In the first half of 2008, virtual worlds raised $345 million in venture investment, according to data from Virtual Worlds Management, a media company that covers the industry. And while it may be easy to dismiss the virtual economy as frivolous or scoff at the idea of attending a virtual trade show as useless, deriding the intangible misses a crucial point about today's culture: A lot of it is happening online.

From World of Warcraft to relationships built on Facebook or MySpace to intensely personal blog entries, we are using the web to extend our real lives into virtual ones. It makes sense that an army of startups will follow us there, ready to supply us with tools that make our virtual lives more productive or enhance our virtual status. So even as Google struggles to monetize video advertising on YouTube and social networks pray for higher CPMs, there is money to be made selling virtual swords and trade show booths.

Given that gaming, all the way back to Dungeons & Dragons offline to World of Warcraft online, has long pushed the envelope when it comes to building virtual worlds, it's easy to see why their players are among the most comfortable buying and selling binary-based goods. Since games are where a lot of this began, it's where a lot of investment dollars continue to flow. Earlier this week, Social Gaming Network netted an investment, the value of which was undisclosed, from Amazon Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos' personal fund. SGN creates games for social networks such as MySpace and Facebook, and makes some of its revenue from the sale of virtual goods.

Last week Challenge Games, the Austin, Texas-based startup behind the popular casual role-playing game Duels, raised $4.5 million in a first round funding. Ironically it started its very real relationship with its newfound venture backer, Sequoia Capital, after a Sequoia partner attempted to purchase a pack of virtual armor. More than swordplay, sparking those real-world relationships is where the future of virtual worlds is headed as socially networked and digitally savvy generations rise in the corporate ranks.

Research firm eMarketer expects the number of teen Internet users visiting virtual worlds to rise to 20 million by 2011 from just 8.2 million in 2007. Expectations like these are driving investments in virtual worlds largely populated by teens, such as the $11 million Series C round of funding Gaia Online took in this week. That world makes money by selling virtual goods and advertisements.

Despite the hype surrounding Corporate America's embrace of Second Life, which included stories about conducting job interviews in the metaverse and its very own news bureau, there is a business model around enterprises going virtual when it comes to conferences and collaboration. Just ask Cisco Systems, which has been quite busy in Second Life as of late.

According to the 2006 Meetings Marketing Report by the International Congress & Convention Association, corporations spend an average of $107 billion sending employees to conventions and in-person meetings. The number of conventions and meetings that year totaled 1,243,600.

Eliminating some of those costs -- and the need to meet face to face at all -- is one of the advantages of virtual conferencing, which explains why On24, a webcasting and virtual event producer, raised $8 million in funding on Tuesday. Many gamers and young adults bring their avatars into the workplace and are comfortable holding meetings online. To some this sort of communication may seem awkward, trendy or forced, but that's at least partly because an older generation of workers isn't used to managing online relationships.

The rise of the virtual won't supplant the economy and relationships of the real world, but it will augment them. However, until bringing your virtual wealth and friends with you around the web becomes easier, virtual worlds will remain fragmented and bereft of their full economic potential. True data portability could allow people to create one digital persona that travels the web, paying money to access certain worlds via subscription, but able to leave that world and still seamlessly connect with friends made there. There’s still too much real-world work required to link your various avatars and social network in multiple worlds. Solving that problem is yet another venture opportunity.

This post was originally published on BusinessWeek.com.

Gaia Online, a virtual world targeted at teens, on Monday said it has raised $11 million in a series C round of financing from Institutional Venture Partners.

The round brings its total financing to more than $32 million. Its previous investors include Benchmark Capital, Redpoint Ventures, and Time Warner.

The San Jose, Calif.-based company, founded in 2003, is among the most popular virtual communities for young people online, with reportedly more than 5 million monthly visitors (or 350,000 people who log on daily) who play games, socialize, and buy virtual goods in its marketplace.

Last year, the company hired celebrated economist Michael Boskin, a Stanford University professor, to be its chief economist.

Craig Sherman, CEO of Gaia, said the company plans to use the funds to continue developing the site. This summer, for example, Gaia said it will introduce a casual (and free) Flash-based massively multiplayer online game, or MMO, that has been in development since last year.

The funds are surely meant to help fend off a throng of rivals, such as Teen Second Life, and ensure that Gaia capitalizes on a growing population of teens in virtual worlds. Researchers estimate that the audience of teens in virtual worlds will more than double, to 20 million members, within the next three years.

Taken from:
Link ]]> http://gigaom.wordpress.com/?p=14142 Mon, 14 Jul 2008 11:00:37 +0000 Om Malik http://gigaom.wordpress.com/?p=14142 With Web 2.0 fever finally starting to wane, the investor community has been pumping some serious dollars into virtual worlds and MMOGs -- about $345 million in 39 virtual worlds in the first six months of 2008. And the third quarter has started off with a bang, with veteran (it was started in 2003) virtual world/online community Gaia Online announcing that it has raised $11 million in Series C funding from Institutional Venture Partners. Gaia raised $12 million last year from DAG Ventures, Benchmark Capital and Redpoint Ventures; its funding now totals $32 million. Interestingly, none of the older investors participated in the latest round. The new money indicates that the San Jose, Calif.-based company might not be profitable just yet.

Last year, when Disney acquired Club Penguin for about $700 million, the conventional wisdom was that Gaia would be the next one to get snapped up. Since then, we've heard rumors that the company was talking to quite a few suitors.

The reason there has been an increased investor interest in virtual worlds is because the sector captures a highly lucrative younger demographic, notably teenagers. eMarketer expects the number of teen Internet users visiting virtual worlds to rise to 20 million by 2011 -- from just 8.2 million in 2007. And unlike the demographic of the traditional gaming business, which is facing a crisis of attention, teens tend to be a more engaged audience, and are more likely to participate in virtual economies and newer forms of advertising.

Gaia's attempts at commercialization have met with some resistance from its community -- read the comments in response to one of our previous posts. Nevertheless, it still has a thriving community and continues to grow at a rapid clip.

Virtual Greats est une filiale de l’agence Millions of Us qui a pour objectif de monétiser des produits dérivés d’artistes dans 60 mondes virtuels. Les premiers artistes signés sont Justin Timberlake, Elvis Presley Enterprises, Snoop Dogg, Paris Hilton, Raven Symone, Tila Tequila et l’incroyable Hulk. La customisation va de l’avatar entier aux détails tels que coupe de cheveux, ligne de vêtements, animations diverses, les expressions ou phrases cultes...

Un premier accord avec Gaia Online qui compte 5 millions de visiteurs uniques a été signé.

The inspiration for Virtual Greats came when I realized that this was a $1.5 billion market without any high-value copyrighted material," said Reuben Steiger, CEO of Millions of Us

Virtual Greats

Moove
Click here
A picture of Heidi Ballinger in "Moove"

GAIA Online
Click here
A picture of Heidi Ballinger in "Gaia Online"

There
Click here
A picture of Heidi Ballinger in "There"

Active Worlds
Click here
A picture of Heidi Ballinger in "Active Worlds"

At the Uni (research project) we have to look at many different virtual places (not only Second Life), and we also have to look at MMO's.

Age Of Conan
Click here to visit Age Of Conan

So, my professor (Sisse Siggaard Jensen) and I are about to join "Age Of Conan" the next months, testing.
Can't wait to play this games (lol just thinking of Sisse and I, go fighting in this violent game) :-)

I have big expectations to this game.
Last month I joined the "Nordic Game Conference", and attended FunCom's talk of Age Of Conan (Jørgen Tharaldsen gave us an awesome presentation of the game). The game was launched last month, and before the launch they already had more than 1 million users!

Eve Online
Click here to visit Eve Online
I have just ordered "Eve Online".
I think my summer will be dedicated to "Age Of Conan" and "Eve".

Unity3D
The other day Johan showed me this awesome 3D browser (I haven't seen anything that beautiful, only browser based). And the Island has an intelligent ostrich - running away from you every time you come near.

Click here to view Unity3D

3dxplorer
This is a really good platform to create your own virtual world. Check it out!!!
Click here to view 3dxplorer

We have three new bloggers with us. Amie, Kiara ( who I have mentioned MORE than once. lol ^^ ) and Jon. Yay. We are now called "Zombie Bunnies of America" because I couldn't come up with a better blog name. I'll still be pursuing the 101thingstodo but as Lu's no longer here we're no long 101 things to do with dru and Lu. For obvious reasons.

So, as we've got our new peoples ( say hello everyone "Hello everyone!" ) and as we're all on Gaia ( with the exception of Jon. He's on there but mainly because I asked him to. ) I'm going to request that everyone makes themselves an avatar with a Grunny. Because they're our sort of our...you know, mascot?

So...yeah. Make a tek tek with a grunny. Or a screen shot of normal you with a grunny.

I don't care. I just want hard core grunny action!

And also...I want to make a little collage with all of us with a multitude of grunnies. Because they're our mascot.

So...

xxdruxx

Since comming back my Orange egg hatched and I adopted a 2-Tone egg.  My Black egg has a hole in it as well.  I think it will hatch before morning.

I posted all of them on Gaia.  One has already jumped from 30 to 160 views!

Well, time to go to bed.  Sleep well sweet internets....

I've haven't talked about him before, but I have this really unique fish called a Black Ghost Knife that I've named Cole.  I've had him for about a year and a half and for all of that time he's been stuck in this little 10gal tank because my large tank (55gal) had fish that kept dieing from an unknown disease.  Now that has FINALLY gotten cleared up I was able to move him over yesterday.  He's grown from 3-4 inches when I first got him to about 7 or so inches now.  He seems to be adjusting just fine to the new tank.  Because he's nocturnal I kept the tank lights off last night.  I usually have them on from 4pm to midnight, so the rest of my fish were a little confused by the darkness, but it gave him time to search everything out.
If you want to see some pics of Black Ghost Knife fish here are some examples:  pic 1,  pic 2,  pic 3,  pic 4.  As you can see they are thin "knife" shaped, or as one of my friends said, they look like a feather from a large bird.  They have a fin that travels from right under their gils all the way to their tail, and it is their main form of propulsion.  Cole eats frozen bloodworms, and is very perticular about what brand.  He only likes San Fransisco Bay Brand.  Every other brand he just noses around looking for the "good stuff".  While other owners have said that their BGK likes brine shrimp and flake food, Cole never touches them and will only eat "his favorite".

That's all for now....

Kind of puts Ning into perspective, doesn't it?

So why, when the likes of me talk about social networking, are forums so often left out of the conversation?  Is it because they feel like transistors to Web 2.0's silicon?  Because forums are inevitably trees rather than rhizomes?  Or because they're difficult to navigate, demand considerable investments of time and energy and oblige you to go out and work for your content and connections whilst the average self-styled social network simply drops them in your lap?  There's certainly an exponentially smaller level of technical investment involved in getting one up and running, mind you.

Hmm.  Perhaps forums are more like a village square or market place where anyone can listen in to a conversation (is Twitter simply a massive unthreaded forum?) and perhaps that's the attraction for  a demographic like The Student Room.  Of course, the same could be said of online communities like Club Penguin or Second Life but there's nothing quite as instantaneous as low-end tech.  The most active and invaluable forums, come to think of it, are found wherever geeks congregate, be that Slashdot (still the model for forum management) and Ars Technica.

One thing I remember (from helping set up the original BBC Online forums with Lizzie Jackson, who did most of the hard work, incidentally) is that successful forums are expensive if you need to moderate them - unless you can get your users to moderate them for you.  But that's another story (more detail from Laurel Papworth here).

(And I suppose if a forum is a village square, a blog is a bloke on a soapbox shouting randomly at passers-by.)

While I'm not one to bash on character customization (how many hours did I spend in the Rock Band clothing store again?) but Gaia's focus seems to be entirely on that, making it a tricky thing to really sink into. Their secret lies in getting people to earn Gold by doing stuff they really like to do--like watch videos and play games, post art and talk on forums. Doing fun things earns you points AKA Gaia Gold, and using that Gold you can buy stuff on the market--a market which consists of stores generated by Gaia and a bidding/selling system with other players. On this market, you can get accessories and hats and dark haloes and burning swords of Oblivion--all of this can go on a little virtual representation of you (far cooler than you have ever looked in real life, of course) and you can show yourself off to the millions of other Gaia players who are all wearing similar equipment.

In the end everyone is so intricate and complex and covered in stuff that it's severely hard to stand out anymore, and it's gotten me to the point of slowing my insane rampage to find all the cool items I wanted.

In my experience, however, I did get to understand a great deal about this online community and why it works--particularly their market system. I've been comparing it to other markets in other games, and took the following examples: City of Heroes, which a friend of mine took the time to explain to me, and elaborated on the confusing market system; World of Warcraft, where I looked at the standard bidding system; EVE Online came to mind; and finally the real world Stock Market, how it works and how it fluctuates.

Surprisingly, out of all those markets, it's most similar to the Stock Market, somehow, despite that it's a buying and selling bidding system, with buy now prices and user-placed bidding increments. Basically, depending on the popularity of a particular item, its market value increases or decreases and people begin to buy or sell more as that fluctuates. Items like Naruto headbands, angel wings and the old-school favorite "Ancient Katana" are constantly high in the hundred thousands for cost, where items that you could purchase in a shop or that have only recently been released--even if they are special edition--are pretty much cheap buys. Usually, you're better off buying new releases directly from the Gaia Stores--players will be itching to earn profit off their own buys and will be selling expensive on the bidding market.

The market has a few broken issues; for example, people can just pull their auctions out at the last minute if they don't like the buy price at no penalty cost to them, and putting an auction up costs no real money, either. It's only when you sell an item that a "broker's fee" is applied, balancing out the market by removing money from the game, but then the prices become a tad inflated from overpricing, so people can earn back that 6k Gold they lose from selling a 300k item.

But that's not the issue--the real problem is how difficult it is to actually get your hands on some of those items because so many people on Gaia are jerks. I'm not saying all, and if you're reading this and agreeing with me you know exactly what I'm talking about. You're seconds away from getting an Ancient Katana for 180k Gold, and the seller decides that because their Buy Now price is 250k, they don't want to settle for that much less, and so they pull their auction out and lose nothing.

All in all, watching the Gaia Market, predicting which items will sell and which ones won't and collecting your own list of cool stuff is extremely addictive. I really like my little character, even if there's probably a hundred thousand people who have characters that are very similar. It's an interesting thing about Gaia--it's like a game, but it's not, and yet people play it all the time. There's games in it. You can make a game of it. It's just one of those quasi-existential things. Gaia doesn't even know what it is. I used to call it an art site. I started calling it an anime site. Now, I'm just not sure what it is anymore. It's a community, filled with all the different things communities do.

Then again, looking on that, doesn't World of Warcraft fit the definition of a community, too?

Good afternoon I wish!

I decided to make out of my online businesses A BIG thing. In meaning ... *whahahahaWHAHAHAHAJAHAH*, lol sorry ... Where was I? Oh, right. I'll be putting some portals at every post from now on at the bottom of the message ^.^! ( You'll see what I mean ... ) Well, I have only ONE MORE GOD DAMN IT WEEK of school. Afterwards supppeeer long holidays. *Yush ... I'm already day dreaming ...* Never mind. I'll be making pixel and vector art!!! *WEeee* About YouChoob ... well I dunno about it ... but I do am gonna make a popular thing about DSA! ( DivinelySweetAddict ). I've got a new haircut o.o! About my fanfiction ... but sure I'll writte more of it o_o! Omg, these Ice cream, pudding, choco thing mix cup was so delicious! I'll hopefully also make some music! ( Yush! My OWN music ... If I will ever make it ... ) I can dream can't I?

And many MANY more up to come in only ... 13 days!!! *WHHAAAHAHAHAHA - cough, cough*

Meh Gallerie! Welcome to LolliRuriKiki! OMFGP!

My Latest Drawing

Sarcasticat says: This is the best blog I've ever read.

Bad kitty.

Emma
—Raws of most of the Emma Bangaihen chapters are now available.

Hellsing
Gentlemen, We Love War: a Millennium fanmix
Sketch - The Dance (art, PG)
Post-dance relaxation (art, PG)
'Teggy Loves Spaghetti (art, G)

—New layout at Shine Hell. There's also a page for fanmixes.
—The Hellsingpuffs are making a comeback! Six scenes freshly uploaded, and counting!

Next Week in Shine:
Research! Logical deduction! Catboy mischief! Pip, of all people, has a flash of insight about vampires! But will it be enough?

Via Soitu m'entere de que el dia 25 va acabar la primera Web 2.0 expo d'enguany, celebrada a San Francisco. Les Web 2.0 expo són cites obligatòries per a estar al tant del que es cuina al món de les 2.0 i quines són les tendències. En aquesta, el guru Tim O'Reilly va llançar un missatge positiu: malgrat la crisi encara queda molt per fer i dir, invocant la computació ambient com a objectiu.

Altre guru, Jonathan Schwartz, considera que el moviment pràcticament s'ha acabat. I, quasi mentre ho deia, i segons explica vilaweb, el portal especialitzat Webware feia pública la llista de les 100 millors aplicacions web 2.0 del 2008.

M'agradaria destacar tres productes del top 10 que desconeixia : un cercador, Maxthon, i dues xarxes socials: Friendster i Gaia Online; els enllaços són a la fitxa de Webware.

Search: Answers.com, Ask.com, Google (ofcourse!), Google Earth, Google Maps, Hakia, Live Search, Wikia, Wikipedia, Yahoo!.

Browsing & Tools: Firefox, Google Reader, iGoogle, IE 7, iPhone, Maxthon, My Yahoo!, Opera, Safari, Windows Live Home.

Publishing: .MAC, Blogger, Drupal, Flickr, FotoFlexer, Photobucket, Picasa Web Albums, Twitter, Wordpress & Wordpress.com, Worth 1000.

Social: Bebo, Deviantart, Facebook, Friendster, Gaia Online, Google Groups, LiveJournal, MySpace, Stardoll, Yahoo! Groups.

It seems that Google won in every category except Audio, Utility & Security and Video. Thats still makes Google the winner in 7 out of 10 categories!

The complete list can be viewed here:
http://www.webware.com/html/ww/100/2008/winners.html

Prototype Sketch :::

To turn the table and get back to the forementioned subject of games this is what I'm downloading right now :

http://breadnbutter.outspark.com/

Courtesy of Outspark.com

You'll be able to find me there on my screen name : Vivid Omen.

Secret of the solstice seems to be very Ragnarok Online which I haven't played in QUITE a while and if I don't click with Solstice I'm thinking I'll go back to RO since Warcraft and I are not meshing very well lately.

Gaia Online – www.gaiaonline.com

In one sentence Gaia Online is an anime-themed forums-based website, where virtual currency ($$$$), infectious flash games and awesome virtual homes exist!

When you first explore the site you are denominated as a Gaian. You get to create an avatar (a cute anime character) and a virtual home; all of which you can customise yourself – whatever your untamed dreams conceive off. Thus being very invigorating personally, being ‘ahem’ a woman, who doesn’t mind the odd dress up and decorate here and there.

As a user you have the ability to change your characters skin tone, eye style and colour, hair style and colour, gender and fashion… Yes! You can posses as many clothes, hats, helmets, and some funky things (that I’m not too sure exactly what they are but hey what the hek I like them too) as you like. However… there is a catch. You need to acquire some Gaia dough. To obtain your Gaia riches, you need to engage in the website activities, for instance the Flash games and forums etc and who knows you could be a millionaire avatar in no time.  

So check it out and have some fun. Shake trees for money, play the puzzle games (my fave) and please be sure to cause a stir in the forums meheheh.

Most of the time, I fail entirely too often. So I decide to hit one of the Pinoy rooms. I don't speak any language other than English, so perhaps it is a bit selfish of me expecting others to know my language when I don't know theirs, but my argument is America's Poor Education System. Besides, I always try to help others polish their English if they need it, so I feel there's a fair exchange going on. At any rate, I was speaking to someone my own age for once, sitting somewhere in Brazil. We spoke on the healthcare systems of both countries, how cutting and burning the forest was illegal but how they continued to do so, and so on.

All in all it was a great talk with someone who didn't speak my own language normally. Connections FTW!

Another thing that I brought up was how I've noticed that most games I play on a regular basis, or used to, had a high concentration of Brazilians. (And these guys know how to tear up some Gunbound. >.< )

So I'm running a little low on steam right now, having been up a good while with a (self imposed) toothache from some home surgery, and I'd like to play a little more CS before I crash.

But for any Brazilians that wander by, HI THERE! Hope to see you on the Road and in Game.

Regards,

Scarab

1. Stardoll signs sponsorship deal around Nim movie - Featuring environments from the film and virtual items
2. Coca Cola launches avatar-based Facebook application - I wonder if they outsourced the development of this app
3. Habbo/Paramount licensing deal - Not all that new, but one of the most interesting I think. Talent/Literary agency WMA brokered this deal apparently