Second Life attracts branding efforts

From retail marketing and politics to education and health care, everyone's looking for their place in Virtual Reality.

Although I have already integrated numerous instances of science fiction into the accepted reality in my everyday life, I am still amazed at the speed by which people are drawn into the science-fiction-like virtual realities of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games. Modeled after Neil Stephenson’s Metaverse in the 1990s science fiction novel “Snow Crash”, Second Life is a MMORPG that is receiving a lot of press attention lately. Giles Whittell of Times Online reported approximately 400,000 “residents” on July 29, 2006. Today, October 13, 2006 Second Life has 911,356 registered residents. That is phenomenal growth!

Most all of this Second Life Metaverse is user created and exists on over 3,000 internet servers in warehouses a few miles south of San Francisco. Whittell reported that between 150 and 200 new servers were being added each month to accommodate this amazing growth rate.

Second Life creator, Linden Lab's policy of allowing users to retain ownership of their virtual creations is unprecedented in online games. Virtual goods and services are bought using the local currency, Linden dollars. Linden dollars can be exchanged for US currency. Within the past 24 hours, the US equivalency of $345,479 has been spent in Second Life on virtual goods.

Emphasizing creativity and communication, Second Life is attracting the branding efforts of more and more corporate entities.

“Branding is an attempt to garner an emotional response to one's products and/or services,” explains Ethan Allan Smith in his July 2006 posting about The Philosophy of Logo Design. And Second Life appears to be a popular place to create emotional response.

In September of 2005, Wells Fargo introduced Stagecoach Island. The free, multi-player, online role-playing game was developed to teach young adults important lessons in financial literacy.

Last month CNet News launched a permanent presence in a Second Life virtual building modeled loosely after their San Francisco offices, complete with an amphitheater where CNet reporters can do interviews, give talks and stream media in the virtual world.

Toyota has been giving away free virtual vehicles of its Scion model and will start selling them in Second Life to create experiences around their brand.

Adidas adidas (104, 182, 53). [<--SL link] has also opened a store on a private island in Second Life, focused on a campaign for a the Microride shoe. The virtual shoes come equipped with a jump script that allows the user's avatar to bounce around the Metaverse. Outside the store there is a "testing area" trampoline.

Starwood's new hotel brand, Aloft, has chosen to build buzz, brand loyalty and gain consumer input on design, by going virtual first. A prototype of the real hotel on Second Life, will be used to hold virtual marketing events and daily board meetings as well as obtaining valuable input from users.

Harvard Law School and the Harvard Extension School are jointly offering a class in the fall semester, 2006 in Second Life. The course in persuasive, empathic argument in the Internet space is studying many different media technologies to understand how they affect the communication process. Classes take place on Berkman Island, a space in Second Life that resembles Harvard Law School. The island is named after the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, of which Professor Nesson is a founder and co-director. Nesson, the Weld professor of law, is offering “CyberOne: Law in the Court of Public Opinion,” not only to Harvard Law School (HLS) students, but also to Extension School students as well as Internet users across the globe.


For the purpose of the Beyond Broadcast conference, an inworld broadcasting center and a 3D replica of the Ames Courtroom at the Harvard Law School was built in Second Life.

Sarah Robbins, a PhD candidate at Ball State University who is studying rhetoric and composition, is also experimenting with a class conducted in Second Life. Robbins, whose avatar goes by the name of Intellagirl Tully, has created a hybrid option for her English composition students, combining classes in real life one day of the week and with online classes in SL on another. Robbins is "very interested in how virtual environments can foster collaboration and community building."

Virtual Reality is also being recognized as an effective tool for political communications. Former Virginia governor, Mark Warner recently flew onto a virtual stage in Second Life in August for an interactive interview that has boosted his name recognition tremendously - especially among the techie population.

The health care industry is not to be excluded from the rush for a virtual presence. There is a group of medical consumers, caretakers and physicians that are working on creating a Virtual Hospital in Second Life to provide information services and activities for all interested people.

There is no doubt. Virtual Reality is having a profound impact on our changing society. Let's become a part of the process that utilizes technology to help create the positive possibilities of the future.

What do you envision?