What's Next?
(* Source: Paulisakson *)
A great presentation to what is otherwise a rather complicated issue made simple.
March 28, 2008
Future Trends in Advertisting
(* Source: Ben Hourahine *)
Nice video from Ben, Futures Editor from Leo Burnett
November 06, 2007
Starbucks, PepsiCo Bring 'Subopera' to Shanghai
(* Source : Walstreet Journal *)
A feel-good film about a girl from the Chinese countryside who moves to the big city to discover love, blogging and Starbucks will premier this month in an unusual venue: Shanghai's subway.
"A Sunny Day," is scheduled to play exclusively on thousands of high-tech flat screen monitors on Shanghai's subway cars and station platforms.
![[Subway]](http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/images/MK-AM596_SUBWAY_20071031194407.jpg) |
| Girl meets boy and Starbucks in 'A Sunny Day,' to be shown in installments |
Tailored for an audience of 2.2 million who cram onto China's biggest underground railway each day, the full-length feature film will be shown in daily segments of a few minutes each over 40 weekdays, soap-opera style. Subtitles in Chinese will help commuters follow the dialogue over the subway noise, and multiple daily rebroadcasts and tie-ins on the Internet are designed to ensure no one misses any of the cliffhangers.
Instead of an ordinary film, the so-called "subopera" is a blend of drama and advertising. A venture between Starbucks Coffee Co. and PepsiCo Inc. financed and helped produce the drama as part of a campaign that kicks off today in Shanghai to introduce bottled frappuccino drinks to the Chinese market.
"It's quite unique and demonstrates a departure from conventional marketing," says Howard Schultz, Starbucks chairman. The coffee company hasn't traditionally advertised, Mr. Schultz says, adding that a soap opera can be effective since it creates "real entertainment for our customers and along the way there is a complementary message." PepsiCo, which will bottle and distribute the Starbucks-branded drinks, referred questions to Starbucks
The film has a clear commercial bent. In some shots, the mermaid from the Starbucks logo gets as much face-time as the movie's big turnstile draw, Huang Xiao Ming, a 29-year-old pop star who is so well known he is sometimes called China's Justin Timberlake.
Still, "A Sunny Day" is no infomercial. Mr. Huang's character "CC" is a struggling musician who strums his guitar for coins in the subway, and falls for big-hearted Sunny, who is trying to get over the death of a boyfriend and fit into a new job.
During the shooting on a recent Sunday, as a gaggle of teenage women sneaked onto the set, Mr. Huang described the subway a "fashionable, very modern" venue that will appeal to a trendy audience.
Subways around the world have long featured visual distractions. A century ago, platforms were showcases for art, like the swank metro stations in Paris. In the 1970s, spray paint enlivened the dank and dangerous New York subway, and in the 1980s, the late Keith Haring helped make graffiti a respected art form with projects like "Studio in the Subway."
This year, the Berlin subway's 1.5 million daily passengers were the judges in a weeklong festival of 90-second, silent films called "Going Underground."
Advertisers are also pressing beneath the streets. Sidetrack Technologies Inc. of Winnipeg and New York-based Submedia LLC place light-board advertising in subway tunnels in several cities around the world, giving riders the motion-picture like effect of seeing a flipbook.
China's $20 billion advertising industry is increasingly adopting the global trend toward marketing disguised as entertainment. In addition to Hollywood-style product placements in TV shows and movies, a rapidly expanding segment is directed at an emerging middle class during the workday hours with slickly crafted TV-style ads in taxis, airplanes and even elevators.
More here
Kylie Konnects with Fans on the Handset
(* Source : NextGreatThing *)
Allison says :
Artists and labels have been exploring different ways to market and monetize their music beyond MySpace. We just heard The next frontier is the handset. Mozes 
that Sony BMG is going to be selling J Lo’s latest album, Brave, on a fancy wooden flash drive (for $70!!) Meanwhile, artists are dropping their labels like bad habits. AmieStreet, MOG, Pure Volume, Indistr, Sellaband, Navio, Roadsound, iFanz, RCRDLBL, iMeem, Popfolio… These are just a few sites out of hundreds they can use to do promotion, distribution, and sales. In addition to the bands we mentioned last week, even the Oldies are going new media; the Eagles, Joni Mitchell and now Aretha Franklin have all dropped their labels to try the digital model.has taken a step there by enabling bands to text fans updates and messages. The real application, though, will be mobile social networking sites, like the newly launched KylieKonnect for Australian singer Kylie Minogue. The dot mobi site (www.kyliekonnect.com redirects to ourtribe.mobi) lets fans blog, communicate with other users and upload images and video all via mobile phone. There is a Kylie’s own blog, a newsfeed and place to buy Monogued-up wallpapers and ringtones. The site, set up by New Visions Mobile, will allow Kylie’s fans to establish a closer connection with her (or the illusion of one), and she will likely profit off it through site sales. Unfortunately for fans, Mashable reports that you seem to need a European-based mobile number to register, just going to show that this sort of technology not as widely embraced (and developed) in the U.S. as it is in Europe, Australia, and Asia.
Radiohead Could Really Piss Off the Music Industry Machine
(* Source : Kristen Nicole *)
Radiohead blew us away with the “donated” sales revenue from its last album “In Rainbows.” The band offered the music for free, and let fans choose how much they’d pay, almost as a tip for the album. What comScore found was that 62% of global users chose not to pay for the album at all.
What’s equally as interesting is the fact that international fans were less likely to pay than US fans. You’d have to do a fairly extensive study to figure out why this may be the case, considering variables such as the native country of the band, the amount of disposable income per capita in various countries around the world, the musical preferences of countries’ citizens, the prevalence of P2P networks as legal options in other countries, etc. So there’s really not much to say in regards to these stats for Radiohead’s album at this particular point.
But what is another topic of conversation is something we’ve touched on in previous coverage of Radiohead’s flip of the script: is this an anomaly and how can regular musicians replicate such success? I’ve said my two cents on the matter–it’s currently rather difficult to make a killing on album sales in the same manner that Radiohead has done, if you don’t already have the fan base. The music industry knows this and may use it to its full advantage.
Radiohead used to be part of the music industry’s machine. Having now cut out the middle man, the band offers content direct to the fans. So with the music industry now looking for ways in which to continually make the same amount of money it raked in during its peak years, I wouldn’t be surprised if Radiohead gets sued.
It was that industry machine that enabled Radiohead to garner such a large fan base, right? So now that the band has kicked the middle man to the curb, the middle man may still want a cut of current sales. While the music industry is still boo-hooing about the decline of sales and the slower adoption of current legal trends, it still has a machine to run. In order to close that gap between previous power and current influence, it will have to find better, more cost-efficient ways in which to advertise artists, and market them across the web.
We’ve seen some pretty under-handed effects arise from this kind of pressure (that means you, Marie Digby), but the evolution will go on, and balance out at some point. As we all know, advertising isn’t going anywhere. The music industry will just need to continue to shift its approach. So will we still have artists able to gain major traction without the music industry’s machine? We won’t have to. The machine will just be better operated.
October 30, 2007
CNN Goes Virtual
(* Source : Mike Shields *)
As news organizations slash budgets and scale back bureaus, CNN is expanding—except not in real life.
In the week of Nov. 5, the news giant is set to open a news-gathering outpost in Second Life. And unlike news service Reuters, which embedded a real reporter in the online virtual world last year, CNN will rely on Second Life "residents" to do all the legwork.
In the space, the network will create a variation of its i-Reports, the real-world vehicle through which average citizens contribute eyewitness reports. CNN will equip Second Life denizens with kits enabling them to transmit copy and photos. Visitors to Second Life will be able to get the latest news via kiosks scattered throughout the virtual community.
And the network will act as a sort of journalism school, offering guidance to avatar citizen journalists via weekly "news meetings" directed by CNN.com staffers. And top CNN personalities including Larry King will conduct virtual training sessions for budding cyber journalists.
Given that Second Life users tend to be highly passionate about the virtual space, CNN execs believe the community will embrace user-generated journalism—more than they would embrace simply repurposed content.
"We looked at what are people doing [in Second Life] that is meaningful to what we do," said Susan Grant, executive vp of CNN News Services. "I love that we don't have to take things from the real world and force them in."
As for whether the world of Second Life will generate news events worthy of reporting, i-Report producer Lila King is not concerned. After all, visitors to the online world include news-making personalities like Newt Gingrich, the former Speaker of the House who most recently had the public guessing whether he'd jump into the presidential race (he hasn't).
CNN's association with Second Life comes at a time when the digital phenomenon is awash in media hype but still far from cracking the mainstream. Its unique user base has hovered between 400,000 and 700,000 per month over the last year, according to Nielsen Online, and has twice fallen below the research firm's minimum reporting threshold.
More here
October 29, 2007
Video game giants slaughter the opposition
(* Source : Timesonline *)
Nigel Kendall says :
The video games industry was told yesterday: “Television used to be accused of corrupting the youth of today. Now you are.”
David Mitchell, the TV comedian, was talking to 750 representatives of the industry at the 25th Golden Joystick Awards, which are decided by public vote. In that quarter of a century, Mitchell observed, video games have gone from “being a few dots dancing around a TV screen to a full-on film that you are in”.
Generations of creative Britons who once dreamt of making films and cracking Hollywood are now just as likely to seek fame and fortune in the video games industry.
Tom Dowding, 25, is a graduate in computer science from Bristol University. He has been playing games since he was 10 and last year set up Mobile Pie, a developer of games for mobile phones. His efforts were rewarded at the Golden Joysticks with a prize of £2,500 and a work placement with Electronic Arts, one of the world’s biggest video game developers. Mr Dowding’s winning game is called Let It Grow.
“You install it on your mobile phone, then, using your phone camera, you nurture it and make it grow,” he said. “Then you post your growing flower on Facebook.” He has licensed the game to a distributor.
For many would-be developers, mobile phones offer a way of making games and minimising expense on programming. A leading game, such as the recent Halo 3, can cost $70 million (£34 million) to develop and a mobile game a fraction of that. The possible rewards are vast. Halo 3 outstripped many blockbuster films in the week that it went on the market, generating sales of $300 million.
Video games have quietly overtaken older entertainment forms such as films and popular music. According to the latest figures from Elspa, the industry body, game software sales in Britain for the first half of 2007 were £519 million, 17 per cent more than in the corresponding period of 2006.
More here
October 26, 2007
Rock Band Vs. Guitar Hero
(* Source : Brian Hiatt *)
The two biggest music releases of the year aren't albums: They're video games. Inside the fight for number one.
In a Boston office with a Fender Strat leaning against the wall, Eric Brosius, a sound designer for video-game developer Harmonix, is staring at clusters of tiny blue bars on his computer screen: Keith Moon's madman drum part from "Won't Get Fooled Again," as mapped out note for note by an on-staff musician. The company that developed Guitar Hero has spent the past year transforming that song and dozens of others -- from the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter" to Metallica's "Enter Sandman" -- into playable pieces of its new music game, Rock Band. Soon, players will be furiously banging electronic drum pads to replicate Moon's stickwork, mashing buttons on guitar-shaped controllers to match Pete Townshend's and John Entwistle's parts, and even trying to scream "Yeeeah!" at the right moment into a microphone. "You get to experience what it's like to play every single part of 'Won't Get Fooled Again' and to see how the parts interact," says Eran Egozy, who co-founded Harmonix as a graduate student at MIT.Guitar Hero may well be this decade's biggest rock & roll phenomenon. Guitar Hero I and II have grossed $360 million since the first game came out in 2005 -- vastly more than any album released in the same period. And the games -- in which players re-create songs' guitar parts by pushing buttons that correspond to notes and chords while hitting a "strum bar" in rhythm -- have inspired kids by the millions to memorize the intricacies of "Free Bird" and "War Pigs." One measure of the games' clout: MTV purchased Harmonix for $175 million last year, and video-game giant Activision paid $99.9 million to acquire RedOctane, the company that owns the Guitar Hero name and manufactured the game's guitar- shaped controllers.
With MTV and Activision unwilling or unable to collaborate, the franchise's future has split in two: Activision's Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock -- a straightforward sequel with a few twists, including a new "battle mode" -- hits stores October 28th, while Harmonix's Rock Band -- which adds drums and vocals to the formula -- comes out November 23rd. Analysts say that the market is big enough for both games to succeed (music games represent about eight percent of the U.S. video-game market, according to the research group NPD) -- so their near-simultaneous releases could become the music event of the year.
More here
October 16, 2007
The New Advertising Outlet: Your Life
(* Source : NYTimes *)
Louise Story says :
Rob Bennett for The New York Times
Joggers in the Nike Running Club in Manhattan last month. Nike is spending more of its advertising dollars on services for consumers like workout advice, online communities and races.
STEVE SAENZ used to run a 10K race in 36 minutes. But last spring — 20 years, 2 children and 50 pounds later — he found himself seriously out of shape. A new Web site from Nike, he says, has brought him back on track.
Since April, Mr. Saenz, 53, has been running with a Nike+, a small sensor in his running shoes that tracks his progress on an Apple iPod he carries. After each run near his home in Louisville, Ky., he docks the iPod into his computer and posts details of his run on the Nike+ Web site. There, he has made friends with other runners around the world who post running routes, meet up in the real world and encourage one another on the site.
Nike’s famous swoosh is there all along. For Nike, this is advertising.
“It’s a very different way to connect with consumers,” says Trevor Edwards, Nike’s corporate vice president for global brand and category management. “People are coming into it on average three times a week. So we’re not having to go to them.”
The success of Nike+ is bad news for the traditional media companies that have long made money from Nike’s television commercials and glossy magazine ads.
Last year, Nike spent just 33 percent of its $678 million United States advertising budget on ads with television networks and other traditional media companies. That’s down from 55 percent 10 years ago, according to the trade publication Advertising Age.
“We’re not in the business of keeping the media companies alive,” Mr. Edwards says he tells many media executives. “We’re in the business of connecting with consumers.”
Mr. Edwards may be more blunt than most. But many large marketers are taking huge chunks of money out of their budgets for traditional media and using the funds to develop new, more direct interactions with consumers — not only on the Internet, but also through in-person events.
Adventurous companies like Nike have been experimenting with these alternatives since the 1990s. But now, even the most conventional marketers are making these alternatives a permanent — and ever bigger — part of their advertising budgets.
Last year, Johnson & Johnson decided to boycott the so-called upfronts, an annual event when advertisers get together with television executives to negotiate for commercial time. In August, General Motors said that 2008 would be the last year for its longtime sponsorship of the Olympics. In May, A. G. Lafley, the chief executive of Procter & Gamble, told financial analysts that the company would spend less on traditional media and more on its Web site, in-store advertising and promotional events.
“If you step back and look at our mix across most of the major brands,” Mr. Lafley said, “it is clearly shifting.”
More here
China plans virtual world for commerce
(* Source : Rachel Konrad *)
SAN JOSE, Calif. - Your favorite pants are fraying? You may soon be able to order replacements directly from the factory where they were made, according to the chief scientist of an ambitious Chinese Internet project.
China's government is building a vast virtual world dubbed Beijing Cyber Recreation District, which founders say will help the manufacturing superpower evolve into an e-commerce juggernaut.
Some supply-chain experts say the project is impossibly grandiose in its goal to provide direct links between tens of thousands of Chinese manufacturers and millions of individual customers around the world. But every "Made in China" label eventually could include a Web site where customers could order more — and Chinese factories would produce custom-made goods and send them directly to consumers' homes, mused Chi Tau Robert Lai, chief scientist of the virtual world.
The 3D world is supposed to be the online counterpart to the China Recreation District, a theme park, mall and playground being built in a former steel plant in Beijing for the 2008 Olympics.
Some Chinese-language Web sites of the CRD are already up, but most of it — including the first direct links to manufacturers — won't come until the second half of next year at the earliest, Lai said.
In addition to connecting factories with people outside China, the project will allow businesses outside China to tap the nation's burgeoning middle class, he said.
"This makes you have to think of China in a different way," Lai said Thursday evening at the Virtual Worlds Conference & Expo in San Jose. "We are stepping back and trying to blend the human and the computer to touch everything associated with people's lives."
More here
October 12, 2007
Virtual Worlds Conference: Ironstar's Joakim Achren Talks Mobile Virtual Worlds
(* Source : Worldsinmotion *)
It seems that mobile connectivity to virtual worlds is right on the horizon. But what about a virtual world actually self-contained in a mobile phone? At the 2007 Virtual Worlds Conference, Ironstar Helsinki CEO Joakim Achren demonstrated and discussed MoiPal, his company's mobile virtual world that works on basic Java handsets.
"The idea was like, your friend in the phone," Achren said. "It’s an avatar that lives in your cellphone." The mobile pal is controlled like a Sim, or a Tamagotchi. Achren explained that he got the idea from thinking of how adults have facebook and kids and 'tweens have Club Penguin -- but what about teens?
"They are usually not at home, but they always have a mobile phone with them," Achren noted. "And they usually have the best phones. It is a means of self-expression, like ringtones. But self expression should be more than just ringtones."
Achren did say that, as it happens only during idle time, gaming and social networking on a mobile platform still have to integrate with a website, especially since mobile phones have such restrictive memory. "Concentrate on using the mobile to do something simple and realistic," he advised. "You can’t just take Second Life and put it on a mobile -- except for Japan, maybe,” he joked.
“It has to be a personality extension... and it has to be free,” Achren continued, noting it's not generally a good idea to aim a subscription-based service to kids, since they probably won't even try it. Incentivizing free content is a much better method, he said.
Moreover, there are a lot of possibilities for the mobile platform. Achren highlights simple 2 or 3-dimensional content items that can be created on a phone without challenging the memory restrictions. There's also social networking. "You’ve seen Facebook on a mobile. It works pretty well," Achren said.
More here
Gigya Offers Widget-Tracking Network
(* Source : Mashable *)
Kristen Nicole says :
Gigya is creating an updated version of its online widget tracking service that will allow developers and web publishers to define and track any type of activity within widgets. Used in conjunction with Gigya’s Wildfire, developers can track widget performance in a more extensive manner, from its initial installation on a user’s page, to the clicking of a link within a widget and the viewing of a widget’s video.
This will, of course, enable you to better lay out your widget strategy, see how widgets are being used across platforms and social networks, and more easily respond to the market. In setting all of this up for your Gigya widgets, you can even choose your own name for various actions, so you’re tracking widgets in a way that makes the most sense for you and your distribution purposes.
Gigya’s Wildfire tool was launched in recent weeks to let developers create applications for use on Facebook. With MySpace and other networks getting ready to open their platforms as well, tracking tools for widgets and applications will become more important, especially as metrics move to become more inclusive of widget distribution, which is when advertising potential comes into play as well.
Music Gifts Facebook App Sends the Real Thing
(* Source : Kristen Nicole *)
Music Gifts is a pretty cool Facebook app launched by MediaMouth. It lets you find music, listen to it, create custom lists and mixes and share all of this with Facebook friends.
But it also is a gifting application, too. And not a fluff gift that’s really just a graphic that sits on your profile. While those are cool (and very addictive), Music Gifts takes gifting a step further and lets you purchase music for your friends. They can get the music in digital or physical format, which will be sent to their home address.
MediaMouth has distribution and retail deals with EMI, Universal, and several indie labels as well, and digital copies of music are sold DRM-free. As with all other music applications currently residing on Facebook, many are wondering if the social network’s rumored mp3 store will have any affect on their existience or success.
October 11, 2007
And The Walls Came Tumbling Down: Madonna Dumps Record Industry
(* Source : Techcrunch *)
Duncan Riley says :
Since reporting Monday that Nine Inch Nails had dumped its record label and was to offer future albums direct to the public, Oasis and Jamiroquai have also joined the move away from the record industry, but the biggest announcement of all is news today that Madonna has dumped the record industry.
According to reports, Madonna has signed a $120million deal with L.A. based concert promotion firm Live Nation to distribute three studio albums, promote concert tours, sell merchandise and license Madonna’s name.
Whilst the deal differs from Nine Inch Nails in that Madonna is not offering direct-to-public albums, Live Nation isn’t a record company. The deal shows that even for a world famous act, a record company is no longer required in the days of digital downloads and P2P music sharing.
The only real question now is how fast will the music industry model come tumbling down. When Radiohead led the way in offering their music directly to fans many predicted that the move was the beginning of the end; Madonna may well be the tipping point from where we will now see a flood of recording artists dumping record labels and where todays model will shortly become a footnote in Wikipedia.
October 10, 2007
More Bands and Musicians Giving Away Free Downloads
(* Source : Kristen Nicole *)
Bands Jamiroquai and Oasis may be following Radiohead’s lead to let fans download new music from the band’s latest album for free, if they visit the site for the radio station XFM. With no contracts to labels, Jamiroquai and Oasis could be considering this move, which often gains a good amount of traction from the fans and spurs the viral growth of their content.
The success of Radiohead’s promotion is cited as the cause for people to pre-order the band’s box set, which costs about $80 and includes vinyl records, a CD and artwork. The hope is to make money on the peripherals, which still come at a premium. That means Radiohead is looking to make money from concert ticket sales, and other merchandise. We’ve already seen Throwdown’s opinion on the matter. And while the concept of giving away something for free isn’t new, it does look to be gaining steam.
[via the telegraph]
Mixaloo: Share Mixtapes and Make Money While Doing It
(* Source : Techcrunch *)
Mark Hendrickson says :
Poughkeepsie, NY startup Mixaloo
wants to make the experience of purchasing music online more social and rewarding, both emotionally and financially.
The company is taking a phenomenon - the mixtape - that has spanned several decades and media formats - 8 tracks, audio cassettes, CDs, and MP3 players - and bringing it to the web.
As a Mixaloo user, you can create playlists of music from all the major record labels, including Warner, Universal, EMI, and Sony. You can then share these playlists with friends via email, or you can embed playlist widgets into your website, blog, personalized homepage, or social networking profile. Mixaloo widgets are powered by Clearspring and can be added to your various online properties with a few clicks of the button (we’ve embedded one below).
To make a mix is free, but your friends will need to pay for the whole mix if they want to hear more than 30-second preview clips. The songs are 99 cents each (good) and protected by Windows Media DRM (very bad). The DRM protection is definitely this service’s biggest downside and could cripple Mixaloo’s potential until the major labels embrace DRM-free music. The company may throw advertisements into the mix at some point to make up for some of the lost revenue (I’ve got to stop it with these puns).
Mixaloo isn’t depending on user sociability to spread their widgets and entice customers to buy music from them. They’re harnessing the power of green by offering to split the profit from each sale 50-50 with mixtape creators. The company estimates that profits are 20-40 cents per track on average, so split that in half to get your per-track profit rate. We should be getting anywhere between $1.30 and $2.60 for each sale of the mix below (buy buy buy!). In addition to earning money that is paid out through PayPal each month, you will collect one point for every track sold. These points can be redeemed at a Mixaloo merchandise store that offers items such as t-shirts, speaker sets, and even cars.
While Mixaloo is currently in private beta, the company has provided us with 1,000 invitations to give our readers. To redeem yours, go here and enter “techcrunch” into the “TechCrunch Code” box.
October 09, 2007
Barry Diller's Web Gaming Play
(* Businessweek *)
Olga Kharif says :
IAC/InterActiveCorp's gaming foray could revolutionize online games and hurt console makers—if it succeeds
Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI) is entering yet another arena. The Web conglomerate, owner of businesses such as Ticketmaster.com and the dating site Match.com, announced Sept. 18 that it has acquired a majority interest in GarageGames.com, a game publisher and provider of programming tools for indie game developers.
The acquisition, which will lay the foundation of a new division focused on Web-based gaming, marks the latest and biggest move in IAC's bid to become a major player in that market. In the past few months, IAC has snared several video gaming executives from rivals, including Nicholas Lehman from Viacom (VIA). "We think this is an untapped $2 billion market today growing to $5 billion in three years," says Shana Fisher, IAC's senior vice-president of strategy and mergers and acquisitions. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime market opportunity, we think. And we are investing appropriately."
Viacom's Big Bet
While the acquisition's terms were not disclosed, BernsteinResearch (AB) estimates it will cost IAC between $80 million and $100 million. InterActive also says it hopes to announce a collaboration with a major gaming studio in the next week.
At first glance, IAC is arriving rather late to Web gaming, which is already the third most popular online activity after e-mail and chat, according to the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society. In May, the number of unique visitors to gaming sites reached almost 217 million worldwide, a jump of 17% from a year earlier, according to traffic data tracked by comScore (SCOR). The sector attracted 28% of the total worldwide online population in May and recorded an average of nine visits per visitor.
As such, a wide array of media and Internet titans have already been staking out the positions to claim a piece of a market that, according to DFC Intelligence, is expected to swell from revenue of $3.4 billion in 2005 to more than $13 billion in 2011. Viacom's MTV Networks alone expects to dump $500 million into gaming in the next two years. Meanwhile, portals led by Yahoo! (YHOO) and Microsoft's (MSFT) MSN have built up their offers to lure online players. Microsoft also offers owners of its Xbox gaming console an online portal called Xbox LIVE Arcade where they can play games, including GarageGames' own Marble Blast Ultima, where players navigate marbles through moving platforms. Similarly, the Cartoon Network (VIA) has been working to adapt its games for online play with Sony's (SNE) PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's (NTDOY) Wii consoles.
More here
SceneCaster Officially Launches on Facebook
( Press Release via Virtual World News *)
TORONTO , ON – October 7, 2007 – SceneCaster today announced the release of the first immersive 3D Web application for Facebook - where anyone can create, transform and explore interactive 3D scenes and share them with their friends – all within Facebook. The application is available at: http://apps.facebook.com/scenecaster.
SceneCaster extends the rich visual experience of 3D on the Web to all Facebook users including consumers, creative professionals, and social media enthusiasts. Bridging the gap between the virtual and real worlds, SceneCaster also connects the Facebook 3D experience to eCommerce sites such as eBay and Amazon, product catalogs from leading manufacturers and retailers and to other rich media social networks such as Flickr.
SceneCaster is breaking new ground in 3D Web applications as the first 3D immersive experience that is built to leverage the "social graph" of Facebook. The Facebook economy is growing every day that could see it achieve 200 million users next year up from over 40 million today. SceneCaster delivers new conversation opportunities to all Facebook users while also providing an innovative revenue model simultaneously with each Facebook profile.
"Facebook facilitates better communication and an easier way to share & discover meaningful content," said Rodney Rumford, Editor of FaceReviews.com, a leading Facebook application review, rating and consulting service based in Solana Beach, CA. "SceneCaster in Facebook makes communications with my real world friends much richer and efficient. SceneCaster's great 3D immersive experience is revolutionary in concept and execution to sharing and discovering the 3D Web." Rodney's review of the SceneCaster Facebook app can be found at http://facereviews.com/2007/10 /04/facebook-3d-rooms-with-scenecaster
SceneCaster was first beta launched on September 25 th at DEMOfall '07, the technology industry's leading conference for innovative and disruptive technologies. Industry media and pundits have praised SceneCaster's debut with over 250,000 pages of reviews and comments residing on the Web today.
"SceneCaster's mission is to mainstream the 3D Web by lowering the barriers to adoption for the largest possible audience," said Mark Zohar, SceneCaster founder. "We've built it from the ground up by combining the very best the Web has to offer today – search, eCommerce and Facebook – with a rich, immersive 3D experience that is accessible within a standard Web browser."
About SceneCaster
SceneCaster is a 3D Web community where anyone can visualize their ideas, share them, and make them real. SceneCaster bridges the gap between the virtual and real worlds by connecting the 3D Web experience to online storefronts, product catalogs from leading brands and retailers, social networks, and consumers' dreams. SceneCaster is a brand initiative of View22 Technology Inc., a leading provider of 3D Web commerce and media solutions used by Global 2000 companies. For more information please visit www.scenecaster.com.
October 04, 2007
Branding in Tween Worlds
(* Source : PSFK *)
Alisson Mooney says :
Kids are consumers (virtually)! That was the message on the “New School” panel at the YPulse Tween Mashup on Friday. Speakers from Stardoll, WhyVille, and Cartoon Doll Emporium all recounted that young users of their virtual worlds wanted brands brought into their online environments.
Mattias Mikshe, CEO of Stardoll, said that users were begging for real world brands (“everything from Gap to Gucci.”) This is what led them to create “StarPlaza,” an in-world mall stocked with virtual brands (they now have 9). LVMH-owned Sephora and DKNY just became the first real world brand to set up shop there (featuring the same items as the stores). Cartoon Doll Emporium, a similar “paper doll” site, is also working with offline brands.
The virtual world meets social network WhyVille has 3,000 different lines of clothing—by 3,000 different girls. CEO Jim Bower says they want to have a Whyville store with the designs from 12 year olds. But kids in WhyVille aren’t immune to brand fever: one group of kids actually created M&Ms costumes for their avatars. Over in WeeWorld, users “consistently asking for brands to better express themselves,” says Marketing and Editorial Director, Maura Welch. “By choosing to wear the assets,” she says “the users are endorsing the brands to their friends.” According to the site’s latest food and drink survey, users’ WeeMees (avatars) were jonesing for some Sprite, Gatorade and Cheerios. As it is, they can already pimp themselves out in Armani sunglasses while they pop Skittles.
According to Mikshe, the kids can “distinguish between being marketed to and adding value.” Or maybe the marketing has just done its job. The demand is there for the brand names, creating a pull rather than a push scenario. And now that these brands can provide utility online, they are becoming more and more integrated into the lives of young consumers.
Ypulse Tween MashupOctober 03, 2007
A Brave New World for TV? Virtually
(* Source : New York Times *)
David Itzkoff says :
Sundance Channel
Visitors to the Sundance Channel area of the Web site Second Life can watch full-length feature films in a virtual screening room
IF you can find him, Vincent Tibbett is precisely the sort of well-connected cultural liaison any emerging filmmaker should want to know. An employee of the Sundance Channel, he is as easily recognizable for his shaggy haircut and assertively casual attire as he is for the crowds of aspiring artists who follow him around, hoping to chat him up about cinematic trends, get him to evaluate their movies or simply score his e-mail address.
Vincent Tibbett and Maya Palmer work for the Sundance Channel, but they’re not exactly real.
But if Mr. Tibbett seems a bit harder to pin down for a lunch date than the average in-demand tastemaker, that’s because he doesn’t exist on our plane of reality. He is an electronic avatar found only in Second Life, the popular online virtual community.
Just six months old, Mr. Tibbett is one experiment in the Sundance Channel’s larger exploration of Internet-based virtual reality, a sort of canary down the mine shaft of a new technology that may or may not take hold among mainstream audiences.
And he is not alone. In the last year broadcast networks, cable channels and television content providers have all set up camp in virtual communities, where they hope that viewers who have forsaken television for computer screens might rediscover their programming online. Some outlets, like Showtime and Sundance, are establishing themselves in existing worlds; others, like MTV, are creating their own. Either way, if the wildest dreams of some very excited technology developers come true, virtual reality might finally be the medium that unites the passive experience of watching television with the interactive potential of the Web.
If that happens, the television industry — which has not been particularly speedy in adapting to the Internet revolution — sees an opportunity not only to recover lost ground from online competitors but also to take a lead, and in so doing create an entirely new environment in which to influence and sell to its audience.
“You want to be in this because you know, as a content provider, that this is where the future is going,” said Quincy Smith, the president of CBS Interactive. “I don’t look at it as science fiction. I look at it as the future of communication.”
For decades ambitious programmers and designers have sought to establish virtual worlds like the one put forth in Neal Stephenson’s influential 1992 novel, “Snow Crash,” which imagines computer users interacting in a simulated three-dimensional world called the Metaverse. But only in recent years, as graphics-accelerator cards and broadband Internet connections have grown more affordable and ubiquitous, has it become possible even to approximate such an experience.
IN Second Life (secondlife.com), visitors to the Sundance Channel area can watch full-length feature films in a three-dimensional screening room or take part in an environmental forum; fans of Showtime’s drama “The L Word” can meet the avatars of the show’s stars and design their own floats for a virtual gay pride parade. In MTV’s Virtual Laguna Beach (at vmtv.com) inhabitants can shop at digital versions of Emporio Optic and Laguna Surf and Sport or, at the click of a mouse, arrive in a virtual version of “The Hills,” where they can then join the party at an electronic replica of the Los Angeles nightclub Area.
More here
October 02, 2007
Q&A: eMarketer's Debra Aho Williamson Talks Kids and Virtual Worlds
(* Source : Worldsinmotion *)
Earlier this week, we took a look at a research report published by market researcher eMarketer about kids, teens, 'tweens and virtual worlds that found that 34.3 million US child and teen Internet users will visit virtual worlds once a month in 2007 -- and eMarketer expects that number to rise to 34 percent in 2008, and to 53 percent by 2011.
Worlds in Motion spoke to eMarketer's Debra Aho Williamson about her findings. "I think what’s attractive about virtual worlds for kids and teens is that they exist at a 'sweet spot' between online games, which are very popular with younger kids, 'tweens and boys, and social networks, which are very popular with teens, particularly girls," she explains. "I think that virtual worlds combine aspects of both of those things."
Zeroing in on major factors in online social worlds, she elaborated. "There are a lot of games, there's the opportunity to meet friends, interact socially, learn about other people and express your interests. So I think those are the two driving factors." Real-time interaction also plays a big role, she says. "[It's a] very immersive experience. You don’t just 'poke' somebody like on Facebook -- you can actually, physically, poke somebody. What that means is that there’s that much more real-time interaction, no latency, no making a post on someone’s wall and waiting for them to respond. It’s all occurring in real time."
More here
October 01, 2007
Your Life: Streaming Live!
(* Source : David Fishman *)
First, streaming music was all the rage. Social networking sites were packed with widgets from companies like imeem
and SNOCAP, which for the first time allowed users to share music from the comfort of their profiles. Popular artists were obviously the first to benefit, but first-timers quickly capitalized on the trend. Word travels fast online, and before long, millions of MySpace users were listening to the likes of previous unknowns such as Arctic Monkeys and Lily Allen.
Today, streaming video is already working to create new stars. YouTube—through its main site and embedded video widgets throughout the web—is launching a fair share of 15-minute-famers: everyone from Soulja Boy to the “Leave Britney Alone” kid, Chris Crocker, who signed for his own TV show last week. MySpace is investing big money in building up interactive web shows like “Quarterlife”, hoping to ride the growing wave of viewers flocking from TV to online.
But with so much of the web going “live”, why shouldn’t video follow? Justin Kan, who broadcasts his life 24/7 on his site, Justin.tv, shows that the model works. And now live video sites like UStream and Kyte—once limited to their own niche sites—are becoming mainstream. Earlier this month, BlogTV released a Facebook application that allows users to create and view live video feeds on their profiles. A variety of personalities—everyone from an amateur DJ and aspiring female vocalist—quickly attracted hundreds of eyeballs within days of the application’s launch. And as if “Quarterlife” wasn’t cool enough, UStream’s new show “35″—a 10-part series about an unwelcome house guest—is already being filmed and broadcast live on Sundays at 9.
While recorded content will undoubtedly remain popular, the combination of live video and widgets brings up-to-the-minute, easy access that web users have grown used to. Widgets already reach over 40% of North American users—or 81 million consumers—according to an April report by comScore. So it’s no surprise that companies are taking advantage of all this new content and established methods of delivering and sharing it. Lifecasting startup YourTrumanShow announced plans on Monday for a new widget that provides access to its aggregated timeline of videos, searchable by topic, person, whatever. YourTrumanShow’s mission: to create a network of “tomorrow’s online reality stars, migrating user-generated content from single videos to multi-episode series.”
Whether it’s live, recorded, on a website, on a widget, on a timeline – you name it – new stars are being born as online video follows in music’s footsteps, realizing dreams for some, and a lot of fun for everyone else watching.
September 27, 2007
Google Prepping A Second Life Competitor?
(* Source : Duncan Riley *)
Rumors of a Google powered virtual world based on Google Earth surfaced in January; today there is word that Google may be testing their virtual world at Arizona State University (ASU).
According to
Google Operating System, ASU students have the opportunity to test a new product “that will be publicly launched later this year” by “a major Internet company” that is related to social networking, 3D modeling and video games. The questionnaire attached to the application process asks would be testers if they have a Gmail account, and if not would they be willing to get one. The product’s name is shown as “My World.”
Google’s Sketchup service already provides the tech to do 3D modeling and could also be used to create avatars.
We know for certain now that Google has big plans for social networking, from SocialStream to Google’s planned November 5 launch of the mother of all open social networking platforms. Whether the planned service will be a true Second Life competitor is still to be seen, however I suspect that if Google is prepping a virtual world it will be closer to IBM’s Virtual World chat platform than Second Life. To deliver a full UGC world is a not an easy step where a basic 3D world which builds on Google Earth, SketchUp, and existing Google social networking platforms including Orkut would seem more likely.
September 24, 2007
Virtual worlds opened up to all
(* Source : BBC News *)
Jonathan Fieldes says :
 The tool could be embedded in blogs as well as used in gaming   Metaplace demo |
Users of Metaplace, as it is known, can build 3D online worlds for PCs or even a mobile phone without any knowledge of complex computer languages.
The web-based program is the brainchild of Raph Koster, one of the developers of massively multiplayer online games such as Ultima Online.
Users make the virtual spaces from simple building blocks.
The results, which could be used for gaming, socialising or e-commerce, can be embedded in a webpage, facebook profile or blog.
"We are out to democratise virtual worlds and bring them to absolutely anybody," said Mr Koster, founder of Areae, the company behind Metaplace.
"You can come to the site, press a button and have a functioning virtual world that supports multiple users in about 30 seconds."
Web puzzle
 Second Life is one of the most popular virtual worlds |
There are already a number of popular virtual worlds such as Second Life, There and Entropia Universe. In addition there are games worlds such as World of Warcraft (WOW).
Most of these require a person to download specialist software or buy a game and there are no links between the different universes.
"They're all walled gardens," said Mr Koster.
In contrast, Metaplace is entirely web based and connections can be made between all of the different worlds.
"We modelled this on the web," said Mr Koster. "You can think about each world being a webpage and every object within in it is a link."
Users can create the worlds using different methods.
People with no programming background can use the graphical interface and choose worlds from a number of templates, such as a shop or a puzzle game.
They can also clone worlds developed by other Metaplace users.
More competent visitors to the site can build a world from scratch using the tool's own programming language known as metamarkup.
The language is "platform agnostic", according to Mr Koster, which means that it can be used to create worlds which can run on anything from a powerful PC to a mobile handset.
User control
 |   We want to see 10,000 virtual worlds so that lots of wild and crazy stuff gets made because that is the only way it will advance as a medium  Raph Koster, founder, Areae |
"Others may want to make a book club that is integrated with Amazon where people can get together and chat every Thursday night about a book but they can actually see the pictures of the books on the wall, click on them and buy them," said Mr Koster.
"The applications are pretty open."
When complete, each world is given its own page on the Metaplace website.
More here
September 19, 2007
Warner Music to Sell iPod Compatible James Blunt Album on MySpace
Starting today, US consumers will be able to listen to all the tracks on James Blunt’s new CD on the artist’s MySpace profile for free. They can then opt to purchase the entire album for $9.99, which will allow them to play the album on an iPod and also send the user the CD through snail mail.
The new Blunt album, “All the Lost Souls,” will be sold through a widget on Blunt’s page that is powered by LaLa.com. With nearly 250,000 “friends,” Blunt is a fairly significant artist with whom to try the new sales approach. Currently, the artist has a SNOCAP widget on his page featuring a la carte songs from his previous album.
While Warner has previously tried selling music through MySpace, the copyright protection on it made it incompatible with the iPod, making it a tough sell with most consumers.
August 07, 2007
Cannes Reflects a Digital Marketing Shift
(* Source: Jason Zada *)
EVB's executive creative director reports from the 2007 Cannes Festival and finds that online media is putting creative big ideas back on top of marketing.
The 2007 Cannes Lions Festival provided an extremely interesting peek into the future of marketing and how the industry itself is reacting. A common thread throughout the festival was the ongoing debate between traditional and new media and the rapidly blurring lines between the two. The advertising industry seems to be in a state of flux, and we are all caught in the middle of a beautiful shift into a media-neutral world.
In particular, Cannes attendees, who came from around the world to share ideas and learn from industry peers, sensed that in 2006 there was a major change in the way they worked and thought about marketing. In cafes, hallways, lounges, poolside terraces and gutters, one word was muttered an incalculable number of times. This single word, one that many traditional agencies in years past avoided like the plague, was on the tip of everyone’s tongues: digital.
Until now, digital has been used widely as a term to describe a single medium used as an entity of a marketing plan. But over the last year, digital has taken on a new definition that is changing the entire marketing structure. It is now being defined as a state of mind; a lifestyle of the non-media captive consumer that we chase day-in and day-out. At Cannes, the RG/A Nike Plus campaign particularly embodied this new digital spirit. It uniquely linked product development with marketing strategy, creating a dedicated consumer running culture around the product. As a result, the Nike Plus campaign was awarded digital’s most prestigious award, the Cyber Grand Prix.
The new digital has transformed the way consumers interact with m’edia, since they are no longer captive. It's changed the way word-of-mouth, "water cooler" conversations happen, driving the popularity of an idea instantly overnight. Most importantly, digital has transformed how the media-savvy consumer experiences and consumes marketing, and these "natural-born filters" are skilled at selecting what they want to interact with and what they prefer avoiding.
More here
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