21st Century Organization

Life beyond "Second Life" - The Metaverse Earns an "Intraverse"

Being a tech vet comes with certain disadvantages. Sure, there is the sense of history that makes imagining the future possible, but there is also the whole "been there, done that" mindset whose cynicism blinds you to that big box under your nose with "NOW" printed in big block letters along the side.

Last week, friends, I had such a moment. A client was in town for the first-annual Virtual Worlds 2007 conference, and I was dutifully preparing for the usual round of schmoozing and media wrangling when something totally unexpected happened: A smack, a well-aimed and apparently well-deserved smack that wiped that Web 1.0 smirk right off my face.

The realization? That the 3D Web, known as the "metaverse" to the kiddies, is the cat's iPod, and not for all the hyped-about reasons.

Alongside the scads of press about the newest mall to be erected in Second Life or the latest celeb to take his/her first 1995-style baby steps across the only real estate that seems to be going up these days came the news that companies are using worlds like Second Life for much more than branding and the distribution of virtual goodie bags to the day-glo, griefing citizenry.

ProtonMedia, for one, leases portions of its 3D world to pharmaceutical and insurance companies to train their reps, a world that comes complete with real-time whiteboarding in 3D classrooms and the ability to share Office docs on the fly. On a related note, there's also Forterra Systems, a company that also works with big corporations, but whose mainstay is training for emergency services and homeland security personnel.

How useful. And completely and utterly useful. And what a wonderful reminder of why I got into this business in the first place. Oh, and lest I be accused to not keeping abreast of the latest jargon, there's even a buzzword for this sort of thing. They call it the "intraverse" - you know, like the love child of "intranet" and "metaverse."

Anyhow, there it is, friends. The cynic has been shown his true nature - the optimist in disguise. And now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for me to get back to perfecting my Barack Obama avatar in the hope that his meatspace equivalent decides to do some 3D campaigning.

~ Bill Lessard

Bill Lessard is President and Creative Director of NYC-based PR boutique PRwithBrains; and with Steve Baldwin, is co-author of NetSlaves and NetSlaves 2.0. Bill has also contributed to NPR, Wired News, the San Francisco Chronicle and the dearly departed Industry Standard. When not talking to reporters, he can be found in pitched frag-fests in his favorite first-person shooters or wondering why the poetry in the New Yorker is so bad.

Doing business in Second Life conversation with Bill Lessard: Digital goodie bags, street teams & universal identity with avatar

A take away from the Internet Strategy Forum's Second Life presentation was not "if" but "when" an open source alternative platform would emerge to compete with Linden Lab's environment.

In light of that prospect I appreciated my conversation today with PRODIGY alum and absolutely PRwithBrains President Bill Lessard about his experience and insights working with clients striving to create buzz through Second Life promotion.

Bill's take on Second Life today:

"the 3D equivalent of what AOL was in it's day.  It's a proprietary iteration of a future aspect of the World Wide Web. Just as PRODIGY and AOL rolled up all the tools for the Internet and put them in a nice safe proprietary package."

Bill also pointed out that unlike development of the Internet, Second Life protocols are not open source. Not HTML. This puts leading developers like The Electric Sheep Company in a powerful position at the moment especially since their $5m investment from CBS.

As a PR guy who's seen traditional PR strategies, Bill is impressed by the buzz-building capabilities of virtual goodie bags and digital street teams. But, as a tech veteran, he's more excited by what the future holds. Bill makes the case for using Second Life for customer service, especially for demonstrating how to assemble computers, electronic devices. Better than step-by-step instructions over the phone.

More interesting to Bill is what the future might hold. He's looking for the ubiquitous avatar, a set online identity, look and a feel complete with a little digital wallet, that can chat using voice and video and through a phone.  In Bill's words:   

"Imagine avatars on your phones keyed to a different ring tone."

Interesting but how far off?  Last December I attended the opening session of the  Internet Identity Workshop at the Computer Museum, MountainView.  A room full of very smart people focused like Paul Trevithick, The Higgins Project on developing an open source platform to put identity control back in the hands of the individual who owns it. I was struck by Paul's statement that on average an individual has pieces of their personal data sitting in 700 databases that others control.

My sense is the IIW has some work do before the universal identity with avatar emerges but no doubt somebody out there is busy working on it. Anyone?

~ Jenny Ambrozek