for a shock. The Final Listing Value is now up to 9%!

Ebay’s own example shows that selling many of these items will now have an increased cost to the seller, and it seems to suggest that you’re better off listing items for an unfair price to get the maximum cash, rather than offering a fair price. Could this see low-margin sellers looking elsewhere? Take a look at the examples for yourself, and note that they all assume an item needs to be listed twice to sell.

There’s also the news that Ebay is delisting ‘Real Money Transfer’ items when they correspond to video gaming. RMT is basically the method for selling your gold or other items harvested from World of Warcraft etc, and converting them into real cash.
Interestingly, however, Second Life is exempt, due to questions about whether it is a game, or a virtual world.

The repercussions could be that low margin sellers and World of Warcraft gold farmers both start looking elsewhere to make sales. And coming at the same time, it could give a significant boost to any alternative route to market.
It also suggests that virtual money making could increasingly move towards the likes of Second Life, whose makers, Linden Labs, have already stated their intention to be behind the framework for the 3D Web 3.0.
And finally it highlights the problem of monopolies in the online world, as much as in reality. Do I accept that I’m going to be paying an extra £1 in fees for every DVD and game I sell, in addition to Paypal costs and postage? Meaning that I get less reward for the pain in the backside which is Ebay trading? In addition to the risks that sellers seem to shoulder by using Paypal?

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