Thursday, July 31st, 2008
I’m keen to know more about Manchester in Second Life. I have now visited three times since it was built last year and it has been fairly empty on each occasion. Apparently the aim of the project was to promote the Manchester brand and raise awareness of the city. I wonder if URBIS and the MDDA consider it to be a success.
There’s been a lot of talk about 3D virtual worlds being the future of the internet and I think there’s some truth in that although I’m not sure it’s quite that clear cut. Also, just because 3D virtual worlds are the future, I’m not convinced the virtual world in question is Second Life in its current state.
When I log in to Second Life I am always disappointed by the chunkiness of the experience, it’s frustrating at best and computer crashing at worst. I have been told I need a better computer to experience Second Life properly but my computer meets all the SL recommended system requirements and I have a healthy 8mb broadband connection so there must be plenty of people who have a similar experience to me. (more…)
Tags: 3d, 3d manchester, Advertising, digital, Digital Marketing, interactive, Interactive 3D, interactive media, July, manchester, second life, virtual, virtual environments, Virtual Worlds
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Monday, July 28th, 2008
I was recently asked where I see advertising going in the future. The person asking me had just announced to the room that “absolutely ALL companies who work in advertising or an advertising related field are going to fail completely in the coming months because of massive cuts in advertising budgets”. I made a mental note to contact Saatchi & Saatchi and let them know. I’m sure they’ll be gutted that a Stockport-based life coach has such dire news for them.
He wasn’t completely wrong though, there have been reductions in advertising budgets on the whole. But while traditional media advertising budgets are shrinking, digital and Internet advertising budgets have remained steady.
So the message seems to be that, in times of economic uncertainty, companies want to know exactly where their money is going and what a campaign is achieving for them. They want value for money and digital provides that.
As consumers, we’re finding it easier and easier to ignore brand messages and many people are cynical about the perceived interruptions advertising represents.
The most successful advertising happens when the line between entertainment and advertising is blurred. Engaging our audience and providing an entertaining experience means consumers will not only participate in the media but will involve other members of their social group in it.
The Adidas - Impossible Story viral campaign by Glue is an excellent example of an entertaining brand experience that communicates the brand message through participation with its audience. It combines quirky visuals with nifty technical execution and the results speak for themselves. (more…)
Tags: 3d, Advertising, digital, flash, interactive, interactive media, July, online, viral, web
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Friday, July 4th, 2008
“By 2011, 80% of active internet users will have a virtual world account.”
Gartner Research, April 2007.
This quotation was identified by one of the presenters at HYPHEN on Wednesday evening. The event focussed on the opportunities new technologies bring with specific reference to Second Life and online gaming. There was quite a lot of discussion about the business opportunities these playful, often entertainment-focussed spaces deliver. Apparently BP identified virtual worlds as the “breakthrough technologies for 2008”.
I don’t think any of us need to be told about the serious business opportunity online gaming brings. The image to the left is Miniclip’s growth chart and although you might not be able to make out the text on the graph, all you really need to know is that the units on the horizontal axis are years and the units on the vertical axis are users (in increments of 5 million).
So what about Second Life’s business opportunities? A few years ago, any business which had a presence in Second Life was guaranteed some publicity out of it but these days that’s not the case. The last Second Life story I heard reported with any gusto was that of Ailin Graef, the Chinese businesswoman who built a business by buying and selling virtual land and made rather a lot of money in doing so. Perhaps that’s the business opportunity Second Life presents…but then, most of us don’t want to build a business in Second Life. We’re busy enough trying run the business we have created in our first lives. (more…)
Tags: interactive, Interactive 3D, interactive media, July, online, online gaming, second life, virtual, virtual environments, Virtual Worlds
Posted in Digital Marketing, Interactive 3D, Virtual Worlds | 2 Comments »
