Second Life (SL) was all the rage since 2005. Since then, it has even been featured in Law & Order and CSI… but where does Second Life stand now? As this msnbc article points out, all new technologies are initially driven by early adopters – but that doesn’t necessarily ensure long term success. With all the initial hype and news reports, many governments and companies jumped on the SL bandwagon investing significant amounts of money into developing their own islands and businesses in the virtual world. Some examples include: Vodafone, SAP Network, Pontiac, Reebok, Mercedes, Dell, Herman Miller… and the list goes on. However, it seems that at the end of the day, SL hasn’t lived up to expectations.
Even Robert Scoble cited SL as a ‘cooling technology’ in an interview with Shel Israel for the SAP Global Survey. In a previous blog post written by New Paradigm colleague Dan Herman, when you compare usage rates and active members, those of SL pale in comparison to social networking sites like Facebook. For example, SL users make up 0.05% of the total US population compared to Facebook users that make up 7% of the total population in the US or 22% in Canada.
Why didn’t SL live up to its great expectations? As the msn article points out, early adopters aren’t turned off by the kinks and faults of a new technology – rather they care more about being one of the first and many of them enjoy the challenge and are willing to pay a premium (in whatever form that may be). For the regular consumer though, the ultimate purpose SL serves is still unclear and on top of that, it’s pretty difficult to use.
Tags: Second Life
Random Posts from the Wikinomics Archive
Comments RSS
| TrackBack URI
“Second Life (SL) was all the rage when it was first introduced.”
It was? You do realize it’s been around since 2003, yes?
I first registered in early 2005 and by my definition it was hardly “all the rage” even at that time. If SL has ever been “all the rage” with average people - not MSM journalists desperate for juicy stories - then it’s news to me. At best that phrase might describe the growth rate in early 2007 or so, four years after its introduction.
-
“However, it seems that at the end of the day, SL hasn’t lived up to expectations.”
To whose expectations are you referring? The poorly-informed corporations who blundered their way in, or the poorly-prepared corporations who launched “build it and they will come” marketing campaigns reflecting their laughably old-school marketing mindsets. Or was it some other entity not influenced by the atrociously inaccurate reports published in the mainstream press (for your reference: http://blog.rebang.com/?p=1311 ).
-
“…when you compare usage rates and active members, those of SL pale in comparison to social networking sites like Facebook.”
Define “usage”. And how are those usage figures measured? Surely not simply by the stats you cite. What about “engagement”, the new metric that’s getting increasing buzz; and which, according to some sources like the Guardian, is where SL beats everyone hands down?
“Facebook’s users spent a total of 991m minutes on the site during August, Bebo users 600m minutes and MySpace users 540m minutes. … However, in terms of time spent per user, Second Life proved the most “sticky” site with total visits averaging five hours 29 minutes during August.” - http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/sep/25/digitalmedia2
“For Steiger, the engagement measures in Second Life is the proof. The average user engaged in a campaign spends 20-30 hours with a brand. When you translate that to interpersonal communication, it’s significant.” - http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2008/02/liveblogging–3.html
I’m not discounting those numbers; just trying to put them into proper perspective.
-
No offense, but from what I’m reading you don’t seem to really know very much about this topic. If you did, I’d expect you to include:
- some mention of how the Second Life *technology* is spurring some other developments which are increasingly hot and attracting a lot of “early adopter” interest.
- why some of those corporate efforts in Second Life failed, how the ongoing Linden Lab re-architecting of the grid code (scheduled for completion at the end of this year) will almost certainly solve many of those complaints and how that fundamental change makes the often misreported Wells Fargo issues disappear.
- why some companies opted for other virtual world platforms instead of Second Life and what that says about their marketing approach in this new, DRMless open media day and age.
All the best.
Comment by csven - March 6, 2008 7:14 pm
csven, thanks for your comment.
Firstly, thanks for pointing out the correction - I didn’t mean to imply that SL was intensely popular since the beginning, and will retrofit that in the post.
However, SL did gain media attention and a flurry of new members as well as private / public sector interest in the past two years.
The points you make are valid and bring a different perspective - the reason behind my post was to point out that, although there seemed to be alot of promise surrounding SLs’ underlying technology and the opportunity for people to interact and its ’stickiness’, after two years these events have yet to materialize.
As you rightly point out, there are issues that need to be addressed regarding SLs code/ platform (and are being addressed). But regardless of whether the expectations were founded or not, the reality is that the expectation were set.
Comment by Ming Kwan - March 7, 2008 1:09 am
No disagreement regarding the past two years or so. In fact, much of that additional attention and the membership increase might well be attributed to two key events from June 2006: 1) American Apparel’s much-hyped entry into SL, 2) Linden Lab opening up SL to non-verified accounts.
However, as to the “promise” of SL’s underlying technology, anyone who’s been following the platform since prior to June 2006 is very much aware that there *was* no such promise. I’m fairly certain I’d written on several occasions back then that I didn’t think SL as we knew it would survive much beyond this point (I still don’t; I believe LL will roll out another, updated grid).
Even Linden Lab had conceded there were some underlying problems with the technology; the result of some very early design decisions. It happens. But if there was unrealistic expectation, it arguably resulted primarily from poor media coverage and bloggers unfamiliar with SL who regurgitated MSM’s inaccuracies. Tell a lie often enough and it becomes the truth, as the saying goes.
That said, those of us who saw the corporate marketing train wrecks coming have also been among the most patient users. For example, the long-awaited “web-on-a-prim” has been sitting idle for longer than two years (reference: http://blog.rebang.com/?p=653 ). It was only included in a release candidate for the first time *today*. More than a few patient old-timers are quietly saying, “Finally”.
-
Expectations are influenced by posts such as this one. If you don’t communicate accurate information, someone is probably being misinformed… just as you apparently were.
Comment by csven - March 7, 2008 3:04 am
Part of the reason for the relative numbers could be that Facebook etc are possibly to access via work PCs, university PCs etc. I know companies who are claiming around 30% of their web traffic is via Facebook for example.
Second Life requires a better PC, bigger commitment, and outside of a few corporations, is very hard to justify during work hours. Particularly in non tech-evangelist companies who are still learning about social networks.
I don’t think there’s too much value in a Facebook - Second Life comparison. What I do think would be really interesting is comparing the time and cost implications of hosting SL meetings as opposed to real life, especially in countries like the UK where public transport etc are so expensive.
Comment by Dan Thornton - March 7, 2008 5:37 am
I like the idea, but if we’re able to host meetings in SL, wouldn’t we equally be able to use videoconferencing? Why use an avatar, when you could have a meeting where you’re as close to being ‘in the flesh’ as possible.
Comment by Ming Kwan - March 7, 2008 10:22 am
csven wrote: “However, as to the “promise” of SL’s underlying technology, anyone who’s been following the platform since prior to June 2006 is very much aware that there *was* no such promise. I’m fairly certain I’d written on several occasions back then that I didn’t think SL as we knew it would survive much beyond this point (I still don’t; I believe LL will roll out another, updated grid).”
Hi csven, thanks for the earlier stats on stickiness. Apparently you’ve spent some time digging into these issues, so I’d be curious to know your opinion on the underlying premise of the blog entry… would you agree that Second Life is cooling? Why or why not? Will a revamp/rewrite of the grid be enough to put them back on track (if indeed you believe they’re off track)?
Also, perhaps I’m mislead, but I for one have been impressed with the “promise” of SL’s technology right from the start. Compared to MMORPGs: maybe SL hasn’t delivered the same FPS, number of simultaneous users to a sim, nor is it as stable… but those are the tradeoff decisions LL made explicitly right from the start when they opted for versatile user created content. Making their technology scale is a whole different ball of wax - even Linden Lab knew they were headed into unknown territory on that front. I commend them for trying to push the envelope there, but on the other hand now they’re having to live with those decisions and contend with the scaling challenges.
I also think they face a few other challenges: usability, the human engineering side of the scalability issue, and a business model that ensures SL improves as fast as Moore’s law. Any others?
scven also wrote:
“some mention of how the Second Life *technology* is spurring some other developments which are increasingly hot and attracting a lot of “early adopter” interest.”
That’s very interesting. Could you point to a few URLs / examples. I’m always looking to learn about how people are using SL in innovative ways or that are spurring other projects or creative thinking. You’ve got me curious now.
Comment by Alan Majer - March 7, 2008 10:56 am
“I don’t think there’s too much value in a Facebook - Second Life comparison.”
Agree that a comparison is effectively worthless. The Terra Nova regulars can’t even get a simpler apples-to-apples framework together ( here’s a link to the last effort: http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2006/12/standard_metric.html ).
-
“I like the idea, but if we’re able to host meetings in SL, wouldn’t we equally be able to use videoconferencing? Why use an avatar, when you could have a meeting where you’re as close to being ‘in the flesh’ as possible.”
In truth you really do have to experience it (beyond the half-assed, measured-in-hours efforts I’ve seen some reporters and academics report).
Rather than attempt to explain and provide links to other individuals who provide their own observations, I’d suggest you watch the video mentioned here: http://fitsl.wordpress.com/2007/12/08/watch-the-video . If I recall correctly, it’s the third and final presenter who first confesses her hesitancy to try Second Life, describes her first failed efforts, and then recalls her “aha” moment. It does a better job than anything I could say.
The video is somewhat lengthy, however, I would suggest watching the entire piece rather than skipping to her presentation. There are a number of ideas and concepts floated here that are important for everyone; ideas which are the raison d’être for my blog and business.
-
“would you agree that Second Life is cooling? Why or why not?”
I wouldn’t call the technology “cooling” because the implication seems to be that a morphing technology is on an irreversible trajectory. That doesn’t make sense to me unless I take short-term approach. I don’t.
I’d agree that the Second Life hype and user adoption has *cooled* but I don’t have a good enough handle on the numbers. I do follow the numbers to some extent, but not closely enough to be able to make sweeping declarations.
If pressed to provide a descriptor, I’d offer up that Second Life is “morphing”; both the technology and the social components (the latter of which is equally if not more important, imo).
-
“Will a revamp/rewrite of the grid be enough to put them back on track (if indeed you believe they’re off track)?”
Some time ago I wrote something that still seems relevant ( http://blog.rebang.com/?p=1027 ). Since I wrote that I’ve come to believe there are additional reasons Linden Lab will launch a new platform, but I’ve not yet gathered all my thoughts and need some time to do that. Later perhaps.
-
“Making their technology scale is a whole different ball of wax”
Agreed. And this is mostly to what I’m referring regarding their “technology”. Recall that for many people the “promise” was for Linden Lab’s tech to usher in the “next internet”. That’s how I regard the claims and promises.
No argument that some of the features built into it are compelling; especially the content creation tools. They are, after all, what interested me in the first place. But those features pale in comparison to completely changing how everyone access the Internet.
That said, they reportedly have a scaling solution. We’ll have to wait and see; probably another year or so. I can wait.
-
“That’s very interesting. Could you point to a few URLs / examples.”
Just follow the OpenSim developments, which are increasingly impressive. The video I mention above links the fashion industry and IBM… who are also working with OpenSim.
There’s talk that the reason Linden Lab released the “web on a prim” feature yesterday was in direct response to OpenSim’s developments. So we may have the first real competitor to Second Life emerging from the open source efforts to emulate Second Life (and this also supports my hypothesis regarding the emergence of a second platform).
Comment by csven - March 7, 2008 2:50 pm