Virtual Worlds - Second Life and MTV's Leapfrog Initiative – Virtual Hills and Laguna Beach

 

Web 2.0 – The Virtual Self   

Second Life and MTV's Leapfrog Initiative – Virtual Hills and Laguna Beach

 

The February 2007 issue of Wired magazine has an article titled "A Second Life for MTV" by Mark Wallace.  The article describes MTV'S newest program – Virtual Hills and Laguna Beach.  They call it a Leapfrog Intiative.

MTV executives are "scrambling to catch up the with hot new hangout spots on the Web.....With its headlong leap into virtual worlds, MTV hopes to forge MySpace 2.0 – and find it's way back to the cutting edge."

"When (MTV exec) Matt Bostwick pitched his ambition vision of an avatarized environment, the network still hadn't fully embraced the Web.  But (MTV exec) Van Toffler's reaction was , 'That's the scariest shit I've ever seen, man. Let's do it'"

"Leapfrog was born, and its first venture would be tied to Laguna Beach, one of MTVs top-rated shows."  The article continues to explain how MTV used the technology currently used by There.com, because it "runs more smoothly, looks prettier, and gives developers tighter control... - a perfect fit for MTV."

Virtual Laguna Beach launched in September  2006  drew 300,00 sign ups in the first ten weeks, compare to Second Life, which took three years to attract that many members. Since the article isn't available on the Wired website yet, this short article explains what MTV is doing with their Leapfrog Initiative.

Second Life is A virtual world that readers may be more familiar with.  I have been following this application since reading about it on the Fourth Turning chatboards. There have been numerous articles about Second Life in the New York Times, Wired, and other MSM.  Photojournalist Rita J. King has been blogging about her experiences on Second Life on her own blog and on the Huffington Post. She calls her avatar Eureka Dejavu, and has been letting her readers experience her adventures in Second Life. She calls the blog Eureka Dejavu, Sex, Money and Fame in Second Life. 

Second Life is much more "do it yourself" than the MTV application, or other virtual communities like There.com.  In Second Life, the user is responsible for creating their own avatar, learning how to manipulate it, dressing it, getting it a place to live, and finding it's own way around the virtual world.  For those who don't have programming ability, time or the inclination, you can purchase "upgrades" to your avatar with Linden dollars.  Linden dollars are converted from real currency.  People have actually become real life millionaires by selling services and upgrades on Second Life. Corporations, advertisers, even political candidates are creating their own presence on Second Life to sell their product or agenda. Their have even been music concerts, lectures, and movie previews on Second Life.  Even though there are not many users as compared to MySpace, currently 150 million, the users are considered influential early adopters.

Second Life has an official blogger, Wagner James Au.  His blog is called "New World Notes."   He has links to  Bloggers, Periodicals, Podcasts, Wikis, Company Blogs, Linden Lab Blogs, and Metaverse Blogs, all within Second Life.  There are even links to a "real world" company called Millions of Us.  This company helps the above mentioned corporations figure out how to utilize Second Life.  Their motto is, "Millions of Us.  Virtual Worlds,  Real Brands."

Au also has an academic article on a peer reviewed journal on the Internet called First Monday.  It's called "Taking New World Notes - An embedded journalist's rough guide to reporting from inside the Internet's next evolution ." 

I haven't attempted creating an avatar on Second Life yet.  I am already too much of an internet addict and  it would take away from my Ebaying.

This is a snapshot of Eureka Dejavu on

Second Life.  She is chatting with an artist named Aimee Weber.

 

Here is the article about launch of Virtual Laguna Beach

    MTV's Leapfrog Initiative.

 

Comments

[John J. Xenakis]

I'm waiting for someone to set up some virtual world software that allows me to set up the virtual world that I want, and then beam myself into it. Then, when I'm in that world on the other side of my monitor screen, I'll look back at this world and see what I'm not missing.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
http://GenerationalDynamics.com

[John Moravec]

Well done!

I updated my post on this to point back to you... http://www.educationfutures.com/2007/01/22/mtv-leapfrogs/

Kudos!
jm

[Joe]

I am a little skeptical about this. To me, the hype is based around the fact that young people (people in their 20's) are gravitating to these products, and commercial enterprises are using them to advertise.

Part of this, I fear, is creating virtual selves and trading away development of our "meatspace" selves and connections to others.

I don't doubt that online tools can help develop communities, but I'm still weighing out for myself how much they actually contribute to this, and how much they are time detractors.

[Alvis Brigis]

Nice summary Janet! SL is indeed a big deal and on the road to diffusion. The potential applications are endless and the interest level is staggering. You might also want to check out multiverse.net (former netscapers)and google the recent talk about google creating their own Second Life by mixing Google Earth, SketchUp and Google CheckOut. IMO, SL, Multiverse and Google Earth look to be the Big 3 initial Metaverse players. There.com and Areae may also emerge as forces, but must pull off some slick innovation to leapfrog the Three Amigos.

Also, check out the ElectricSheepCompany.com and Rivers Run Red. Both companies have more going on than Millions of Us. E-Sheep, in particular, could emerge as the leading Metaverse solutions provider, either them or IBM.

Also, here's a cool thread on Terra Nova http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2007/01/open_source_and.html
by Cory Ondrejka, CTO of SL, predicting Metaverse-related events for 2007.

Final note: in a world that is accelerating rapidly, 3D VWs such as SL are an inevitable development.