Arcade Exchange Update

Revision 2.95

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Marketplace: http://marketplace.secondlife.com/stores/22206

What’s New

AES (Audio Engine System)

When we first built the arcade series, we weren’t entirely knowledgeable about scripting in the high-end. Of course, there was the llPlaySound command to handle short clips, but when you’re dealing with arcade machines that have audio loops measured in minutes, even for the attract modes, you can see how this falls short as a solution. Stringing together the audio commands with llSleep in between only goes so far, and when you begin extending the amount of files needed in that loop, the rest of the menu system begins to stall while it waits for the audio and sleep commands to complete.

This has been an ongoing issue for the life of the Series III Arcade Exchange, but we’re proud to announce that as of Revision 2.95, it is no longer a problem.

We’ve re-written the audio engine system (AES) to be more dynamic, pre-load items in advance, and handle hundreds of audio clips in a loop without interfering with the main script.

What his means for you: The menu system is now responsive, even when playing the audio loop, as the AES has been separated into its own script and handler to multi-task.

As a result of the AES upgrade, your arcade machines are now able to loop many minutes of audio when toggled – in many cases, an entire run through the game itself.

That being said, please keep in mind that the pre-loader is not an indication of actual time to pre-load but merely an estimation. The actual time to pre-load and play those clips is entirely dependent on your connection speed and other various factors such as sim lag and Second Life itself. You may not hear the entire loop the first time through because of this, but we’re pretty certain the second time through you will.

Support Call Decal

On the back of every arcade machine, there is now an Andromeda Games Support Decal (Upper Right Corner). Because your arcade machines are under “Second Lifetime” Warranty, you can always trade-up to the latest revisions or have broken machines fixed for free. However, it hasn’t always been clear who to contact or get in touch with to handle this. Sure, we put that warranty information into your Instructions card that is included, but we also know that customers aren’t always interested in reading.

As a result, we’ve put the support call decal on the back of every machine, and made it an active call sticker. Which is to say, if you click on them, it’ll give you the warranty information, and contact for support. It’ll also page me (Aeonix Aeon) in-world and let me know who is requesting support and what machine you’ve invoked it on.

We don’t think it gets any easier than this, really.

Various Updates

There have been some amount of various issues (minor) which have gone unfixed in the past on our arcade machines. While not all game-breaking, they did warrant another look during this update and a correction. TRON, for example, had a minor alignment issue with the side panels which left a small gap. The Glow was set way too high, and so on. It is also currently one of two arcade machines that do not have an animated screen (Space Invaders being the other). With this machine there are some technical limitations in-world which we haven’t quite sorted out yet – the screen is not uniform and due to the complexity involved with the build (geometry and faces) it isn’t feasible to animate the screen as of yet. We’re still looking into it.

Fix-It Felix Jr has had the animation set for the screen re-done with better quality, and the audio is now much better without the lag. However, this game is only available in the Arcade Exchange Mega-Pack as a bonus.

Joust had the same panel alignment issue as TRON, and so it was also corrected in this update.

Tetris as of 2.91 and earlier is now broken – the game itself no longer works. The 2.95 update corrects this.

Instruction Card

The instruction cards on all of our Arcade Exchange have been entirely redone for legibility and to include new information. This includes a better explanation of your warranty so you know what is and is not covered. I’ve made the card more unified with ASCII headers and such, so now it should be quite easy to discern all the main topics as you scroll through. The same has been done to the card for “How to fix Flash for Second Life”.

Marketplace Availability

During the long tenure of the Series III Arcade Exchange, our customers will have noticed that the original premise of the name meant that you could purchase only the Polybius arcade machine on Marketplace and then trade it in-world for the one you really wanted. While available in-world via our vendor boards at certain locations, we didn’t make them available on Marketplace directly.

That is until recently.

There are many pros and cons to doing this, and most importantly is that being a near perfect replica of the original arcade machines in real life poses a bit of a problem. Many hours of debate and discussion have happened over the years about this very issue – IP Infringement.

While we absolutely will not contest that our arcade machines are IP Infringing, there is a deeper explanation about why they should be left on Marketplace. If you read below, we’ll get into those details.

Marketing

One of the other things you may have noticed as of recently is that the ad-copy and marketing for our products has been updated to be more uniform and professional.

Having a real life marketing background helps in this case, in that I used to work for Pulse Point Media as a VP of Operations.

Now, just as a reminder, when I use “we” and “I” in these posts, it’s a matter of who in AMG I’m talking about. I refers to me (Will Burns, the founder) and We refers to the rest of the team involved with the products (such as RobsterRawb Jaxxon, Jon Dragoone, et al) inclusive.

When writing these blogs, I’m writing them on my own and so it’s always coming from “me” as a representation of the group interchangeably. Just wanted to clear that up in case you were wondering.

In any event, as I have had years of marketing experience, I decided to go ahead and apply that to our forward facing image by creating proper ad-copy for our arcade machines. A unified look and feel so to speak. It is purposefully reminiscent of an Atari logo in a subtle fashion.

I think it’s something you don’t normally see with a lot of items on Marketplace or in-world. Of course, the bigger brands do this properly, but that’s the difference between the big kids and inexperienced. Doubly so for the listings involving Arcade Machines on Marketplace – but we’ll get to that below.

The ad-copy is mirrored on our boxes now, and the look/feel is also in our magazine advertisements (as you see above at the beginning of the post). We regularly advertise in both Attention! Magazine and Playdolls as a two page spread. It is clean, gets attention, and gets to the point with a visual and short, witty slogan.

We’ll be using this format going forward.

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Backstory

In the course of the Series III Arcade Exchange, we’ve undergone quite a lot of updates and revisions. Originally conceived in 2010 before Second Life had mesh ability, it was a major overhaul when we started updating them all in higher quality mesh.

Back then, and even today, we spent quite a lot of time sourcing our materials and pouring over reference photos for the arcade machines in real life. There was and still remains a lot of points to why we would go to such painstaking trouble with these builds for what amounts to a virtual product with a limited audience.

VIPER Licensing

One of the biggest issues with doing something like this is the obvious elephant in the room: IP Infringement. In the modern age, it is considered the scourge of IP Holders, and takes up quite a lot of time attempting in vain to police their Intellectual Property online.

The standard tools for this give those IP Holders the legal precedent to DMCA or issue a Cease and Desist order. On Youtube, we see this as “Copyright Strike” where a claim is filed against a video.

But does this really solve the problem? It’s a never-ending battle that is both costly and time consuming, with little result. You win battles but arguably are losing the war.

In the example of the fan created game AM2R (Another Metroid 2 Remake), it was a brilliant game made by fans out of the love of the game. In my opinion, it absolutely did justice to the franchise and IP. However, it still remains that they did not have permission from Nintendo to use that IP and so Nintendo issued a DMCA to take it down.

But here is where it gets tricky.

The tools of DMCA and C&D are not effective in the bigger picture. If anything, it is akin to cutting the head off of a Hydra and being surprised when it grows back a thousand heads. What DMCA and C&D invoke in the modern age is known as the Streisand Effect – which is to say the thing you want to get rid of instead draws more attention and becomes more available as a result.

In the case of AM2R, this was true. Yes, the fans who made it took it down and complied with the DMCA, but those who had already downloaded it simply mirrored the files all over the world and on BitTorrent.

If anything, AM2R ended up with far more visibility in the media and higher accessibility as a result of the DMCA from Nintendo. In short, it had the opposite effect they wanted. Their strategy backfired spectacularly.

Back in 2013, I wrote a chapter in a college textbook whereby I outlined the solution to this miserable state of affairs: VIPER.

In the beginning, I outlined that IP Holders rarely (if ever) have a clear avenue to pursue in the instance of user generated media. For instance, most companies have a clear protocol to handle either a Producer of content or a Consumer of content, whereby a producer is seen as a large media firm that can pay a large licensing fee up front and a consumer is just the person who is expected to buy such items or be exposed to what the producer has created.

But what about the prosumer culture? The user-generated media made by the consumers as non-professional producers?

This is where we get into the grey area of legality and approach as we look at spaces like Second Life. Yes, those companies have every right to issue DMCA notices to take content down – but is it effective? In this case, the answer is absolutely not. If anything, it only exacerbates the problem as we see with AM2R.

You take one down and twenty more pop up to take its place.

So the premise of VIPER is to be an effective tool for IP Management in a user-generated content environment. Something that Second Life is sorely lacking, and companies in the real world do not currently subscribe to, which is exactly why we see this Streisand Effect continually playing out despite their best efforts.

VIPER is an acronym for: Virtual Intellectual Property Engagement and Recourse. The premise is simple: to manage IP on the prosumer level effectively and without the content explosion back-fire otherwise seen with typical DMCA approaches.

In the case of the Arcade Exchange, the premise is quite clear – to make available the best options for those media examples as a poison pill approach to IP Infringement. If high quality versions exist, it makes the countless low quality knock-offs irrelevant and so they will slowly cull themselves. By leaving the best options to fill a need in a space whereby a company would otherwise not be engaged, it has far more positive impact in regard to IP Management and Protection than had the same companies sent an army of lawyers to issue a paper storm of DMCA notices.

In short: Absolutely, these arcade machines are IP Infringing. By no means should DMCA take-down be implemented as a recourse. They are there to actually cull the plethora of existing knock-offs that are low quality, and in effect have the actual intended outcome that the constant DMCA take-downs and account bans have tried to accomplish all these years.

VIPER is a mindset that follows one of the biggest rules in user generated worlds; Whether that is the hobbyist at home making a fan game, somebody making creative content on YouTube (Adult Wednesday Addams for example), or virtual worlds like Second Life: Work within the system.

In this case, “the system” means not the legal recourse you’ve been given (DMCA etc) but the mentality of the community by which the IP is existing.

In order to understand VIPER licensing mentality, you as a company must ask a few questions to qualify the action:

• 1. Will a DMCA result in the desired outcome, or will it backfire and cause a Streisand Effect?

• 2. If our end-goal is to reduce or eliminate the IP Infringement, protecting our intellectual property, then would engagement in the system to fill the supply where there is clearly a demand actually achieve this end?

• 3. What is the least involved manner by which we can accomplish #2 on this list?

• 4. Does it make sense to engage and ask for a marginal licensing fee on each sale of said item in a virtual world (percentage) or is it enough to sanction the item as a preventative measure to cull the majority?

The answer in this case is obviously to identify the best version of the IP Infringing material and sanction it. However, one must also be willing to leave the other low quality versions alone to their fate as a result. This is how to eliminate the Streisand Effect in virtual worlds and elsewhere while actually accomplishing your end goal.

That doesn’t mean as a company that you should be saying “This is an official product” of our company. What you’re really saying here is: This is a licensed product in a virtual sense, we acknowledge it, and it represents the IP and brand in a positive light. It is the responsibility of the content creator to handle the sales, the marketing, the updates, and customer interaction.

In the event that said virtual item no longer represents the IP in a positive light, then you have a dialog with the end-user about how this can be corrected (reasonably). Again, we’re not going into things DMCA-Akimbo. After all, you’re running the risk of punching a hole in the dam of IP infringement and letting the torrent of knock-offs take its place.

We clearly don’t want this to happen.

This is also entails that companies (internally) set up some sort of “Best Practices” guidelines exactly for this purpose, and to convey to the end-users (consumers) that should they wish to use the IP in this manner, these are the rules they must follow.

Of course, in this document, the point is to be fair about it. So don’t go into it with massively unbalanced disincentive. In example – saying “Sure, you can make and sell this in a virtual world, but we expect a 90% cut on money earned.” or “Sure you can make this but you cannot sell it in the virtual space or make any money on it.”

Let’s be real here. If your goal is to cull the IP Infringement and protect your IP, it does you no justice to create a hostile environment whereby it makes more sense to just ignore you and do as they please, albeit in a less visible manner.

See also: BitTorrent and AM2R.

You absolutely don’t want to drive those virtual goods underground, because then you’re really screwed. So be fair about it, make some light concessions, and be willing to work within the system and with the end-users themselves to achieve these means.

The perceptual cost of those virtual goods sales versus the amount of money you’ve been burning trying to DMCA everything is like night and day. The perceptual loss of revenue from said virtual goods is negligible by comparison and is far less than what you would spend to police it otherwise.

So instead of approaching as a loss, approach it as a quadruple positive in your favor -

1. The loss of perceptual revenue from said virtual item costs you far less than trying to police it via typical DMCA means. Instead of counting it as a loss, count is as time and money saved. You could be paying lawyers ten or one hundred times as much to have zero impact on the state of affairs versus the negligible loss of the virtual item for sale having a massive impact on the state of affairs. It just makes perfect business sense.

2. Because the items in question are high quality, consider them as a marketing gain instead of a lost sale or cost. You’re not paying for that marketing, nor the time it takes to create the items and maintain them. You’re not paying the person responsible for making it either. You, as a company already know how costly this normally would be if you hired a marketing firm to develop this sort of content and maintain it. Again, this is advantageous to you.

3. High quality items in a virtual world represent your brand in a positive light and are the antithesis to low quality knock-offs, thereby killing two birds with one stone that costs far less than the DMCA nuclear bombs you’ve been using that apparently couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn. It is actually effective, and that’s what you’ve been trying to accomplish all this time – isn’t it?

4. Instituting negative penalties for IP Infringement when it is presented in he best possible light to do justice to the brand is actually counter-productive in the most exponential fashion possible.

Allow me to expound a bit on the last point further.

Normally, yes the companies can issue a DMCA to Linden Lab concerning said items. Linden Lab would, therefore be legally required to comply, and as a result likely issue a temporary or permanent ban on my account in the process. This, again, is typical. It happens the same way with YouTube, and elsewhere.

But here’s the fallout from those actions:

1. The highest quality items would no longer be available, thus creating a void to fill in the market.

2. That void would quickly be filled not with one but likely dozens of IP infringing materials to take the place of the dam you just broke.

3. What is eliminated on the open marketplace will thrive in-world under the radar, making it impossible for the same IP Holders to find.

4. You’ve punished one creator for doing the one thing you actually needed done, and undone the positive outcome of those actions while vastly multiplying the negative outcomes. You’re back to square one.

It wouldn’t make any logical or reasonable sense to therefore issue a DMCA or Account Ban. There’s literally no positive outcome to doing so, and it amounts to dropping the bomb on your own foot making matters worse instead of better.

That doesn’t mean companies will listen to reason.

VIPER is simply an appeal to reason, and to accomplish the IP Management companies so desperately need in a world that is exploding with content. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results.

What the Arcade Exchange represents is a viable means to accomplish exactly what the owners of the IP have been trying to do all along and have been failing at.

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High Quality vs Low Quality

When it comes to virtual worlds, or any other media, there is no shortage of high quality examples. Just the same, for every high quality example there are ten times as many low quality “cheap” knockoffs.

You can very well buy a Galaga arcade machine on Marketplace for 99L$ and you’d get something like what you see to the left from Brazilian Surf.

Yes, it works (if you’re lucky)… but that’s about it. What you’re getting is a generic cabinet haphazardly retextured with a media prim glued to the screen.

It doesn’t have the game history, it doesn’t have an extended audio loop, it doesn’t have an animated screen, and more importantly it looks nothing like the actual arcade machine. We’re not even certain it has any sort of warranty or support if it breaks. This is the standard fare when it comes to arcade machines in Second Life.

Then you have the Arcade Exchange version of Galaga to the right which, as you immediately notice is of much higher quality and detail. It has far more features than the cheaper knock-offs, and is jam-packed with attention to detail.

If you were Midway (or whomever owns the rights to Galaga), which one of these would you want representing your IP?

Only one of them actually does it justice, and that is the entire point of VIPER.

We’ve supported the Arcade Exchange since 2012, with bug fixes, updates, and revisions. As of Revision 2.95, there is a service call sticker on the back of them all to quickly and easily contact us if ever your machines break or you would like to trade-up for an update.

So long as you own one of our arcade machines, we will support them and continue working to make them better.

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Marketing Phoenix

The Age of Human Engagement Optimization

 

If you want to know what the ROI of #socialmedia is, you first have to understand the ROI of a Piano. If you don't know how to play the piano, that answer is zero. But if you're Elton John or Billy Joel, then that answer is substantial. The problem with social media (and especially those new to #GooglePlus) is that they are concentrating on customer acquisition but not level of engagement.

 

 

 

Essentially you're all acting like 19 year old dudes trying to close on the first move, which rarely works. This is why you see a lot of first generation social marketers coming into things like Google+ and failing miserably.

We're entering into an age where relevancy, context, and level of engagement all matter. If Content is King, then Engagement is the Queen. No longer do we live in an age where you can just produce a lot of content (or hire some firm to write it out for you) and expect high engagement levels or ROI. In this context, you have to change your strategy to address authenticity and engagement.

 

“If you don’t give a shit about people, you’re done” – Gary Vaynerchuk

You're looking for long term and not short term in this generation of social media. While the interactions tend to be shorter, the long-term engagement is getting longer. And then there are social engagements like Google+ that transcend just the conversation at hand and have a relevancy in everything a person does in countless contexts because it's being mapped to an identity.

Raw numbers are meaningless today. It's not the number of followers that you have which counts but how you engage with them and how many engage with you and your brand.

This is something I pointed out in 2010 when all of the social media marketers were still doing SEO (people still do that today?) instead of HEO.

 

SEO is essentially figuring out ways to game a search engine in order to boost popularity or visibility and hope the people you’ve duped into clicking through to your content will stick around and share it. Instead of appealing to people, you spent all of your effort trying to appeal to algorithms and computer search engines. And now with things like Google+ and how it ties into their search engine and other products, your SEO tactics will ultimately fail.

HEO is my term (I'm coining it now) for Human Engagement Optimization, and it refers to a total LOE (Level of Engagement) Metric. Because one lifelong customer acquisition is worth more than ten thousand "followers" who are as engaged as a pack of mindless zombies.

Let me put this into perspective:

 

One HEO result has ten thousand times the impact as your best SEO. It is a measurement and understanding of social media which says Quality over Quantity. In a world of unending bullshit flooding social media networks, you need to hit the home run the first time. You need to be genuine and engaging.

People remember you when you're catering to HEO, because they can put a face or personality to the brand, they can make the connection that lasts in their mind. And when they do that, they are more likely to recommend you to others in their social circles, who will (if you continue HEO) recommend to their friends. It's word of mouth on steroids.

 

“You cannot underestimate the sharpness of people’s BS radar – they can spot a soulless, bureaucratic tactic a million miles away.” – Gary Vaynerchuk

You don't need to be the loudest voice, and you don't need to reach the most people by your own effort through brute force. With HEO marketing, you just need to be compelling, genuine, and engaging. Your audience will build itself and amplify your voice.

 

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And that is where most marketing places these days are failing miserably. They come over to Google+ or some other social media service fresh and then just start spamming the hell out of it with their content, and no engagement. Closing the deal on the first post... or trying desperately.

Take +Applebees Tomsriver - which doesn't seem to know they even exist on Google+ (zero engagement and zero HEO), the main Applebees on social media itself and +Sears - go ahead and take a look at their pages and you'll see that their engagement levels are miserable and in most cases non-existent.

Perfect example of being a 19 year old dude trying to close on the first move. Then they wonder why Google+ or other social media isn't working for them, and so you see countless articles (usually from the HEO losers) whining and bashing Google+ for being a "ghost town" or just not worth it.

Well of course not! You suck at HEO, and SEO tricks don't work in an HEO social world. Real people see through your bullshit in a hurry and will call you on it in an instant. SEO is catering to automated algorithms and the last time I checked, this place is full of real human beings having conversations, talking about topics and sharing things with their friends and acquaintances that they find interesting.

 

So the simple fact of the matter is that since you aren't treating them like you care or find them interesting... they are treating you the same way, and so find yourself shouting into the Grand Canyon with only an echo and a tumbleweed to keep you company.

The video for this post is very enlightening, and I encourage anyone who is interested in #socialmediamarketing and #seomarketing  to watch it in full and take notes.

+Gary Vaynerchuk gets it right, and if there was anything you should listen to today, make it this guy. 

 

 

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Game Theory

Everything except the blatantly obvious in #SecondLife

 

I’m not entirely sure I get the point of the strategy for Linden Lab lately. On the one hand, they want to focus on mobile games and offer starter/upgrade packs on Amazon for sale, but then you look at the strategy and wonder if they’re really thinking clearly in the bigger picture.

 

 

 

 

Take for instance the Amazon packages available. What we have are pre-packaged bundles which are essentially no better than had the person just made a free account and bought the equivalent L$ to go with it. After all, $9.95 in L$ equates to about 1000L in-world at any given time. I suppose this leaves the added value model with the vehicles to justify the purchase, but even then I’m not convinced it is worth the money.

 

After all, there are far better Hoverboards available as an incentive, and vehicles on the whole to be honest. Just a cursory search in marketplace will tell you that the residents are doing a far better job putting the best foot forward in showing what Second Life is capable of than Linden Lab themselves.

 

After all, the bigger question is that once you have your hoverboard from Linden Lab, what exactly where you going to do with it? Sure it’s fun to ride around, but there is no added purpose, incentive or community to support having it. Of course, then we enter into the equation the Vetox CS Simboard, which is free, comes with a sport designed around it called Simball, and an active community. If Linden Lab wanted to impress new users with a hoverboard, they screwed up out of the gate.

 

Adding a “Turbo Mode” version for $12.95 and throwing in a pair of knee guards and a helmet is just adding insult to injury.

 

This is what they should have been offering/showing the public instead -

 

 

Better Hoverboards, Better Community. Vetox delivers.

 

 

Then, there is the other vehicle pack on Amazon which offers what I can only surmise is a near freebie of a Dune Buggy as if it is premium content.

 

Albeit, the specific Dune Buggy in the pack may not be the same, but the bigger question to be asked at this point is “Just how incredibly pissed off is a new user going to be when they find out they just paid 25 bucks for three vehicles they could have found on Marketplace for cheaper or free, and better quality?”

 

 

I think the answer to that question would be “Incomprehensibly.”

 

So why the hell is Linden Lab doing this to themselves? I mean, they can’t possibly be so naïve that they are unable to find products in their own community which would put their best foot forward to the public and make them look good, can they?

 

 

 

 

 

 

After all, what’s the point of offering a vehicle pack if you know a cursory search on your own marketplace is going to show those new users that you essentially just hoodwinked them?

 

In the bigger picture, we have to take into account the target audience and reach for those promotions. After all, a cursory glance at the reviews will tell you that a lot of those purchases (if any) are coming from long time residents. People leaving reviews talking up Second Life, but then saying they’ve been a resident for years now…

 

If the point of this strategy was to introduce Second Life to a larger audience and bring in new (potentially premium) users, I’m pretty sure this is not the way to go.

 

Let’s say, for the sake of reason, the intended audience for these promotions was to entice casual gamers, maybe in the demographic of 30-50 and female. Essentially, we’re talking bored housewives here – and we have to admit that’s a huge demographic in SL if the in-world dating circuit has anything to tell.

 

Let’s go one further and add the 18-30 casual gamer demographic who may also already play other games online like Perfect World. I’ll even give the benefit of the doubt and say male and female subcategory combined, and disposable income.

 

One thing these two demographics are already accustomed to if they already play other games casually, happens to be the one thing Linden Lab doesn’t apparently have available for them.

 

Game Cards

 

Like I said in the beginning, I was out doing some shopping at the supermarket and there was a wall of game cards on display. Everything from Farmville to Perfect World and all manner of games in between. Each of these games has a lot in common with Second Life in that the premise of in-game tokens and items is a big cash cow. Micro transactions fuel their business model and they know it.

 

This is why you’ll find at most supermarkets a sort of kiosk for these game cards. Ability to pre-purchase, at the point of sale, tokens in-game or upgrades with extra items as bonuses. This sounds eerily familiar to what Linden Lab is attempting to offer on Amazon.

 

The irony (I suppose) is that even Amazon itself has a host of these gift cards available at point of sale in the real world, alongside Facebook cards for their online games. GameStop is there as well, and on the other two sides of the kiosk were all manner of specific cards for games and services.

 

Standing there at this kiosk, I was completely baffled that pretty much everything except Second Life was represented. So I did the obvious thing and pulled out my cell phone, taking a picture.

 

 

 

 

One of the most common things I’ve heard from new users of Second Life who have come from other games is that they ask why Linden Lab doesn’t have those cards available at the stores (GameStop, Supermarkets, etc) when they could buy them for every other game they’ve played so far. Why do they have to buy L$ with a credit card or Paypal and hook up their account to it when they shouldn’t have to?

 

I agree with this sentiment wholeheartedly.

 

Standing in the supermarket and staring at this wall of game cards, I asked the same exact question. I didn’t know about the Amazon package online until existing residents of Second Life started blogging, posting on social media, and tweeting about it. But here I was in the one place where the average casual gamer would actually be likely to find out about Second Life if they hadn’t heard about it before and didn’t have the benefit of having “somebody in the know” to tell them about it. Those same cards also exist at point of sale elsewhere in more specific shops like GameStop, and even Wal-Mart.

 

Essentially, the exact place most likely to reach new people and get them interested, legitimately, for the first time. People who play other games or use other services casually, or hardcore, and would see a Second Life card next to their game of choice and think “Hey, that looks interesting… Let’s give that a try.”

 

 

 

 

I’m not exactly in the mindset to say Second Life is a game, but it shares enough in common with games (at least in fundamentals) that it makes no sense not to play in the same arena. After all, Linden Lab already is busy on that path with their mobile games… or I guess whatever they want to bill them as. So I’ll concede at least on that level that if they want to align it side by side with games, but then call it “a different kind of game experience”, then that’s fine. I’ll compromise on that topic, even though I wholeheartedly don’t believe Second Life is a game (which if you read the reviews on Amazon, most of those long time users are saying exactly the same thing).

 

But in doing so, they are going to have to explore the common sense of that path which wouldn’t be a second thought to a game developer today. Even EA has game cards, and Zynga, and PlayFish, and pretty much any hardcore or casual online enabled game or social environment.

 

The underlying premise of all of these companies is that they already acknowledge the one thing that Linden Lab is fighting tooth and nail to ignore. The business model is in micro transactions and virtual items, and less about premium memberships. The business model includes sponsored items from companies for their virtual population in-game.

 

Essentially, there is far more to be made from the “Freemium” model than by attempting to sell Premium accounts or sell the game itself. World of Warcraft is a full MMO, and thrives on Premium Memberships, but Second Life isn’t World of Warcraft… Therein is the difference between a game in the stricter sense and a sandbox virtual environment. World of Warcraft is a game in that a majority of the content and game world are created by the developers. In Second Life, a majority of the content and world are created by the “players”.

 

That’s why the motto of Second Life was “Your world, Your imagination.”

 

Domino Dancing

 

I used to say there are three dominos to how we can go about making money from a virtual world or a game. Somebody needs to pay the bills, of course, and so we explore where we can add a charge to offset those costs and make a profit. The first domino is the end-user, the second domino is the content creator, and the third is corporate involvement (advertising). In a game, that second domino exists as “in-house developers” whereas Linden Lab has the distinct advantage of outsourcing the entire world and content by default to the users/players. A games developer today would kill to have that situation, and yet Linden Lab apparently squanders that advantage. The reason WoW has premium membership and subscription is because their model is linear whereas Second Life benefits from a non-linear model.

 

When we look at this set of dominos, they line up from left to right, and knocking one down goes to the left. So if we knock down the first domino, the end-user, it falls to the left and hits nothing else. This leaves the other two dominos untouched (and untapped) as legitimate revenue sources. If we hit the second domino, it falls to the left and takes with it the end-user as well – this is better but leaves out a very big revenue source untapped, that being the corporate involvement who effectively have the most money to spend.

 

When we take out a domino in that chain, everything to the left of it is automatically covered (or is included) by the domino to the right. So if we focused on the second domino in the chain (the content creator), the end-user is covered freely (or purely through transactions or just using the system). If we concentrated on the Corporate domino, the content creator and end-user is covered freely or at a minimum barrier.

 

Ultimately, our solution exists in a delicate combination of the three dominos, with the biggest burden on the third (metaphorically), less burden on the second and (if possible) little to no barrier of use to the end-user, save spending their disposable income on what the content creators are making, which in turn could (and should) also include Intellectual Property from the third domino which is our Corporate Sponsors.

 

Making Dollars (and Sense)

 

Right now, what Linden Lab has is a scenario where they are trying to independently knock down the first and second domino while ignoring the third entirely. But even then, they are using a rocket propelled grenade launcher on the first domino and a pillow on the second.

 

Focusing on the Premium accounts and Simulator Sales, while not being entirely sure what the hell to do with Marketplace. In the bigger picture, since it seems like some sort of clusterfsk to them, the strategy is more about making new games and promoting them, along with acquisition of other companies and technologies which support their new games.

 

In essence, they are trying to recapture the underlying creation aspect of Second Life but this time keep it under tighter lock and key as a game environment so they can have better control. Keeping the genie locked up tight, so to speak.

 

It seems like the sort of strategy that says: “We have no idea what to do with Second Life, so we’re going to try and recapture that thunder in another game and move on. Try to rebrand the company as something else.”

 

Essentially, this is the equivalent of quietly getting into the lifeboats without alerting the passengers that the ship is going to sink.

 

 

The management would like to inform you that everything is perfectly fine.

 

 

What they should be doing, logically, is using the rocket propelled grenade launcher to knock down the third domino, marry the content creator aspect to it in a symbiotic nature, and work on eliminating the premium accounts as we know them, instead rebranding the premium accounts as “Professional Accounts”.

 

Problem solved. Mostly.

 

Statement of Vision

 

If I were to get into more detail about strategy, it would be stunningly simple. The ship is sinking, I agree, but it is premature to write it off and get into the lifeboats.

 

Let’s take a look at how the domino theory applies in this situation.

 

I think Linden Lab actually had a great idea with their idea of business accounts and Gold Partners. In-world content creators or service providers that could apply for that level of involvement. The problem wasn’t the idea (as Mark Kingdon came up with) but instead it was the poor execution. So, let’s say we bring that back but this time we marry it to the idea of evolving the Premium Account into a Professional Account to be eligible.

 

Starting on the third domino this time, which is corporate involvement, we’re not looking to sell them simulators but instead in-world content opportunities as marketing on their end. They can still purchase simulators if they wanted, but we’d deter them and try to make a compelling case for the marketing instead.

 

The Professional Accounts who are certified through Linden Lab become part of the pool of content creators which are eligible for applying for and winning the right to create the content on behalf of those corporate intellectual properties.

 

Therein, the best content creators who are involved professionally would be vying for the right to represent and create the content for those corporate names in-world. The incentive for those content creators becomes legitimate brand name merchandise in their stores and on marketplace, and the incentive for corporate involvement is that brand names likely sell better than non-brand names, so the propagation of their brand name in a viral fashion and presented in a natural setting of involvement in-world counts as self-sufficient marketing.

 

This sort of marketing/advertising does not break the metaphor of involvement in-world, and thus there is no metaphor shear as we (should have) expected from outright selling simulators for brands. In the latter case, it was no different than intrusive and independent banner advertising in a virtual world. Who the hell wants to visit the misguided attempt at a corporate theme park known as Dell Island? Nobody… that’s who.

 

But a cursory search on marketplace will show you that there are quite a lot of people interested in functional laptops and digital gadgets. So, why not have Professional Accounts who are vying for the opportunity to build those brand name laptops and gadgets in-world on behalf of Dell to put on Marketplace?

 

All Dell as a company would have to do is authorize it, and the professional Account (content creator) that wins the bid would handle everything else according to the terms set by Dell. Which is to say, a percentage of sales goes to Dell automatically on a split profit, the existing tax goes to Linden Lab on transaction fee, and the content creator is responsible for promoting, presenting and selling the items in question.

 

Which really shouldn’t be a stretch since it’s a hell of a lot easier to do that with a brand name item than an item that has to make a name for itself.

 

In the same manner, we utilize the organic nature of content creators as a supplement in that when a brand name (intellectual property) is involved under this premise, other content creators may not be building what Dell may have asked for, but we shouldn’t outright penalize them by default. If there exists other products on marketplace which are covered by an existing IP relationship (corporate account) – for instance, let’s say a third party content creator goes ahead and makes Alienware laptops in-world instead of XPS like Dell would get from the content creator that won the original bid, then the option is up to Dell whether they want to cease and desist that item… but here’s the alternative that didn't exist a moment ago: Dell has the option of authorizing it retroactively, and tagging a profit split to that item.

 

Now we’re onto something…

 

If the content creator had sold that item in advance of the profit split, then Dell gets 100% of profits until such time as the difference is made up for what they would have made until that point, and when they make up the difference, the profit split goes back to a normal percentage (15-20%) going forward.

 

So yes, there is a penalty for abusing intellectual property and content creators would have to pay the piper. But the penalty isn’t an all or nothing scenario, and actually works with the content creator for a good outcome on both parties involved without the nasty DMCA and such involved.

 

Content creators wishing to create content that isn’t requested from corporate sponsors could go ahead and create the content in advance, and instead of putting it for sale on marketplace, there would be an option for them to leave it unlisted and submit it for review to the owner of the IP if they are on the list already. Once that item is reviewed and cleared, they get an email stating so and their item goes on sale with the typical 15-20% split to the IP holder.

 

If the item is not cleared, the email should state the reason and what steps the content creator could take in order to resubmit successfully. Maybe a simple “We’d like to see a higher quality or [such and such] ability in the product before we can clear it.”

 

Apply this scenario to potentially every corporate entity on earth, and now we’re doing something that Morningstar and Farmer stated in 1991 when they said

 

Work within the system

 

We’re now utilizing our greatest asset in Second Life to the advantage of all parties involved, and treating it like an ecosystem which should be respected.

 

Everybody wins with this situation. The content creators now have added incentive to create high quality, brand name virtual products, corporate entities have a zero footprint and high yield entry into Second Life, and the end-users (players) will see a flood of brand names in the virtual environment which they will likely purchase.

 

Higher volume of sales on Marketplace equals higher profits for Linden Lab, in conjunction with additional fees taken from the corporate entities for marketing.

 

After all, what the hell is Dell going to do with 15-20% of the profits from virtual items in Second Life? It’s negligible at best to them in the grand scheme, but what if I said the percentage was actually going to Linden Lab as profit?

 

Instead of charging Dell outright for marketing fees, Linden Lab just says “Let us take the 15-20% automatically and you don’t owe us a dime. You get Scott-free marketing and all you have to do is authorize it. It literally will pay for itself and you get all the benefit.”

 

Do you know what’s cooler than offering a free generic hoverboard or dune buggy with a new account? Offering brand name virtual items.

 

Screw the dune buggy… How about a free Aston Martin, Lamborghini, or Bugatti Veyron? Then you set up race tracks on those Premium Sims which have less lag (apparently). All while they’re wearing real world styles, a pair of Rayban Sunglasses, and slamming back a Coca-Cola. Instead of making a walled garden out of “Premium Sims” just make them official Linden Lab sims which are subsidized by the sales of those branded items to begin with.

 

Know what’s better than that?

 

Killing three birds with one stone, and making money from every angle while making everyone happy at the same time. For instance, let’s try the following scenario:

 

Arcade Legends Starter Pack: $9.95

Includes 1,000L$ and playable Pac-Man Arcade Machine

 

 

 

 

Who benefits from this starter pack?

 

Let’s trace the logic…

 

NAMCO authorizes it to Linden Lab, a content creator makes it and agrees to 20% of sales to NAMCO/Linden Lab. NAMCO gets zero footprint high volume marketing for free, content creator gets paid for the work (sales), Linden Lab now has a recognizable asset to offer in start packs, which in turn is more enticing than a generic virtual item on a Game Card or in Amazon.com, and the end-users in-world now have something they wanted all along. In turn, a brand item that now would sell like wildfire on Marketplace, earning Linden Lab (and the content creator) money, and giving Linden Lab a 20% cut, while giving NAMCO the marketing.

 

Rinse and repeat. I’ve literally just solved every single problem in the food chain.

 

And now you understand the gold-mine that is Second Life.

 

I could continue on like this much longer, but this post is long enough as-is. The point overall is that all the things Linden Lab could be doing to turn Second Life around they are neglecting, instead jumping in the lifeboats and arguably firing cannons at the damned ship on the way out. Which is a shame, because they’re arbitrarily taking a short sighted approach in the face of a long-term possible cash cow. A multi-stream revenue model that has the best interest of everyone in mind and still pays the bills.

 

But hey… who am I to criticize? I guess Premium accounts are doing well and so are simulator sales. They have nothing to worry about, right? It’s not like they’ve lost nearly all corporate involvement from brands, squandered worldwide good-will and press, or driven off the educational sector en-mass….

 

I do have to say this about the educational aspect: Even Apple Computer is smart enough (or was) to give discounts or educational donations of their computers to get them into classrooms. Maybe it’s a write off (charitable donation?) but in the end the worst you do is write it off as re-investment or marketing. I’d be bringing back those educational discounts, and working with classrooms and universities again.

 

It only makes sense to work with universities. It’s Business 101.

 

I know I’m one of the biggest critics of Second Life and Linden Lab. But that’s the underlying point. I’m willing to take an honest look and say we can do better than where it’s at today, for the benefit of all involved, because at the end of the day I’m also their biggest fan and I want nothing more than for them to succeed.

 

So long as Linden Lab is quietly boarding the lifeboats, it pains me. For every year I watch yet another virtual environment snatch defeat from the jaws of victory after 16 years in this industry, it hurts me to witness it. Each and every time I see a company that doesn’t understand the dynamics of their flagship product and community, and actively works against it or ignores it, when simply enabling them to thrive and grow would benefit the company ten-fold or more, it bothers me to no end.

 

I want to yell and scream at the top of my lungs – WAKE UP! It’s not over! Get the hell up from the mat and fight like you mean it! It’s not impossible! It’s dead simple! It always has been dead simple.

 

And yet, each and every time, that voice goes unheard and unheeded. As small as the text that comprises this sentence.

 

I’ve watched companies come and go, and I’ve raised the flags and told them it was coming from Active Worlds to Atari. I’ve watched them bury themselves time and again… because they thought they understood. Watched them squander good will, a dedicated community, and countless opportunities to reap the rewards…

 

It’s always been simple. I’ve been saying this to deaf ears since 1998.

 

But apparently common sense is a super power these days.

 

 

 

 

One Step Beyond

There’s always more to my projects in #SecondLife

 

I’ve been taking a bit of a break from writing lately due to some external projects and implications thereof, but if you’ve been following my twitter feed @DarianKnight then you know I’ve been talking a lot about the creation of the mesh arcade machines in Second Life with Robbie Heath. For some, I know the seeming barrage of pictures comes across as a one-note tweet and beating a dead horse – “Look how real they look!”, but there is far more going on with the purpose of this project than I actually let on.

 

There is, of course, the aspect of how detailed one can get with in-world mesh and more appropriately how accurate a virtual representation of a real world object can be. That’s a given, though there is still more to this which I’ll explain.

 

 

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For starters, I’m exploring the differentiation of texture quality versus subtle realism that such textures would imply. Just because you can have an ultra-high resolution independent vector graphic as your basis doesn’t mean that the crispness and detail translates into a warm and believable texture in-world. Sometimes the HD quality works against you and offers too much crispness and detail, or as I often say –

 

Imperfection is actually a cue for implied perfection, where overt perfection is a cue for fakeness.

 

Therein is the first part of this puzzle – implications of attaining an organic feel to your builds versus something too perfect, which in itself destroys your attempt at believability in a virtual sense. The subtle imperfections add the organic feel, and thus raises the believability factor far more than the high definition textures with crispness would – and to wit the ultra high detailed and crisp textures often times sabotages your efforts toward atmosphere believability.

 

The rest of this project is information that I hadn’t really talked about much, but it’s just as important overall. The reason I chose arcade machines as the subject of this project was multi-fold:

 

1. Recognizable brands
2. Defining the state of prosumer interaction with companies
3. Learning a bit of history as well as the climate of existing communities
4. Define a working solution that addresses the context of prosumer overall

 

 

 

Recognizable Brands

 

It’s nearly a universal understanding that the arcade machines are immediately recognizable. You probably have fond memories of your childhood in an arcade, the many hours pumping quarters into that digital hypnotist which compelled you to continue. While all of this is very important, it is not just the machines themselves that are important but also (and maybe more importantly) the memories and atmosphere they invoke.

 

There’s a certain feel you get from the arcade, and the arcade machines themselves definitely contributed to that. There’s far more, however – the actual building, the darkened rooms filled with lines of lit marquees, the smell and conglomerating sounds that came together in ambience, which despite the “noise” you somehow managed to focus just on the game you were playing like a laser.

 

 

Then there is the external factors that are attached to this project – so let’s get into the second bullet point:

 

 

 

Defining the state of prosumer

interaction with companies

 

Definitely of interest to me is the relationship that the social media prosumer (producer + consumer of content) has with companies today. After all, social media is quite the driving force in our online world but companies with recognizable brands are still thinking in 20th Century logic. There’s the controlling factor of push media involved, wherein the companies create and control the message, method and form that their brands take in the public. This could manifest as television, print, and radio advertising but also these methodologies are used in the social media aspect with mixed results at best.

 

So I’m looking at this aspect in terms of 21st Century Prosumer culture, and whether or not companies are actually within their right corporate minds to actually engage intelligently with this paradigm.

 

For this point, I came across some really interesting situations that had arisen within existing communities concerning the companies who own the brands. Allow me to explain -

 

In the case of Ms. Pacman, which is a world recognizable icon owned by NAMCO, there are the original arcade machines and a large community of collectors which meticulously restore and refurbish original cabinets with artwork and hardware in order to get the machines back to not only working order but near pristine condition as if they came off the factory floor in 1981.

 

These arcade cabinets are worth quite a lot of money fully restored, with estimates ranging from $1,500 all the way up to $6,000 in some cases. Restoration of these original arcade machines is a serious endeavor, and not taken lightly by serious collectors.

 

In order to restore a Ms. Pacman arcade cabinet to factory glory, you need the replacement hardware (if the existing hardware is faulty) and you also need the vinyl decals and artwork. For this you go to an authorized reproduction printer that specializes in arcade graphics for cabinets – in which you are looking for your basic sets:

 

CPO – Control Panel Overlay

Side Art – Cabinet Side Artwork

Marquee – The plexiglass title on the top front with the light behind it

Bezel – The artwork around the screen as an insert

Kick plate – Usually under or surrounding the coin doors

 

Now, it’s not as simple as just going to a printer and saying “I would like the Ms. Pacman CPO” because within that domain itself there are reproduction artworks which are not the same as the originals but sometimes are preferable to the collector in a personal sense, and then there is the idea of NOS reproduction which are “New Old Stock” or reproductions of the original artworks for actual collectors trying to restore the cabinets accurately to retain the value or increase the value on resale.

 

And this is where it gets interesting in terms of Ms. Pacman (and likely many others). When a company is authorized and licensed to be the official reproduction artwork outlet for these machines, that company is then charged with the retracing and reproduction of the original artwork in high quality.

 

In the case of Ms. Pacman the company who has the license and rights to reproduce the NOS artwork is a company named TwoBits. The problem is that the actual collector community realized that TwoBits, the only company authorized to officially make NOS reproductions of the original artwork, clearly and unrepentantly did a horrible job. Such a bastardization of the original graphics ensued (not to mention the bad quality of the stickers instead of using vinyl) that actually using the official NOS artwork will devalue a restored cabinet.

 

 

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Apparently NAMCO enjoys forcing a pile of crap down people’s throats

 

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At this point, I’m still talking about arcade machines and detail, and I know some of you are tapping your fingers impatiently wondering when I’m going to stop beating the dead horse. Well, for those of you tapping your fingers and getting impatient, I suggest you instead sit on your hands and keep your mouth shut while I continue. The blatantly obvious seems to have escaped you for why I’d even bother with this project to begin with.

 

Herein is the important part of this story, and the real relevance to our second bullet point:

 

The community, upon realizing the horrible botch job that TwoBits was doing with their beloved NAMCO icon, refused to purchase the only official NOS artwork available for their own cabinets because (obviously) they didn’t want to devalue their hefty investment, or effectively destroy something they’ve put so much work into restoring.

 

But that didn’t stop them from continuing to restore their cabinets to factory appeal, which means they must have had another option than TwoBits.

 

This is where the relevance to the prosumer community comes into play, and why I chose arcade machines as the subject of this project. What happened next succinctly defines the prosumer relationship with companies in the 21st century versus the 20th century push mentality that companies exhibit. In short – one of the answers I was after in doing this project.

 

And here you thought it was all about how cool they looked in-world…

 

The community of prosumers – producers and consumers of media, are no longer in a position where they are forced into a single channel of consuming whatever media is prepared for them without any other options. That’s the old way of thinking, and companies today still (strangely) believe they have this control in the digital age. Since this is the new paradigm, and our prosumer community is no longer bound to accept media as defined solely by the companies within the channels the companies define nor the circumstances, they did what anyone in a social media industry would expect them to have done.

 

Somebody with the artistic know-how and printing background went out and purchased a high quality original Ms. Pacman machine with as few defects as possible in the original artwork. In short, as near to pristine condition as they could get. This alone set them back quite a lot of money, but it was seen as a beneficial investment for the entire community and world. Therein is one aspect of the prosumer mentality that companies don’t seem to readily grasp – altruism.

 

They then scanned the entire machine into a computer at high resolution photography, and then meticulously retraced the entire machine – including printing layer separation, into vector format. The results were a near perfect NOS reproduction set.

 

So what did the community do with this holy grail of arcade artwork that they now possessed?

 

They attempted to give it away for free to TwoBits, so that TwoBits could sell it back to the community who would then be willing to purchase it. This saving TwoBits and NAMCO further shame in authorizing and producing a bastardization of artwork.

 

Let’s recap for a moment:

 

An active and detail obsessed community bent on authenticity was given only the option of decidedly non-authentic media for which to consume and use. Being a prosumer community, they rejected the sub-par offering and set their expertise on recreating accurate artwork instead for both the benefit of the community and the company authorized to reproduce that artwork, as well as do right by a brand name they supported (NAMCO), and they offered that work at absolutely no charge or stipulation.

 

If anything, TwoBits was now in a very lucrative position.

 

Any company with a shred of common sense would see this. The community which they were targeting with their products has essentially boycotted their product because of the horrendous job they have done, but is now offering them a highly accurate NOS artwork set that they (a detail obsessed group) have meticulously produced. They are offering it to that company for free and without stipulation, because they want to do right by them, NAMCO and their own community in staying on the right side of the law and supporting both that company and NAMCO.

 

They stand to make a lot of money and regain their reputation in the process, as well as the universal good will of the very customers which they have wronged. This, for all intents and purposes, is a situation that is entirely in their favor on all accounts.

 

What did TwoBits say?

 

They flatly refused, opting to keep their own product offering instead.

 

So this community of prosumers, still wanting to do right by NAMCO, did the only thing they could at that point. They went to NAMCO and attempted to apply for licensing of the NOS Artwork so that they could legally reproduce it for the community and still do right by NAMCO in the process. Again, there were no stipulations involved in this, other than that they explicitly stated that they weren’t interested in a profit margin and wished only to charge the cost of reproduction, printing and shipping. If there was a licensing fee involved from NAMCO, they would gladly add that to the costs to pay their dues but did not want to make any profit themselves.

 

After many unsuccessful attempts to get the time of day out of NAMCO, and what I believe was close to a year of waiting, NAMCO finally responded not with a well thought out reply or addressing the devotion and altruism to their iconic IP from die-hard fans, but by stating flatly that only TwoBits had the license and rights to reproduce their artwork.

 

Open and shut case.

 

Well, not quite. There is one option left, and this is the option that so many prosumers just skip to from the beginning. Faced with a brick wall from NAMCO and TwoBits, the community still had the holy grail of reproduction artwork on their hands. They sure as hell weren’t going to buy TwoBits reproduction artwork because it would devalue their hefty investments in restoration.

 

What was left, is what sadly is a normal occurrence in the prosumer culture – they as a community simply gave each other the accurate artworks freely to be sent off to a third party printer. No costs, no production fees. They just gave the vector templates away freely to each other. This in and of itself is IP violation, but that’s the situation that so often rears its head in the 21st century paradigm. These IP violations happen (quite often) not because prosumers haven’t tried to do things the correct way, and follow the appropriate channels – but because companies that own these IP and brands act without common sense, even when the situation is handed to them on not just a silver platter but a platinum platter.

 

Now that we’ve covered bullet points 2 and 3, we’ve defined the deeper purpose for producing arcade machines in Second Life. That being said, detail is actually a large part – so we’re coming full circle for a very important reason.

 

 

Biff to the Future

Make like a tree, and get outta’ here

 

A few years back, I originally followed a similar path with the Series I arcade cabinets in Second Life. It was an exercise to demonstrate the reluctance and outright ignorance of companies when dealing with prosumer culture. Like the community and the Ms. Pacman scenario, I jumped through countless hoops to get the time of day out of NAMCO and other companies, only to be met with silence or the equivalent answer of:

 

We’re not in a position to either authorize nor ignore this request. We reserve the right to request removal of your offering at our convenience, but in the meantime we’re not outright telling you no.

 

Essentially it was the greatest non-answer they could construct. This in itself was intriguing to me because it implies that these companies have no protocol to handle or engage with prosumer communities for their own benefit. You’re either a producer or a consumer to them. Producers create stuff for money and make a profit, they pay you licensing fees and are professionals. You can measure the units of sales, the demographics, etc easily and construct appropriate licensing fees. Consumers are just the people those producers are supposed to be selling to, and companies usually have a strict “No Solicitation” policy in place barring consumers from playing the part of the producer.

 

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You have permission only if we can revoke that permission and claim we never gave you permission.

Also, we reserve the right to hold you responsible for what other people are doing unrelated to you.

 

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The problem is, this situation worked well in the 20th century when consumers were largely not enabled to produce high-quality media on their own so quickly and cheaply. But in the 21st century, it’s a whole other ballgame – and the consumers are now the high-quality producers of content as well, with the ultimate realization that in many cases your customers can actually do a better job than you as a company.

 

The really interesting thing is that those same customers aren’t looking to compete with you, but are so devoted to your brand and company that they only look for a symbiotic relationship whereby they can offer their devotion freely and for the benefit of all. It’s that altruism and devotion that companies seem to have a problem comprehending.

 

So the prosumers largely end up on their own little black-market mentality. They’d love to openly show their devotion and support for their favorite brands, but the brands and companies are forbidding it. Regardless, that isn’t stopping the prosumers from going ahead anyway and producing content and showing their support for their favorite brands. For a different context, one need only search for popular music on Youtube.

 

 

Devil in the Details

 

And now we’ve come full circle to why the detail of the mesh arcade machines in Second Life is important.

 

After learning the current prosumer situation, the attitude of the companies involved, and (yes) even putting in those requests personally myself though I know it’s just a good faith gesture, I’ve come to an expected impasse.

 

 

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This time around, the arcade machines aren’t for sale. You won’t find them on Marketplace. That much I’ve clearly decided. They do, however, stand to represent a highly-detailed representation of the prosumer concept in action, which is why I talk about how detailed and accurate they are. If there is really any chance of convincing a company like NAMCO (or any company for that matter) that such a thing is in their benefit, it helps to start with an accurate and detailed reproduction in order to show that the quality assurance aspect is not a problem.

 

That’s one less thing for them to worry about, assuming they bother giving it the time of day at all. The solution for this prosumer atmosphere is still the very thing I’ve been saying since 1998, in that it needs to be addressed on a case by case basis and taken into context of the situation at hand in order that these companies can reap massive benefits in the process in the form of self-propelled social marketing initiatives.

 

It’s a whole new ballgame for them, and I know change is fought hard.

 

That being said, the original hypothesis stands – ignoring prosumers doesn’t make the content go away. Better to have the high quality content be official from them than to allow countless low-quality knockoffs that make you look bad. Celebrate the dedicated community making you look good instead of ignoring them and punishing them.

 

The problem is… those low quality knock-offs are turning out to be the officially licensed products themselves while the unauthorized stuff is putting it to shame.

 

So here’s the solution (our 4th Bullet Point):

 

 

 

Virtual Intellectual Property and Electronic Revenue [VIPER] Licensing

 

To an extent, this already exists in a primordial fashion. You see it on Youtube when you search for music and the Artist shows up with an iTunes or Amazon purchase link, but I’m talking about the virtual world context here and further integration in social prosumer context. The thing about the situation is, until recently I hadn’t bothered trying to sort out exactly how to address this gap in a way that would be beneficial for all, and even though I’ve hinted at ideas for this (X-Factor, etc) it has only been recently that I’ve been tasked with sorting that out in detail for an entirely different project outside of Second Life.

 

What transpires below is just a basic overview of what I’ve been working out in detail. It should give a better idea of what I’ve been up to and how all of this relates. The description here isn’t complete, so implementing it “AS-IS” would probably be volatile at best without those missing pieces which I am keeping to myself.

 

Essentially it works like thus -

 

1. Consumers are also producers of content. In a social media age, this is a no-brainer to admit.
2. Prosumers are passionate about your products or brands. Again, no-brainer.
3. They are often quite brilliant and creative. Still not a far stretch and quite obvious
4. You no longer control the message or direction of the message
5. Prosumers will still create content whether you like it or not
6. You do control the brand and image
7. It’s better that you enable an outlet for that creativity and call it marketing
8. Automate the channel for prosumers to register projects/products
9. Set an automatic licensing percentage on digital content sales
10. Ask only that the company retains the sole right to do quality assurance before and during availability, which the company may invoke at any point before or during the digital offering

 

We’ll call this the ten commandments of VIPER Licensing. The point is to establish a prosumer friendly situation which takes into account both the prosumers and the community which is capable and already producing content with your brand (overtly or covertly), and giving the option to simply register that creative project/product as a prosumer and agree to a preset licensing fee tier based on the price of the digital asset, context, and volume of sales.

 

VIPER Licensing does not ask the prosumer to predict demographics, or any of the statistics up front like you would normally ask with a Producer. They aren’t treated like consumers (ignored) and they aren’t treated like production companies (massive licensing fees, etc). Instead, VIPER licensing does what the name implies:

 

It is a method by which a surgical precision can be applied to a prosumer context, whereby evaluation on a per project basis is enabled but not required. VIPER Licensing is also preemptive in that it automatically assumes clearance and applies a percentage fee for licensing to be paid to the brand owner/ IP owner. Upon review, that licensing may be adjusted or revoked at the discretion of the brand/IP owner.

 

The purpose of VIPER Licensing is to enable a marketing aspect from prosumers, while also fast-tracking and enabling virtual worlds prosumers to import real world brands. In context, a company/brand that enables VIPER Licensing for their brand in a virtual environment… say like Second Life, would simply set the brand name, the license fee tier, and any additional QA requirements on a Corporate Control Panel of Marketplace.

 

The company would be alerted whenever a project/product in a virtual world is registered for VIPER Licensing for their brand/company (email) and they may review them at their leisure – either revoking the VIPER License for projects or requesting some changes to keep in line with the QA requirements in order to remain authorized.

 

Only the projects/products from prosumers that the brand/IP owner feels meets the QA guidelines would remain after the filtering process. Overall, the brand/IP owner can use this wisely or to further defeat the purpose of this system by using it to abuse the good faith of their prosumer community through systematically denying any and all projects/products willingly registered in VIPER Licensing for such brand. In which case, a company is then no better off than they began because they’ve fostered a situation whereby they’ve destroyed the faith of the prosumers who will merely continue creating but no longer trusting your brand in the VIPER Licensing system.

 

Because the virtual world system (I’m still using Second Life as the example) would be making a percentage of the transaction on Marketplace, and the VIPER License would be setting aside a percentage for the brand owner, while the content creator is still making something for their efforts – everyone wins. VIPER Licensed digital products in a virtual world would likely sell far more since they would be officially sanctioned (and legal), which means that there is a huge benefit for prosumers to have their virtual products registered under VIPER.

 

It’s a flexible, agile, and elegant solution to the prosumer context with real world brands. It offers real world companies a zero-cost marketing solution that actually returns revenue. It’s a system that is automatic and as painless as choosing from a list of VIPER Enabled brands which are participating. It raises volume of sales being officially sanctioned, which means that the marketplace that enables this makes a larger volume of money through transactions while offering a method by which real world brands can re-enter the virtual world without the overhead.

 

And now you know the point of the arcade machines.

 

 

 

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Wrap-up

Other things of interest

 

Yes, I’ve been quiet and really haven’t sounded off on anything going on. We can blame that on my crippling Minecraft and Google+ addictions for which I may need to seek a rehab. In any event, this post is much longer than usual as I attempt to catch up.

 

Let’s get this out of the way in the short version:

 

New Materials coming to Second Life –

 

Specular and Normal Maps, thanks to Exodus team. Great start, but still needs Parallax Occlusion Mapping added to that materials list before I get giddy. Still, some kudos are in order for this. I’ll add it on the list with Mesh Deformer, Built-In Weather, Zones, and a laundry list of other things I expected 5 years ago when I first came to Second Life.

 

Still, better late than never I suppose.

 

 

It doesn’t require Crysis level graphics to do.

 

 

Everyone/Nobody is Going to Leave Second Life!

 

I’ve heard this one too many times.

 

It’s a statement that only holds true because Second Life is a virtual monopoly with no serious contenders. They can get away with bloody murder for all it matters at this point because there is nowhere viable to go. However, it’s unwise to make an assertion based on an assumption.

 

It is a situation that is contextual and almost always likely to change going forward. See also every other virtual environment that has come and gone prior whereby they thought they were immune to an exodus and so started pissing all over their customers. Before Second Life there was ActiveWorlds – and they said and did the same things under the impression that there was nowhere to go and so they could use and abuse their community at will.

 

Funny how that worked out. Linden Lab is not immune to this fact, so don’t jump the gun quite yet. If ever there is an equal or better alternative, you may as well pull the plug on the bathtub, because that’s the sound you’re going to hear in Second Life if they continue pissing on their community. Just because right now there isn’t a compelling alternative doesn’t mean that there never will be one.

 

At this point, all it’s going to take in order to meet that single requirement is to piss off enough open source programmers who specialize in virtual worlds that they organize and push advanceme – oh wait, yeah that might actually be happening.

 

Relax and just watch the situation. It could go both ways, really. I wouldn’t say “never” but in the same breath it’s premature to state that right now the situation is enough to trigger that exodus. What I will say to this end is simply that Linden Lab seems to be doing a great job setting themselves up for a future fall, because actions in an ecosystem tend to have a long-tail effect which aren’t apparent until the tsunami comes to shore.

 

Try switching to herbal non-caffeinated tea. No reason to be bent out of shape for either talking point. We can all come to a happy medium and just be patient to see what transpires without polarized fear mongering and sensationalist rants.

 

One thing is for certain – with the recent cutting off of open source grids, the Metaverse just got a hell of a lot smaller today. Maybe that’s actually for the best… I’ve always contended that in order to grow into something bigger and better, the open source end had to cut their apron strings and hold their own.

 

I see this as a fantastic opportunity for the future of the Metaverse. The real question is whether or not the community will seize that opportunity.

 

 

Minecraft is the Metaverse?

 

In a word: No.

 

I’ve been paying attention quite a bit lately to the latest updates (1.3.1) wherein Mojang changed the server code aspect to where each local client is also acting as a server. I find this interesting because it’s similar to the Hybrid Decentralized approach that I advocated years ago with Solipsis. It’s also one of the future looking requirements for server architecture proposed in the research paper I wrote with LMU for Association for Computing Machinery journal.

 

There is still quite a bit of lag involved with the new architecture of 1.3.1 Minecraft and the “everyone is a server” mentality. To me this means that the Area of Interest networking nodes aren’t quite optimized yet and the balance between decentralized and centralized communication haven’t been fine tuned. I’m pretty certain though that those aspects will iron out.

 

If not the Metaverse, I would say at least that Minecraft is serving as a wonderful template for the Metaverse for some crucial aspects. So there’s that – and I’m quite happy to see at least that coming of it.

 

 

 

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