The development of the virtual life engines many call massively multiplayer online games is such that businesses and business executives are forced to take notice.
Business Week offers an
inside look into the bizarre world of virtual commerce--and trust me, it's seriously bizarre. The reporter delves into the virtual worlds of today's most popular MMO, Linden Lab's Second Life, a free,
Internet-based downloadable software application that lets users create and control an avatar that lives in a dynamically shifting and growing virtual world where the activities are created and
controlled by other users. Second Life is different from other MMOs in that games like Blizzard Entertainment's enormously popular World of Warcraft (in which users must pay to play) feature
warriors, hunters, orcs, or guildmasters competing against one another in a quest for gold and power. In Second Life, there isn't actually anything in particular to do, so new players often get lost
in the confusion. Because there's no central plot, users have to create things to do, which has opened the platform up to commerce. Linden dollars, as the game's currency is called, trade at 300 to
one U.S. dollar, and users are encouraged to use them to make things. You can buy property and build a home or a store, but you can also use the technology to customize the things you make, be it a
storefront, furniture or clothing, which gives people the opportunity to cash in on their creativity. Business Week goes in-depth into the various business opportunities afforded by Second Life,
including potential media buys for advertisers. As the site's user base exceeds 170,000, some of the more successful virtual businesses earning six figures or more are having to hire real-world
executives to manage explosive growth.
Read the whole story at Business Week »
