I came across an article speaking about Nickelodeon and their plans to increase work on their own virtual world. Nickelodeon is expected to announce Thursday that it is developing an entire virtual world, involving games, avatars and a strong social-networking component, based on network hit “SpongeBob SquarePants.”
Nick also is expected to announce that it is developing Monkey World, a social-networking and massive multiplayer game based on an original concept and not tied to any of its existing franchises.
The company is becoming increasingly competitive with Disney, which already has ToonTown and recently acquired Club Penguin. Virtual worlds such as these are targeting young children, but do frequently charge subscription fees.
Although these worlds target a younger crowd than that of Second Life, it could pose problems if SL intends to grow and starts a "Children's Second Life."
This is a great idea. Nickelodeon and Disney are definitely better candidates to create virtual worlds for children than Linden Lab.
ReplyDeleteMy hope is that children's virtual worlds will encourage building and not simply give them content. Children live in virtual worlds everyday through their imaginations. Virtual worlds should help children harness the power of their imaginations. If they are simply using these forums to promote their products it will be a failure of the virtual system and send kids down the path of get, get,get instead of create, create, create. I will be interested to see how this pans out.
Good insight, West.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, to expect Nickelodeon and Disney to ignore these advertising opportunities isn't very realistic. What someone needs to do is to show them why content creation by kids would benefit their bottom line. Any thoughts?
In another class, Gritz and I are working on a content analysis of media coverage of social networking sites and virtual worlds in 5 major US papers for the past three years. I will share more when it is complete. BUT, having just completed coding all the SL stories, I can tell you that the overwhelming majority of media coverage has been tied to COMMERCE and business opportunity. All the big corporate and media guns are paying close attention to virtual environments (especially SL) to see how they can make it work as a businesss model... some with success, many with failure. It's early in the game, but if there's a way to market to the powerful buying market of children (and, of course their parents), they will do it (think Happy Meals). The open source issue is much trickier, because of the desire to control and capture profits, but, I think companies, organizations, and individuals are beginning to see how to create a balance and are becoming more open to creating a space that nurtures, promotes and supports creativity. I recall the success we heard about the creative capital generated at Carnegie Mellon! Let the students create, own, and succeed... it's a win/win!
ReplyDeleteI came across some online resources related to youth-oriented VWs:
ReplyDeleteVirtual Worlds Management Report: 100+ Youth-Oriented Worlds Live or Developing
VIRTUAL WORLDS MANAGEMENTS YOUTH WORLDS ANALYSIS - APRIL 2008 lists down the youth-oriented VWs and further states that there are now more than 100 VWs operating live/in development that have a general focus on the under-18 market.
From the marketing figures shown in theVW industry report,
"Four of the companies that raised funding are squarely focused on the youth and kids virtual worlds market: Gaia, Hidden City, Numedeon and Star In Me."
I believe the youth-oriented VWs are definitely new for research and business development, which need researchers/investors to think with caution when coming up with the best suited model for users.