Second Life: Closed for BusinessI've said it before, and I'll say it again: If you're a marketer, Second Life is a waste of time. Now, it seems that several Second Life marketers agree, and the LA Times has the story. Here are some quotes from Alana Semuels' story, Virtual marketers have second thoughts about Second Life: "There's not a compelling reason to stay," said Brian McGuinness, vice president of Aloft, a brand of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. that is closing its Second Life shop and donating its virtual land to the nonprofit social-networking group TakingITGlobal.
During a recent in-world visit, Best Buy Co.'s Geek Squad Island was devoid of visitors and the virtual staff that was supposed to be online.
The schedule of events on Sun Microsystems Inc.'s site was blank, and the green landscape of Dell Island was deserted. Signs posted on the window of the empty American Apparel store said it had closed up shop.
In Metaverses for the Masses, I wrote: All I can say is that you should proceed with caution and temper your enthusiasm when it comes to expectations of ROI from this type of activity ... I feel that at present, the main/only benefit of doing stuff on Second Life is the PR and hype that is generated from mainstream media and blogs. With the PR fading and marketers deserting the islands, the end is near. SL may hang on for a while, but it won't last. When the history of web 2.0 is written, Second Life will go down as the Boo.com of this generation of digital businesses: An over-hyped, over-funded, PR and VC-driven failure. Technorati Tags: marketing, second.life, 2.0
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
 Comments:
i still think that second life will be really good for giving people a taste of something before they go there, e.g. a holiday destination, hotel etc
# posted by Trevor Ginn : 8:44 PM, July 18, 2007
Hi Trevor,
Thanks for stopping by and for your comment.
Not sure I agree. Is the "taste" from Second Life any good? Hmmm. Seems pretty clunky to me in terms of the experience.
Isn't the role of a brand's own website to provide that level of experience? Why do they need Second Life to do this? It sure isn't for traffic, given the pathetic usage levels ...
Take cars, for example. I'd rather a cool 3D spin around the dealership than a second rate showroom on Second Life.
What do you think?
Check my post on Fiat's new site if you're interested in more on the topic.
~G~
# posted by George Nimeh : 11:09 AM, July 19, 2007
2 Years later... :)
I'm kinda against Second life to. It was a hype that faild pretty hard. The world was full of crap. When i made an account 1 and a half years ago, the first thing i saw when i entered the world was an image of lesbian porn. Seriously, what a mess that place was :) It was totaly not userfriendly and it wouldn't last very long imo. They said they had 2.5 million users, but actually 90% never logged in after the first time.
U happen to have any data on how it is going with second life? How many company's or ppl are still in the game? The statistics on their site claim to have 450.000 users logged in over the last 7 days, i still think it's to much :)
Greetings
# posted by : 1:45 PM, March 07, 2009
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