We Have Been Living In Virtual Worlds For A Long Time, Don't Kid Yourself

I have been doing a lot of talking about Virtual Worlds lately. Most recently I gave a talk at the iMedia Entertainment Summit in Beverly Hills. You can download my presentation here and you can see the write up by Adam Shahbaz (a super cool young writer and musician) on my presentation here.


To Live In 3D or Not To Live In 3D


While I think my presentation was largely well taken, I think there were some skeptics in the audience, and to be honest I partly take the blame for not fully convincing them . I was reviewing my presentation and what I failed to mention about virtual worlds is, it is an irrefutable fact that the hyper mediated world we currently live in is, in fact, already largely virtual. Furthermore, I did not point out the fact that when referring to virtual worlds I am not only referring to 3D environments. While the third dimension adds a more human element to the web, it is not essential in creating a virtual environment. I would go as far as to say that Facebook is a virtual world in many ways (and with all of the new functionalities it is becoming increasingly so). While my focus tends to be on 3D virtual worlds, I want to make sure that I am clear about how I define what I feel a virtual world is in the current era.


In my estimation the core principles that make up the modern  virtual world are as follows:




  • Persistence


    • Virtual Worlds create perpetual identities and communities that exist outside of the physical world

      • Sometimes these identities are fictional, sometimes they are extensions of real life. I am largely concerned with those that act as an extension of real life.



    • This is where lifelogging comes in. If you are not familiar with this concept, I would ready what Jerry Paffendorf has to say about the topic. He is a long time champion of this notion, and while I am not sure where this concept originated, it was he who familiarized me with the concept.




  • Immersion


    • Virtual worlds are becoming increasingly human. Those of us who grew up with AIM know that after a while an IM conversation feels almost every bit as human as a face to face conversation.

      •  When performing the many layers of communication that we perform online today, one can get the sense that we are in fact immersed in a more human web than ever before






  • Real Time Interaction

    • This concept is very close to the above statements about IM, however online chat has matured significantly. We are now able to chat in groups (in real time) using any number of various digital media (audio, video, self mirrors/avatars, text). The online forum is much more human than ever before.




  • Experience

    • When all the components are online virtual world are tied together, we get a virtual experience not unlike the type of experience that occurs in real life.

    • I will never stop going out with friends, going to conferences and hanging out in public places, however The Experience Web provides me with far greater opportunity to to  be social, with a far greater amount of people in places all over the world than ever before and I love it!




There Are Many Flavors Of The Metaverse


As outlined in The Metaverse Roadmap (which is a must read), there are elements that make up what is being referred to as the metaverse. The metaverse not only encompasses online virtual worlds such as Second Life, it encompasses Mirror Worlds such as Google Earth, Augmented realities which include technologies that add information elements to, and enhance our experience in the the physical world and lifelogging.


Perhaps A Virtual World Map Looks Something Like This




I think there are elements of the world pictured above that most of us can relate to. Before you rule out Virtual Worlds or the Metaverse as a significant part of the way we communicate, I urge you to do some research on what these concepts really are and what technologies they employ.


In the future marketers will not be able to simply ignore these matters. The ubiquitous nature of computing will, to a large degree, dictate the way in which we live, as humans and as consumers. The marketer who is not taking this fact seriously will be the marketer who will not be taken seriously for very long. I am not saying you have to agree with my opinions, however it is tough to debate the importance for marketers to be well versed in the subject of  virtual worlds.



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