If you’ve followed the exploits of Linden Lab’s former CEO and current Chairman over the past year or so, you’ll know he’s been off creating something new. The New York Times has run a profile on that venture, Coffee and Power.

That venture seems interesting enough and leverages heavily the virtual currency model used for Second Life, in this case to purchase or receive payment for goods or services.

It’s very similar to a bunch of other services, though it seems a solid community is already being built up. Whether you need a garden gnome restored, someone to crochet an octopus for you or a Powerpoint presentation created for you, it can all be purchased.

What interested me most however, was this paragraph:

While he is still chairman of Linden Lab, the company that created Second life, Mr. Rosedale talks about that venture in the past tense.

“The problem with creating an immersive 3-D experience is that it is just too involved, and so it’s hard to get people to engage,” he said. “Smart people in rural areas, the handicapped, people looking for companionship, they love it. But you have to be highly motivated to get on and learn to use it.”

Assuming the quote is accurate, is that the message you want coming from the Chairman of your Board? There’s nothing in the statement I’d disagree with factually, but it still seems an interesting approach from someone who’s been aligned with Second Life from the beginning.

Over to you: a skewed story or an indication of malaise at the very top of Linden Lab?

As you’re probably aware, there’s been a lot of interest over the past couple of years in ‘gamification’ – the application of gaming principles to work or any activity where the objective is greater participation. We reviewed one of the tomes dedicated to it last year – the arguments for the concept are appealing to say the least.

That said, I was just as engaged with the argument against gamification from Ian Bogost. He essentially argues that by trying to incorporate gaming into a workplace, you are killing the fundamental magic that makes games appealing. Have a read for yourself.

For what it’s worth, I think things fall somewhere in the middle. There’s no doubt some companies will latch onto the concept of ‘gamification’ (and I agree with Bogost that the term sucks), purely because it’s the latest ‘cool’ strategy and then implement it poorly. That said, I think the opportunity exists to do it right – have a look through these slides (linked by a commenter on Bogost’s post) for one powerful argument on how that could be achieved:

Like any emergent area there’s plenty of debate and until there are numerous engaging and effective examples of gaming applied to work, there will thankfully be sceptics questioning it and pushing the boundaries.

Gurus of virtual worlds statistics, KZero, have released their second quarter 2011 info on virtual worlds. Estimated registered virtual worlds accounts now sits at 1.399 billion, up from 1.185 billion in the first quarter of this year:

If you’d like to see the whole shebang, you can view the Slideshare presentation right here:

One thing’s for certain, a lot of industries would wish they had this sort of growth trajectory. What I’m waiting (and hoping) for is a spike in the adult space that matches the kid space.

Virtual worlds TV host Paisley Beebe has announced the cessation of her long-running show Tonight Live. Citing the need to devote more time to her newly established physical world business and family, Beebe won’t be making any further shows. I asked her why:

Oh I hate farewells, I’m no good at them…I always stuff it up. Happy to just transition quietly sort of…

It’s a shame to see new mediums like this disappear, and it also emphasises how they’re still a long way off being a financially viable option if you’re needing actual income. Have a read of Paisley’s farewell here. For some reminiscing, you can view my 2008 interview here or a 2011 one I wrote for ABC Technology here.

One of the most frequent questions I’m asked (after “Is Second Life still around?”), is what large businesses are still actively involved in Second Life. I noticed this afternoon while reading my RSS feeds that Daniel Voyager has compiled a list of those at the big end of town still involved.

They include Air France, Cisco Systems, Dell, IBM and Siemens (pictured). All businesses featured on Daniel’s list have SLURLs so you can have a look for yourself.

These last two weeks, Linden Lab has opened the doors for some of us to have limited interviews with Rod Humble, the freshly-minted CEO of Linden Lab, and the new face at the helm of Second Life, and I was among those given the opportunity to ask some questions. I took the opportunity to ask a number of you just what questions you’d like answered, and managed to squeeze a number of them in on your behalf.

Humble was quite circumspect and reticent in his responses, but to be fair, he’s only been involved with Linden Lab for about three weeks so far, and is far less acquainted with what Linden Lab has done to-date than most of the rest of us.

TMJ: How would you describe Second Life in your own words?

I wouldn’t. Partly because I feel I would be a little silly by naming something that others (such as yourself) have experienced far more than me, but more importantly, I would let our customers do that over time as we figure it out together. I think it has something to do with creativity and how we evolve identity as we interact with others, but I like its undefined nature. I like its ambiguity. That to me feels like it is the beginning of something.

TMJ: Linden Lab has received quite a bit of criticism for its removal of discounts for educators. Given the subsequent increase in educators starting to look elsewhere, how does Linden Lab see the non-profit / education sector fitting into its strategy?

I wasn’t really here for that, so it’s hard for me to comment on past policy, but we certainly value these communities and don’t want to hamper their contributions to Second Life or prevent them from getting the value from it that they currently do.

TMJ: Going back a couple of years, Linden Lab was driving the interoperability agenda to a large extent, with that now being driven primarily by the OpenSim community. Does Linden Lab have any plans to get more substantively into that space and if not, is it just a case of keeping Second Life’s feature set ahead of OpenSim in order to maintain the lead?

Sorry it’s too soon to talk about this. Gotta play the new guy card.

TMJ: To get parochial for a second, back in mid-2007 we were told there would be Australian-based Second Life servers “real soon now”. Can you outline your strategy for managing bandwidth and response times for Second Life outside of the USA?

Yeah that’s a bit too detailed for me right now, but we definitely intend to fully support customers worldwide. How we can do that, we are looking at, but it varies by territory.

TMJ: What do you think Linden Lab’s strengths are?

Customers – we are blessed by customers who talk to us a lot and are not shy. This is a tremendous asset. While obviously we make mistakes and do not please everyone, the level of feedback helps us enormously. Our harshest critics are also our staunchest defenders when others put out misinformation about Second Life. If anything, getting customers’ voices heard coherently is our biggest task. There are way too many places where customers send feedback (or a “tower of babble” as one customer put it). As part of serving folks better the team here is trying to focus that more.  The new user groups are a step along that path. Finally, of course, our customers literally make the whole world.

TMJ: Given that you’re approaching things from a different background, what do you think Linden Lab’s biggest mistake has been?

Given the incredible technical and social challenges that Second Life solved, I am not sure I would label much to be a massive mistake. Second Life is technically really impressive – Linden Lab solved some astoundingly difficult technical problems in order to create it – but it’s still much too hard for new users by an exponential factor rather than a small one. There’s a big gap between how experienced customers can enjoy Second Life and the experience of a new user, and that’s a huge opportunity for us. What’s interesting is that in the entertainment space, most companies face these challenges in the reverse order – first you figure out ease of use and accessibility, how to make interacting with it an enjoyable experience, and then you tackle the technical stuff to make it work.

TMJ: What particular thing do you feel you’re bringing to Linden Lab, given your skills and background?

I hope my experience in growing large communities will prove useful to our customers. I care about art and creativity, I express myself through technology. I hope those traits will prove helpful.

TMJ: Linden Lab has spent much of the last decade juggling one or another balance of “fast, easy, fun”, seemingly without really finding a balance point that lasts for more than a few months. Is the problem – do you think – with finding the right balance, with the thrust of the strategy itself, or is there some third angle we’re overlooking?

I wasn’t here, so it would be inappropriate for me to comment on past strategies, but I will say Second Life is a vibrant world that exists today and is enjoyed by millions of people, so it succeeded in many ways. It seems to me that a blended strategy can often be effective. I am used to operating a strategy where you have a general strategy setting the overall direction then initiatives on a 1, 3, 6, 12, and 24 month timeline, which evolve as you work through them. That technique is not particularly revolutionary but it works.

TMJ: Linden Lab has always seemed to most focused on the retention of new users at the apparent expense of existing users. I know this comes across as quite a leading sort of question, and I cannot really see quite how to avoid that I’m afraid, but do you think that situation should continue, be reversed or should some other sort of balance be struck?

I think you can see from my comments above that I strongly believe you need both. Our existing customers should expect us to do a bunch of unsexy backend work to address your valid issues. I would also say that intelligent internet savvy new users are utterly lost with the current experience and discoverability. That for sure will also be addressed in the short term.

TMJ: Have you tried any third-party viewers? If so, do you have any preferences?

I have tried them all they all have positives and negatives. I do have various features I like from each that I think we should learn from.

TMJ: What do you feel is the greatest threat to Second Life?

If we put barriers in the way of creativity and exploration. There are temptations to do this every day. They need to be avoided.

TMJ: What actually are Linden Lab’s goals or direction for Second Life? Nobody’s ever really said, and everyone’s awfully curious.

As I mentioned before, my goal is to enable our customers’ expression and creativity, beyond that, let us see where the journey takes us all. The residents of Second Life are smart, communicative and creative. They are going to take this in all sorts of directions. Our job at Linden Lab is to set solid foundations, create the tools, and then get out of the way as much as we can.

TMJ: Should we expect a change of direction from the Lab and/or for Second Life? If so, how?

Expect to see a focus on customer service, experience, creativity and usability. Second Life should become the natural home for intelligent, creative, and social people online. Whether that is a change or not I don’t really know, but those are my priorities right now.

TMJ: Under Philip Rosedale’s tenure as CEO, Second Life’s motto was “Your world, your imagination”. During Mark Kingdon’s era it was “Your world, your way”. What motto do you feel will be the hallmark of your own tenure at the Lab?

Those both sound good and appropriate to me. I don’t think 3 weeks in it would be appropriate for me to succinctly summarise or change a mission statement or motto.

TMJ: What are your initial impressions about the culture and communications inside the Lab?

It’s great! People are very friendly and committed to wanting to make something important. I am really taken aback by just how much people here care. It is good to see.

TMJ: What are your personal goals while you’re the CEO of Linden Lab?

I would like to meet someone in five years who said “Yeah I joined Second Life just after you joined, and it really meant a lot to me. The people I met, the things I saw. That was important.” If I can achieve that, if a decision I take changes some human beings for the better, then I will be pleased …………Oh and I want to script a fully operational miniature wargames table in Second Life

TMJ: We don’t want this to be entirely one-sided. What are we – as users and customers – not asking you about that you’d nevertheless like us to hear?

I will read the comments to this interview, what I would most like to know is this: In 2 years time what would you most like to be doing in Second Life, and how would you like to be doing it? The answers to that question would be very helpful indeed.

Just a quick heads-up to our infrequent / casual readers that the latest quarterly briefing is now available. You can view it here or sign up to receive them automatically via email each quarter. For the dedicated virtual worlds observer the briefings may not have much new but the feedback we get is overwhelmingly positive from those who have a more fleeting grasp of issues in the field.

As always we love feedback, so please do contact us if you’d like to see other publications come on line.

One final thing – our 2011 Virtual Worlds and Business publication should be completed and available by mid-February 2011. If you’re a vendor with a good virtual worlds solution for business, now’s the time to pitch it so we can include it in the roundup.

In a fairly unexpected move, Avatar Reality’s CEO Jim Sink has announced the cessation of development of the PC application version of virtual world Blue Mars, with the soon to be smaller company moving to focus on developing for the iOS (read: iPhone / iPad) platform. The change involves the loss of a number of staff, including Jim himself. You can also listen to audio of his discussion with the Blue Mars community here.

Whichever way you look at it, this is a major setback for the company. The switch to iOS, however viable, does provide a stark contrast to the PC-only development to date. That sort of strategic shift doesn’t happen overnight, and given the fact an alpha of the iOS version is already in existence adds weight to that. On the face of it, it looks like another shift to the more superficial virtual worlds offering. The withdrawal of technical support and the shelving of further development for the current PC client will have a serious impact on the core group of content creators who’ve been working on the platform to date. Those creators may still have a role to play on the iOS version but it’s hard to envisage it moving out of beta before the end of the year.

Overall, this announcement has a few key impacts. First, it effectively ends in the short-term any claim Blue Mars had over being a serious challenger to Second Life. Second, Blue Mars now enters the iOS marketplace which is burgeoning with developers working on virtual worlds. Third, this places an ever more focused spotlight on the viability of more complex, content-driven virtual worlds. I’m hopefully very wrong but there seems to be a race to the bottom for market share more broadly. Hopefullt Blue Mars proves that wrong but I’m unconvinced.

Sincere commiserations to those affected by this change.

Just a heads-up that I’ve written a small piece for the ABC Technology site on the use of MMOs in education and business. For the seasoned virtual worlds watcher there’s nothing earth-shattering in there, but it’s a useful overview for the newcomer or casual observer. Obviously these concepts don’t just apply to World of Warcraft (WoW), but as the behemoth in the arena it’s one of the better showcases.

I wrote recently on the lessons the latest WoW has for virtual worlds as well, if you’re interested.

For those of you out there playing through the new Cataclysm content, is there anything that’s really impressed you or frustrated you so far?

Linden Lab have certainly had a year of senior executive changes, with Mark Kingdon, Philip Rosedale and now Rod Humble sitting in the CEO’s chair. The press release from Linden Lab can be viewed here.

Coming from work on The Sims 2 and 3 and his cited interest in developing ‘experimental games’, he could be considered an obvious choice for the role. There’ll be some concerns from long-term residents around Second Life taking a gaming focus, but I think that’s unlikely. There’s plenty of aspects of user experience that game companies get very right and it’s a key weakness of Second Life at present. The challenge will be making those improvements without turning Second Life into The Sims. Unless of course it’s been identified that that’s where the market is, in which case hold onto your seats.

There’s also the ongoing buyout rumours: they’re not likely to abate with the appointment of someone from Electronic Arts. 2011 was always going to be interesting for Second Life and Linden Lab, and this has appointment has made things more so.

Photo courtesy of Next-Gen.biz

Treet TV are ground-breakers and Australia-based ones at that. I’ve been following them since mid-2007 (original profile here) when they were the Second Life Cable Network (SLCN), and they’ve been plugging away ever since, growing to arguably the world’s most credible and prolific virtual world TV production outfit. I say plugging away because even though they have a pretty solid track record now as innovators and quality content producers, establishing a wider profile within the Australian business sector has been a challenge.

Treet’s Mt Eliza-based founders, Gary Wisniewski (SL: Wiz Nordberg) and Grace Roberts (SL: Texas Timtam), caught up with me for a chat last weekend on everything Treet plus some broader themes. If you’ve thought about getting a team together to make your own show, read on as Treet are interested in new pitches.

Lowell: We last caught up in June 2007 when you were still SLCN TV – what are your strongest memories of those early times for you?

Wiz: Strongest memories?  Confusion. No, really, I suppose the strongest memory is how “new” the idea was, of using a virtual worlds platform to create true television-like content, and the reaction of people to what we were doing. It was very fresh and very new and it seemed like there were limitless possibilities.

Texas: It was very exciting then. We were learning new things everyday and it was still in the glory days of Second Life hype so everyone around us was filled with optimisim about the opportunities.

Lowell: So has that confusion abated or just changed in dynamic?

Wiz: Well the dynamic has changed a lot. It is no longer new, and a lot has been learned – I was only joking when I said confusion actually.

Lowell: On learning: if you had to list a few key learnings over the past three years, what would they be?

Wiz: It seemed obvious to us that doing virtual worlds television was the right thing to try.   I have to say it was almost the opposite of confusion, but total confidence back then. Well, one thing we learned is that people in Second Life have almost boundless energy to create, and to us it is the reason to remain committed to Second Life despite many people’s negative feelings about it right now. We also learned to divide machinima into two broad categories: documentary and story telling. Documentary is easy. Storytelling is hard. I suppose the list could go on for pages.  After three years, you learn a lot of things!

Lowell: So for those who don’t know Treet TV, can you give an executive summary of what it offers today?

Wiz: Treet TV offers the largest collection of live television broadcasts and archives made almost exclusively in Second Life, documenting the activities, sports, lives, and stories of Second Life residents and creators.

Lowell: Your work is most recognised in Second Life but do you use other platforms / grids?

Wiz: We are starting to use OpenSim and you will see a lot more OpenSim based shows in the coming year. But almost everything is still done in Second Life.

Lowell: What are the limitations of OpenSim so far when compared to what you do in Second Life?

Wiz: The limitations don’t apply to us at Treet so much as they apply to those creating and participating in the shows.   Filming in OpenSim can be done as perfectly as we do it in Second Life. The main limitations show producers face are – there are fewer people and thus less diversity to pool upon for guests, interviews, lifestyle and sports content; there are fewer vendors of products, thus less available if you want to devise your own original show content; and stability is, incredible to say, not as good as Second Life, so the production reliability is lessened. But those things are changing fast, I should add.

Texas: OpenSim-based grids are just now gaining enough momentum to have enough users that will make for interesting viewing and stories to tell.

Lowell: Second Life has copped a lot of negative press: what do you see as its strong points and do you remain confident in its longer-term viability?

Wiz: The strong point of Second Life is that it is a new kind of virtual world, based upon an empty slate, where people can do and create what they wish without any limit to their imagination.  Arguably Linden Lab invented this type of world.   I am not sure they will end up playing a major role over time, but I am certain that this kind of world will survive, grow, and probably displace many many other types of virtual spaces. I am confident in the long term viability of such worlds. Not so much of Second Life itself. But today, Second Life is the best.

Lowell: Without going too negative ourselves, what is it about Linden Lab and Second Life that makes it likely to be overtaken?

Wiz: The need for Linden Lab’s product has grown beyond their ability to service it and respond to the market. This has to do with very early decisions they made before they realised what they really had. Some of those decisions will be hard to recover from, and I’m not sure they can.

Lowell: What in your opinion were those key decisions – architecture related, community related or others?

Wiz: Most are architecture related. Essentially, they locked themselves into an architecture where it takes approximately 25% of the resources of a fairly high-end server to support a gathering place with 100 people. Imagine for example, that you required  a full Xeon server to accommodate a website which would accommodate 400 people.   You would have a huge liability. This is the reason for most of their problems, including the inability to scale, and inability to create cheap land available to more people who perceive it as having much better ROI. I am not sure any amount of “thinking outside the box” in terms of their customer service and company structure can make up for that problem.

Lowell: The thing is, as OpenSIm evolves they may avoid some of those issues but not all – are the architecture issues really that solvable in the short-term?

Wiz: OpenSim has the same liability in terms of architecture, but it has the advantage of greater ROI with reduced cost. This will cause more people to engage with it, and more people can be involved in trying to rejig the architecture to solve some of these major problems. Open source groups have proven time and time again that “if there is a will, there is a way”, and I have a lot of hope for OpenSim because I think it will soon reach a tipping point where the necessary technology people will be able to truly hunker down and start making dramatic steps forward. In the short term?  No. That means that those of us who are already at the limits of our patience need to be more patient still!!

Lowell: Let’s talk business for a while – I can imagine you still struggle with the credibility issue i.e. that a lot of the business / funding sector see virtual worlds work as R&D rather than ROI. Are you seeing that shift at all?

Wiz: Well, we don’t struggle with it so much at Treet. We are very committed to having a broad range of content creators producing shows. While there are surely revenue issues we now struggle with because corporate money is not flowing like it once did, this is a shared problem we all deal with. I also believe virtual worlds have been R&D all along. I think that any assumption that there was ROI was predicated by assuming a great deal of PR leverage for having “engaged in something new”. Once you remove the PR leverage, much of the ROI for many corporations didn’t hold up under scrutiny.

Lowell: So obviously without expecting explicit detail, what is Treet’s business model and strategy?

Wiz: Treet is like any other start-up gambling on the increasing trend to do something online which has never been done before. So, our business model evolves and changes over time and mostly is a model of “sustainability” at this point, mainly because there is so much R&D going on in the area we’ve chosen. I think the biggest limitation of any business model for a virtual worlds content company is the small size of the market.

Lowell: Which is a good lead-in to your shows – how many shows do you now produce?

Wiz: 12 shows are currently in production, 10 of them with weekly episodes that are aired live every Sunday and Monday. We have over 3000 archived episodes, not only of those shows, but of many shows no longer in production, or special events and features.

Lowell: What are your most successful shows, both as far as view statistics but also in regard to audience feedback?

Wiz: The three most successful shows in terms of feedback and numbers are Metanomics, Tonight Live with Paisley Beebe, and Designing Worlds….not necessarily in that order. Some shows actually have much greater consistency than those, with very loyal audiences, but haven’t achieved the high points those have. Two notables are the Best Practices in Education Series and the ISTE Eduverse series, both of which are short term productions and both achieved signifcant viewership and web buzz.

Lowell: Over your time producing such a large amount of content – have you discovered any unique trends on what works in SL as compered to more mainstream TV production? That is, have any of the shows worked really well when you thought they wouldn’t or vice versa?

Wiz: Comparing SL to mainstream TV is an interesting “apples and oranges” exercise.  The viewership of each is fueled by very different things. The “unique trend” is that Internet based TV is more dependent upon having an active community surrounding the content. Mainstream TV is more dependent upon a streamlined and efficient delivery channel. The former requires more social capital.  The latter requires more financial capital.

Lowell: On community: does Treet do active engagement there or is it more up to each show’s team to drive that?

Wiz: It is a combination.  Each of our shows is a partnership.   Treet works actively to build a community of those interested in “virtual television” and many people’s shows are discovered because there is crossover from the Treet community.  On the other hand, each show brings new communities to Treet, and this is probably one of the main ways Treet’s viewership grows, by having each producer’s community join in a larger community which has greater momentum. Three years ago it was the reverse.  Treet had no community and it was show communities which essentially “bootstrapped” Treet into having people who could cross-over into other communities.  Now, such crossover is the norm.

Lowell: On the partnership, how does that work? Where are the boundaries with creative control etc?

Wiz: We try our best to let our producers do what they want.  That’s the honest truth.  We try to let them envision the show, decide on the format, and drive the creative behind the shows with little or no intervention from us. We try to provide feedback about audience size, live viewership, and if we do exert creative control, it has more to do with the mechanics, such as trying to assure that shows are more “watchable” on the web, that intros are the right length, that advertising is used in ways that are most effective.

Texas: The Treet website offers the ability to include a much larger audience than could be achieved with only the Second Life residents. We can live stream to a much larger number of viewers via the web.

Lowell: So let’s say I have a great show concept and I approach Treet and you like it a lot as well. What happens from there?

Wiz: We are very interested in new pitches at the moment. We have a number of broadcast slots open because of the way we have rearranged our schedule. The main thing people with show ideas need to consider is that it is not about the idea or concept. A good concept does not make a show. A good, dedicated team, and a lot of effort in production make a show. A good concept helps because it makes it easier to attract people to the effort, and of course, once the show is produced, it makes it more appealing. But, building a team, and being realistic about the effort required at production are the most important things for people to consider. Two shows, “The Daily PWN” and “The Grid’s Honest Truth” are complete outside machinima productions which air on Treet.   Most people think Treet “wants” to produce everything.  That is not at all true, we are very receptive to people doing complete productions.   But – our requirements are rather stringent.

To be honest, the realities vary from show to show. For sports shows, there is no script, the main thing is being sure that announcers are ready, and that stats are prepared.  Some shows require a script, and there is a completely different team effort.  Some shows require 1 hour per week of pre-production, some shows require 40.

Texas: We are also keen to include serial stories to Treet. Not necessarily produced by us.

Lowell: Texas you mentioned serials and Wiz you mentioned earlier that story-telling is difficult – is that an area you’d like to do lots more in?

Texas: Yes, very much. Moving from a live broadcast model to post-produced drama / comedy is another exercise in “apples & oranges”.  :) But we are very interested in headed that way.

Wiz: Yes! We would love to have more people who are willing and interested in working with us on fictional series.

Lowell: Who are the core Treet TV team besides yourselves now?

Wiz: There are four of us that make up the core team right now, Wiz, Texas, August Lusch, and Yxes Delacroix. We have many other people assisting as well.

Lowell: Is Treet now a profit-making entity for you all? If so – what is your primary revenue source?

Wiz: No, Treet still runs in the red. It is funded by Texas and I. We do have a 24/7 studio which is unlike any other in the world, capable of doing these kinds of live broadcasts for anybody, so we are always interested in corporate work and other revenue, but ultimately, we are building a brand and an audience with Treet and revenue will require that it grow several times larger. As it is, however, Treet has over 100,000 monthly viewers across all our shows, but doing what we do is expensive, and even that many viewers doesn’t really generate enough revenue to fund this.

Lowell: Crystal-ball time: what are your ambitions for Treet in the coming 12-24 months?

Wiz: Expansion in two areas. First, to involve more and more independent machinima producers in Treet to take advatnage of our distribution and audience, and to add to the diversity of our content. Second, to move more and more into OpenSim specificaly and any other platforms we see that have “creator leverage” in the way Second Life does. We also have a couple interesting things we are doing that we can’t talk about . We also expect to continue to work more with Linden Lab – we have had many good joint promotions with Linden Lab and they have helped us fuel growth in many ways.

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A disclosure: I’ve appeared once on Tonight Live with Paisley Beebe and once on The 1st Question with Pooky Amsterdam.

Linden Lab have released third-quarter results for the Second Life economy. I use the term ‘released’ loosely, as it still grates on me how little information is released now compared to a couple of years back. That aside, the results show that aside from the 11% drop in overall user hours over the past year, coming mostly from those who spend more than 300 hours a month in Second Life, that things are steady. Or stagnant depending on your perspective. The only stark upside is the lift in web-based purchases for in-world goods (115% growth), although that’s skewed by the conglomeration of purchase options under the Linden Lab umbrella.

One of the most frequent questions I’m still asked when I talk virtual worlds with the uninitiated is: “hasn’t Second Life died?”. These stats again put paid to that misconception, but they also don’t provide much basis for evangelism either.