Tag: virtual world

Rethinking Second Life Demographics

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When a technology innovation appears on the horizon, one would stereotypically expect that the younger generation will sign on to it faster than older adults. This was the same expectation I had with Second Life. Like many people, I thought of Second Life as a playground for mostly Gen Y’s and the occasional Gen X’s. As I am about to reach 33, I thought I would be “old” in SL. But my two recent encounters in SL made me rethink this issue.

The two avatars that I encountered in these situations were both in their mid-fifties. They were very adept at creating their own images and environments within Second Life, much better than a newbie like me is able to. Entering into the interaction, I never intended to find out about their real-life age, but it somehow just came out during the conversation. Both avatars were very kind and helpful, both were happy with their real life, and both expressed a newly found youthfulness in Second Life, as if they were taken back to that time when they were much younger.

These conversations made me rethink the value of SL to different age groups and the real-life demographics of SL participants. If we were to look at three generations of people: the baby boomers and above, the Gen X, and the Gen Y and younger groups, it is actually not that difficult to see the appeal of SL to the first group. As the idea of living a second life allows someone to create an ideal self that s/he cannot fulfill in real life, Second Life allows the older generation to either relive or recreate their life. Now that most of their kids have grown up, they also have much more time to enjoy the virtual world, once they master the technology needed to use it. For Gen Xers like me, in contrast, we are so busy dealing with our real-life responsibilities at home or at work that it is hard to find the time to truly escape to the wonderland. The even younger text-messaging generation may have more time but may not have the patience for the amount of time it takes for 3D worlds to load and function.

Of course, these thoughts came from only two recent encounters, and they are very likely to be biased. I do not have concrete data to support my argument. Digging around on the Internet only landed me on an older set of statistics on Second Life’s real-life demographics in early 2006, which showed a median age of 36. But I truly believe in the power of Second Life for the older generation. The sweeping Internet revolution has already brought this generation to be more on par with the rest of the population in terms of technology use, and it has prepared them for the even newer 3D Web. Once the technology barrier has been removed, these virtual worlds could mean great additions to their life that cannot be found anywhere else in real world. This may explain the findings I posted in a previous blog on how SL enhances individuals’ happiness in real life.

Why Hi-Tech Firms Engage in Second Life

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Last year, ComputerWorld published an article on the top eight corporate sites in Second Life. The rankings are: 1. IBM; 2. Pontiac; 3. Sun Microsystems; 4. Dell; 5. Reuters; 6. Cisco Systems; 7. H&R Block 8. Best Buy Geek Squad.  It’s not difficult to see from this list that many of these companies are in hi-tech industries.  Some may argue that these firms are more engaged in Second Life because they have the skills and resources to.  While this is probably true to some extent, I think there is another much more important reason for these firms’ SL investments: to be ahead of the learning curve for the next-generation 3D Internet.

Second Life is most well-known for the ability of individuals to take on an alter-ego in the form of an avatar.  While this concept is appealing to some people, others also find the concept laughable.   But the much more universal appeal of Second Life comes from the 3D virtual reality of the environment.  Currently the Internet is dominated by textual information (such as this blog), with multimedia added here and there.  This is NOT a “normal” way of experiencing things or interacting with other human beings.  What Second Life demonstrates is a more realistic environment where individuals “walk” and “touch” like they do in real-world, if not quite yet, it will be that way soon.

The implications of this new way of presenting information in a connected Internet is huge, from new product development, marketing, to basic business operations.  Yes, many still complain that Second Life platform requires too much computing power.  But that’s similar to the difficulty of watching video online before broadband becomes popular.  As computing power increases according to Moore’s Law predictions, the platform will eventually become a piece of cake for most users’ computers to handle.  Or if the Second Life Grid (the platform underlying Second Life) is not the best way to support 3D virtual reality, someone else along the way will come up with a better way of doing that.  It’s just a matter of time.

For hi-tech companies, this potential shift represents another significant wave of change since the birth of the Internet.  The structure of today’s online environment may become obsolete under the new system.  Rather than being sitting ducks waiting for the wave to push them along, smart companies have already taken on this learning task and have championed in this yet unknown territory, on the surface for marketing reasons but deep down for much bigger revolution of business ideas and processes.

Happiness and Second Life

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Although the 2006 EPN study on Second Life (PDF) is quite old judging by the Internet age, I have just discovered it as a newbie to SL.  What I find interesting in that report is the general conclusion of enhanced psychological health and happier life due to participation in Second Life.  Converging on a point I raised before in my blog, this report suggests that, for most people, SL does not threaten to replace real-life but rather functions as a supplement and extension of our real life.  It’s all interconnected in our own mind and therefore has a real impact on who we are as an individual.