When presenting Second Life to friends or clients, there is always a question which ends up to be raised, and believe it or not, this is always the same one. Guess what ? "Why is there no one here ?" And then maybe you would go hmmm or you would desperately try to find someone there on your friend list to make a demonstration that you are not totally alone in the world...

Strangely, no one would ever ask this question when you are surfing on the web. Unless you are in a chat, on a private logged area or on twitter, there is no ways to know who is visiting a website at the same moment that you. You just know that the internet keeps growing, on and on, bigger and bigger. Same here in Second Life, the world is larger, wilder, and the community, engaged and strong, develops itself worldwide.

Linden Lab's late figures & metrics are here to attest on this, and they are quite impressive.

• In total, users around the world have spent more than one billion hours in Second Life. That's roughly 115,000 years spent doing everything from meeting and socializing with friends; to attending live concerts; to creating, selling, and shopping for virtual goods; to learning a foreign language; to attending business meetings; and much more. User hours grew 33% year-over-year to an all-time high of 126 million in Q2 2009.
• Second Life Residents spend an average of about 100 minutes inworld per visit. This average session time is significantly greater than those seen with popular social networking websites and reveals the uniquely high level of engagement Residents have with Second Life.
• More than 18 billion minutes of voice chat have been used in Second Life since voice was introduced in 2007. Voice minutes grew 44% year-over-year from Q2 2008 to Q2 2009, and more than six billion minutes of voice have been delivered in 2009 alone, making Linden Lab a major VoIP provider.
• Approximately 1,250 text-based messages are sent every second in Second Life, and more than 600 million words are typed on an average day. Roughly 60% of active Second Life Residents based outside of the US, representing more than 200 countries, and the Second Life Viewer available in 10 languages.

That is just about communications.... But if you look at the land it is even more striking.
That was Second Life land in 2002...
.. and this is Second Life in 2009.
The total land area of Second Life is now equivalent to approximately two billion square meters – roughly the size of the state of Rhode Island. Land in Second Life has grown roughly 18% from Q1 of 2009 and approximately 75% since Q1 of 2008. As the creator and original seller of all virtual land in Second Life, Linden Lab is not only the provider of the worlds largest platform for user-generated virtual goods, but also a leading virtual goods vendor itself.

Ok, so if all of those datas are true facts, what is the problem ?
Well, imagine that you open a shop, a hotel, a library, or any commercial place in the middle of nowhere somewhere in France, or England, or anywhere in the world. How would you expect anyone would know about it and arrive there - except in the Bagdad Café movie, you know, as we know, this is all about advertising and marketing.

Setting a presence in Second Life is not only about building the most beautiful headquarters, with great functionnalities, that you can buzz all over the net. It is also and primarily about building a faithful and engaged audience which will fill the place (under control) on a daily base. It starts by working on organic search the way you would work on the SEO of your website, and deploying a real strategy of content, links, conversations, and useful services for the community you target, for a maximum visibility and traffic.

Whether you are a small SL business willing to expand, or a real life corporate company wishing to enter and conquer immersive internet territories, you should definitely establish a presence strategy prior to any other decisions...

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Kennt man doch, wird doch überall in den Stadien gesungen, das Lied. Auf dem Fußballplatz ist damit natürlich was anderes gemeint. »Alone« hat nämlich noch nie Tore geschossen.

Aber darum soll es hier nicht gehen. Wie immer spreche ich von virtuellen Welten und ... von Second Life, denn genau da will man auch nicht alleine sein. Da will man möglichst viele Menschen um sich haben. Immer.

In einer jüngst veröffentlichten Umfrage, die das Verhalten von Second Life Nutzern (von Insidern Residents genannt) untersuchte, kam heraus, dass chatten, spielen und Events besuchen zu den Lieblingsbeschäftigungen in Second Life gehört. Gut, das wundert einen nun nicht so unbedingt.

In der gleichen Studie war aber auch noch etwas anderes zu lesen. Dabei störten sich die meisten SL-Bewohner daran, dass in den meisten Orten, so schön sie auch sein mögen, einfach keiner rumläuft. Will meinen, ähh ... da ist einfach keiner. Es ist sozusagen menschenleer. Niemand da zum spielen, niemand da zum chatten. Insbesondere wenn man bedenkt, wie viel Aufwand Unternehmen betreiben, um einigermaßen ansehnliche Präsenzen in Second Life zu kreieren, wundert es demnach nicht, dass sich immer wieder die eine oder andere Niederlassung aus der virtuellen Welt wieder verabschiedet, die vorher großartig angekündigt wurde. Mercedes Benz, adidas, Sony, TUI, Vodafone – die Liste der Aussteiger ist so lang wie prominent.

Aber woran liegt das eigentlich? Wo sind denn all die vielen Residents, die sich laut letzter Linden Lab Verlautbarung (siehe hier) in Second Life tummeln und im letzten Quartal Waren im Wert von umgerechnet 150.000.000(!!!) US$ (in Worten: einhundertfünfzigmillionen) untereinander gehandelt haben? Immerhin sprechen die SL-Erfinder von mehr als 54.000 Residents, die im 3. Quartal 2009 im Schnitt zeitgleich online waren.

Dazu mal folgendes: Ich glaube , die wenigsten machen sich eine Vorstellung davon, wie groß Second Life mittlerweile ist. Als ich Anfang 2007 mein virtuelles Leben startete, sprach man davon, das Second Life den Umfang des Großraums München hat (wobei ich jetzt nicht darüber diskutieren möchte, ob man München und das Wort GROSSRAUM überhaupt in irgendeine Verbindung bringen kann, smile).

Oben sehen wir die Generalkarte (Map) von Second Life. Diese kleinen grünen Dots, die da wie wahllos hingeworfen aussehen, sind jeweils 65.000 qm. Das Blaue dazwischen ist einfach nur Platz, Speicher um genau zu sein. Und jetzt stellen wir uns einmal vor, hier, irgendwo verteilen sich 54.000 Einwohner.

Nun? Genau. Es verwundert wohl kaum, dass es schon mit dem Teufel zugehen muss, wenn man dort jemanden antrifft. Was natürlich trotzdem passiert. Soviel mal dazu.

Und diese kleine Betrachtung zeigt uns dann auch gleich noch etwas anderes: Es bringt sozusagen überhaupt nichts, sich besonders viel Mühe zu geben, um eine wundervolle Landschaft oder Unternehmenspräsenz zu kreieren, wenn man nicht dafür sorgt, dass die Einwohner davon erfahren. Das heißt, man muss in Second Life dafür werben, dass die Leute kommen, konsumieren und kaufen. Wie im richtigen Leben auch. Und obwohl Second Life wirklich alle Techniken für marketingrelevante Aktionen bietet, scheinen Unternehmen immer wieder zu vergessen, was genau sie tun müssen, um die Bewohner von Second Life auf sich aufmerksam zu machen. Schade eigentlich.

Das es auch anders geht, zeigt die Präsenz von EnBW in Second Life. Auf insgesamt 4 SIMS (vier Inseln á 65.000 qm) zeigt das Energieunternehmen, wie man in Second Life mit der Zielgruppe kommuniziert. Da wird Technologie erklärt, Energiesparmaßnahmen aufgezeigt und ein Quiz mit leckeren Gewinnen für die Residents sorgt für den nötigen Traffic dort. Und am besten kommt wohl an, dass Bewohner sich hier Ihr eigenes »Kraftwerk for free« besorgen können. Damit auf deren eigenen Inseln nicht das Licht ausgeht. Respekt. So muss man es machen. Mehr Infos findet man auf der EnBW SL-Website.

So, das musste mal gesagt werden. Und nun hier noch ein kleiner Film, der zeigt, dass Second Life auch schön sein kann, wenn man nicht überall Schlange stehen muss. Einfach ansehen und genießen.

Ich freu mich! Wie immer ...

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Small study tour of the Berlin Wall in Second Life and Twinity, or how to implement a moment of great history in a real-time 3D world .... The idea is to pass not only a series of contents, texts and images, in the memory of the learner, but the real sensation of "separation" in a capital city, and above all the confinement of a part of the city and its people - part of the "free world" - in another hostile world "under dictatorship."...

Explaining this might seem a bit simplistic, but the intention of the author of this blog is not to give a history lesson!

Immersive Internet offers all the components and the qualities to develop new ways of teaching History. It is deeply different from all the audiovisual documentaries since it owns the capacity to make you "feel", cognitively speaking. It does participate only to the intellectual construction, but to the sensorial construction. And in this sense, it changes everything, opening the door to a memorisation where the individual learner can appropriate himself the facts as part of his own history.

Bet that traditional educational publishers will hear the message, and that teachers of the 21st century will also consider educationnal travel for school into virtual environments suitable for children. This won't take anything away from real visits and tours of the sites, but in reality quite the opposite ...

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Press release :
Following a thorough application and vetting process, MakeMyWorlds has been selected by Linden Lab as one of his 39 gold solutions providers all over the world, for Second Life and the brand new Second Life Enterprise.

"The Gold Solution Provider program identifies highly qualified providers who have demonstrated a high level of client satisfaction (through the review of client references) and have developed successful projects on behalf of businesses, governments, educational institutions, and other business organizations in Second Life. For example, Gold Solution Providers have created projects for companies and institutions such as Adobe, Cisco Systems, Michelin, Wiley Publishing, Imperial College of London, and the Goethe Institute. ..

Gold Solution Providers are top-quality providers for large businesses and international corporations looking for a Solution Provider to help them develop their Second Life strategy and presence. Services that Gold Solution Providers offer include developing facilities to hold company meetings and events, holding trainings and seminars, creating simulations for educators to recreate science experiments, organizing and managing conferences and mixed media events, and growing successful Second Life communities around client brands and experiences. "

Created by Kai-Michael Schmuck (Hambourg) and Hélène Zuili (Paris), MakeMyWorlds is the first franco-german agency coming from Second Life to get this qualification. MakeMyWorlds helps its clients to integrate virtual worlds by engaging into powerful communication strategies, both internal and external, on very diverse audience & targets, using technologies coming from games or immersive internet. MakeMyWorlds also builds specific products based on training and coaching to accompany changes, and this can be done in french, english or german. Among its clients, MakeMyWorlds is happy to count the Swiss Stem Cells Bank, Konolive 2go, FrontRange, the National Realtors Association (NAR), a few european communication and advertising agencies and a few educative departments from universities or schools.

For any information , contact Hélène Zuili - "helene (at) makemyworlds.com" - or Kai-Michael Schmuck - "kms (at) makemyworlds.com"

Second Life and Linden Lab are trademarks of Linden Research, Inc

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Diesmal was in eigener Sache. Es ist passiert und wir sind ein ganz klein wenig stolz darauf: Seit dem 2. November 2009 gehört makemyworlds.com zu den weltweit 39 Firmen, die aufgrund ihrer speziellen Erfahrung und der zahlreichen Projekte in virtuellen Welten von Linden Lab (dem Anbieter der 3D Plattform Second Life) in den erlauchten Kreis der Gold Solution Provider berufen wurde.

Das von Linden Lab ins Leben gerufene Solution Provider Programm steht für die eindeutige und letztendlich auch konsequente Ausrichtung auf Business, denn hier wird Know-how gebündelt und für Unternehmen, die virtuelle Umgebungen als Collaboration Plattform nutzen wollen, zur Verfügung gestellt. Und einer muss es ja machen. ;-)).

Nimmt man die jüngste Verlautbarung Linden Labs hinzu, in der das Release der neuen »Behind the Firewall« Solution namens Second Life Enterprise angekündigt wird, dann wird die Sache rund. Denn jetzt ist es möglich, eine virtuelle Umgebung auf dem eigenen Server zu installieren, mit den gleichen und noch mehr Features zu nutzen und dabei gleichzeitig die Sicherheitsrichtlinien von Unternehmen zu integrieren. Das war bisher immer ein Showstopper, denn wer will schon gerne, dass eine Horde von abgedrehten Pferde quer durch die eigenen Pressekonferenz läuft.

Eben.

SLE – welche Strategie dahinter steckt und wie Unternehmen davon profitieren können, erzählte Mark Kingdon (M Linden) auf der Enterprise 2.0 Conference. Bitte beachten: die kleine Performance mit den Laserpointern. Sehr nett.

Sie kann also losgehen, die Verknüpfung von virtuellen Umgebungen und Business. Und niemand ist so gespannt wie ich. Aber ich glaube ja stets an das Gute.

Liest man übrigens die einschlägigen Blogs, dann scheine ich allerdings der einzige zu sein, der das Gute sieht. Da wird gepostet was das Zeug hält, und nimmt man alles zusammen, dann machen sich die üblichen Verdächtigen gerade mal wieder ein wenig ins Hemd. Da sagen die einen, dass Linden Lab den Aufwand besser in die Verbesserung der Performance des Main Grid hätte stecken sollen, anstatt eine isolierte SL-Lösung zu entwickeln. Die anderen klagen, warum nur Gold Solution Provider SLE vermarkten dürften und nicht alle. Und dann gibt es welche, die einfach nicht verstehen, warum der ach so schnöde Mammon nun auch Einzug in diese virtuelle Welt hält. (Als ob das nicht schon längst passiert wäre.) Und so weiter und so fort.

Die meisten scheinen nicht zu verstehen, dass SLE so rein gar nichts mit Second Life zu tun hat, wenn man von der Basistechnologie einmal absieht. Es ist keine Business-Parallelwelt zu SL, nichts wird verdrängt, nichts gerät in den Hintergrund. Im Gegenteil. Ich bin davon überzeugt, dass durch den Einsatz von SLE die Akzeptanz virtueller Welten generell steigen wird. Und davon profitiert auch SL. Glaube ich.

So sei es.

PS: Der Kontakt zu makemyworlds.com ist ganz einfach!

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A couple of weeks ago, Philip Rosedale (aka Philip Linden) announced that he was quitting his job at Second Life to work on a new company of his own, though staying in the Linden Lab Board. Same day, Amanda Linden was publishing a post called "The Time for Work Avatars has Arrived". A few days after, Linden Lab was announcing the date of the official launching of Nebraska on November 4th, the enterprise project which will allow companies to create their own virtual environment on their own server, so called "behind the firewall solution".

It has been a long way since I entered Second Life for the first time in 2006. At that time, it was all about socialization, sex, games, shopping and money. THE PLACE for your imagination. I came to look and to undertand what it was all about, I started to create and to meet people from of all over the world, and despite the mockeries of all kind around me, I stayed there and started to really integrate Second Life to my real life, thru work and thru personal relationships.

I had no plans. It just happened. At this time of my life, it just perfectly met my needs and my lacks, with many ingredients which stimulates my brain : creativity, people from "elsewhere", technology, game, experiment, adventure... It was as we say the meeting of chance and necessities.

I was lucky enough to make the right choices and met the right people, but maybe i just met the people i could only meet considering who I was. A friend of mine told me one day that virtual meeting on the net were all about our unconscious and maybe it really is.

I entered very quickly into a semi-professionnal project with the creation of Feel At Home and of one of the first virtual "ClubMed", bungalows on the beach, meeting center, pool parties etc.. I remember my astonishment shared with my first friend ab Vanmoer from Canada, while preparing a bungalow for a "just married" couple ... "What I am doing here ? LOL !"

At that time, Second Life became the darling of the medias and a lot of professionnal actors came inworld to see what they could do with it, thinking for a lot of them, they could just transpose some kind of communication means they would do with print or traditionnal medias. That is how I met Pietro Veragouh, from Switzerland, working on behalf of the Swiss Stem Cells Bank and created for them my first immersive Headquarters site in Second Life. We encoutered many challenges on a technical point of view which were hard to complete. But we did it, and that project was really nice to do. Thru it, I met new friends like Blaise Timtam from the Guided Tour System or Porky Gorky from Hydro Houses.

On my first sim Tulip Island, I still had time to share and meet. And I met a lot of people of all kinds, among whom some became real bonds : Master Quatro, my good friend from Boston who was at that time the main "commercial director" for Anshe Chung land business, Aron Chapman from Heidelberg, whom I shared many important conversations before he became a virtual assassin, Waldfon Shwartsman, a german wine lover, who divorced and marry the Californian Kitty in real life, Darko Okamoto, a young widow from the midwest who relearnt to socialize, Linda Sautereau, a american university teacher who develops great educative projects, and so many others that opened my eyes on the many ways Second Life could help or change once person life.

I also met Kai Michael Schmuck from Hambourg in Germany, aka Kigh Kline, with whom I created my second project for the Cebit. Kai is a dear friend and my professionnal partner for makemyworlds, the company we created to offer business solutions in virtual worlds.

The list could go on like this, and I am sorry if I can't mention everyone with whom discussions and sharing were important to me as they would bring me to learn, open my mind and question myself. Some are still here, some left Second Life, some died and will only be remembered tru their SL name. Thanks to all of them.

At some point I decided I needed to know more about those people who were hiding behind the avatars and decided to join the Second Life Community Convention in Chicago. There I saw and maybe understood much better that Second Life was all about life and people. And a lot about community. A community of people who wanted to push the borders and move the lines : librarians and academics with knowledge sharing, architects and creators with expression, entepreneurs with global business projects, and regular people from all over who could just be themselves deeply and sincerely without all the restrictions of their appearance, look, opinions and that this world could allow to extend their own perception, vision, friends and relationships.

That was Second Life at that time, a kind of enormous cauldron of ideas, creativity and research under the protective look of Philip Linden and the Linden "family". Philip who was there, with his big tee shirt "Missing Image" already explaining us hs great vision that we all could hopefull shared. Talking with him in Chicago and a year later in Amsterdam, I knew at least 2 things. That Philip was a real (blue eyes) visionnar and creator, an active dreamer who was on had no other choice that to "leave his baby" (translated from french) so the baby could grow in the best direction. And that Second Life would change to make it possible to happen and I wanted to be part of it.

And Second Life changed. And we also changed and adjusted. The change went thru the co-direction with Mark Kingdon, the new CEO, who softly but smartly conducted his team and processes to modify Second Life. Technically. How long has it been since you really experienced a real crash ? Stability was a must for making Second Life a real application. Implementing voice was a deep change also though some might not consider it this way. Socially. By banning casinos and banks, closing ad farms, separating adult territories, and I guess I forget some other measures. Professionnaly. By creating diverse services turned towards professional needs and expectations, a real website with serious conversations structured for a better feedback, a service provider list and offer, etc.. And soon Nebraska.

And hopefully much more is coming along. Philip says he will be working on some project based on the existence on Second Life. Could that be a browser based Second Life which will defintely open it to Mister and Misses Everyone... ? Or some kind of no browser, no viewer platform that could allow us some kind of virtual reality total immersion... like in Total Recall... ?

Second Life as we met it 4 years ago has disappeared, but Second Life as it is today is really worth to try and to experiment, and still surprises me. It is different in many ways, but its maturity makes it even more enjoyable for creative people and dreamers. Second Life is more than ever your world, your imagination. Join us ! We'll be opening our Makemyworlds Business Center in a couple of weeks and be happy to welcome you there in english, german ou français !

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I wish I could write more. The making of our makemyworlds website plus the creation of our own island in Second Life, plus regular work, new clients into Second Life, kept me so busy, it just was too much... So in almost 2 Months, a lot is to say, and one post would not be enough...

Maybe I will just start to tell you about my frame of mind, this morning, writing from a small city of the Norman coast in France, eyes watching the long white beach all way across to the Pacific Coast where my S.L. community is holding its annual meeting and that I could not attend for the fist time since I am a Second Life resident.

I miss being there, with you, just gathering with you and sharing experiences and much more... The feeling of belonging to a community of creatives, entrepreneurs, dreamers, imaginers, artists, scientists, genius developpers, hobos .... from all over the world. I miss sharing the breakfast with you, guys, before attending the first meeting, I miss looking at the faces, giving some flesh and corps to an avatar name, I miss to know what happened this year with you Ben from Holland, Carol from Australia, Pikes from Malaisia, Gabriel from Boston, Ab from Seattle, Kigh from Germany, Pahtudee from Chicago...

I miss not being on the picture - which is really a great picture, M. Linden - Not for the picture itself, but to be able to hold this feeling during a whole year after the SLCC, that I am also part of this world, in real.

See, for once, I am not talking about figures, statistics, or social medias, theorizing on an idea of collaborative web 3.0, or buzzing on SL in a social network... No, I am just talking about love... maybe not a romantic love, but a deep emotion that give sense to all of you there to be able to share your Second Life passion.

So next year, why not to come to Europe and give the Old Word an idea of what is SLCC...

I have put the slides of my last year conference at SLCC. Any questions, just ask, I'll be happy to share ....

Towards Marketing 3.0 : 7 rules for a better use of Second Life in WebMarketing strategies

View more documents from Helene Zuili.

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