Another world: is the remarkable internet phenomenon second life all hype, or is it relevant to businesses and therefore to professional communicators? A journey to this metaverse may hold the answer.

Casecamp, for those unfamiliar with it, is a sort of self-organized mini-conference. No associations are Involved, only the people who want to attend and present. It's also free. Usually four people volunteer to share a marketing program with attenders.

The venues for casecamps have included cities like Toronto and Boston, but none near my base of operations in California, so I was thrilled when one was announced that I could attend. I arrived at the amphitheater, walking beneath the archway that displayed the sponsor's name, then down the steps to a row with some empty seats. About 50 others were assembled, and I sat beside one of them. The emcee took the stage and went through the usual welcome messages, and then introduced the first speaker.

As the speaker presented his case study--how a new association built visibility--and moved through a variety of PowerPoint-like slides, several attenders chatted among themselves. As you might expect, a Q&A session followed the presentation. Then the emcee introduced the second speaker, who talked about a bank's promotion based on a partnership with a professional hockey team. The third speaker outlined a Google search campaign conducted on behalf of a client. The final speaker presented an overview of a nonprofit's campaign to raise awareness for its cause.

The final speaker didn't fit the profile of a marketer at a conference presenting a case study. He had reptilian scales instead of skin and a lizard-like face--far more unusual than the third speaker, who simply had green skin and yellow hair. For me, though, there was nothing particularly remarkable about this as I turned to the person sitting beside me and remarked on the substance of the speaker's presentation. It was also unremarkable that I was in Concord, California, and the person I was talking to was in Chicago. She could just as easily have been in Prague.

This entire experience occurred in the three-dimensional virtual world called Second Life, and this particular casecamp was held on crayonville island, the home base of crayon, the new marketing company for which I work. It's just one of many islands in Second Life owned and populated by individuals, groups and companies. It doesn't matter where I live--as long as I have a computer, an Internet connection and a Second Life account, I can attend the casecamp, watch the presentations, ask questions of the speakers and interact with others in the audience. What does it matter that some of those in the audience have wings or that everybody there can fly?

A blend of virtual and reality

Opinions among communicators about Second Life are as varied as the businesses they represent. Some believe it is nothing short of the future of online communication. Others dismiss it as an overhyped fad offering little payoff and no real role for communicators. Still others simply look befuddled, offering a now-hackneyed rejoinder: "Second Life? I don't have time for my first life!"

For an online destination that is only about three years old, Second Life has generated a lot of controversy. People already availing themselves of Second Life have strongly held beliefs about the culture they have created and the influence newcomers should have, echoing the experience so many America Online users had when they first ventured beyond AOL's walled garden into the relative anarchy of the Internet. Businesses are establishing presences in Second Life without much research and with even less understanding of what makes it a compelling venue. Business publications from BusinessWeek and Forbes to The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times have published articles proclaiming the marketing opportunities that await companies in Second Life.

What, exactly, is this phenomenon, and what implications does it really have for communicators?

In 1992, cyberpunk writer Neal Stephenson published his vision of the future in the novel Snow Crash. Stephenson envisioned a virtual-reality-based Internet as the evolved, logical successor to the Internet we use. It was this imagining of the Net's future that inspired Philip Rosedale, former chief technology officer of Real Networks (the company behind the once ubiquitous Real Media Player) to create Second Life. He launched Linden Lab in 1999 with the goal of proving the viability of a virtual economy. "I'm not building a game," he told Wired magazine. "I'm building a new country."

Indeed, most of the metaverse environments that preceded Second Life have been games. Perhaps the best known is World of Warcraft, which is known as an MMORPG--a massively multiplayer online role-playing game. Players control their "avatars"--computer-generated characters who exist within the virtual world-guiding them through varying landscapes in which they interact with other avatars (controlled by other players at their computers). Through these interactions, players acquire money (that can be spent only within the game), virtual items like weapons, and experience (gamers proudly proclaim, "I'm a ninth-level paladin!"). The acquisition of these items--and the ability to win battles--is the goal of the game.

Second Life uses a similar technology called a game engine, but there is no goal. Registered users are "residents" instead of players. Most resident avatars are human, although many people opt to outfit their avatars as fantastical characters, animals or other creatures. Once an avatar is selected, the resident simply exists within the environment, interacting with other residents, forming groups, establishing relationships and engaging in commerce.

While Linden Lab owns Second Life, it is the residents who create it. By acquiring land, residents are able to build structures and landscapes, resulting in a tremendous variety of virtual real estate. There are beach resorts, casinos, discotheques, futuristic worlds, fantasy landscapes and painstakingly crafted recreations of entire cities.

Rosedale's vision of a virtual economy has also come to pass. Residents exchange "Linden Dollars," which are worth a fraction of a U.S. dollar and are purchased with real money. Many such trans actions can amount to big money. Just ask Anshe Chung (her avatar name), who has earned more than US$1 million--in real dollars--selling virtual real estate in Second Life. Others have generated income selling everything from virtual furniture for Second Life homes to vehicles to drive on virtual roads. Online virtuoso Eric Rice rents a virtual convention center to organizations looking to host in-world conferences. Then there are companies like Millions of Us and Electric Sheep that are raking in fees building structures for clients, having mastered the scripting language necessary to construct complex virtual architecture.

The business boom

It would be a mistake to assume this exchange of real-world currency is the driver behind the business rush into Second Life. In fact, few of the businesses that have set up shop in-world are selling anything other than their brand identities. Rather than viewing Second Life as an opportunity to generate a few bucks, businesses view the metaverse as a dynamic new environment in which to market their wares and conduct various aspects of their work.

Sun Microsystems and Dell Computer, for example, have held virtual press conferences in Second Life with participation from very real members of the press. (Of course, those reporters didn't all have to be in the same location at the same time in the real world.) Dell also lets visitors to its Second Life facility build a virtual computer. The American Cancer Society has held a virtual walk-a-thon, raising US$40,000 in pledges. Nissan built a giant virtual vending machine to distribute Sentra sedans. Starwood Hotels is constructing a full-size replica of its Aloft hotel, complete with lobby, guest rooms, ballrooms, restaurants and other amenities, even though the upscale brand won't debut in the real world until 2008. Sweden plans to open a virtual embassy in Second Life. Reuters has embedded a news bureau to report on Second Life both in-world and out. Government agencies, nonprofit organizations, retailers, manufacturers, and PR and advertising agencies have all set up shop on the grid.

As companies enter a world populated by customers, consumers, activists and all the other publics that can affect a business in the real world, they will require communication expertise. Hence the importance of Second Life to communicators.

Of course, there is considerable dispute about the hype versus the relevance of Second Life.

One argument is that much of the activity in Second Life is not the kind of thing with which most businesses would want to be affiliated. Vampires populate a virtual Transylvania, while elsewhere "furries" cavort in their animal skins. Couples and groups engage in virtual sex everywhere. But the real world can also be messy, and business thrives within that environment. Why should a virtual world be any different?

Of greater concern is the hype versus the reality of Second Life. Much has been made of the 3.3 million accounts that have been created for the virtual world, but that number doesn't mean more than 3 million people populate the grid. Because an account is free, a lot of people sign up, have a look around Orientation Island, then never return. Among regular residents, there are many who have more than one account (one for doing business, for instance, and another for having fun). Estimates suggest the real population of Second Life is in the low hundreds of thousands, with only tens of thousands online at any given time.

On top of that, no venue can contain more than about 50 avatars at any given time; exceeding that limit can crash the Second Life servers (or, as they say in-world, "bring down the grid").

How, the critics ask, can these low numbers--compared with the blogosphere and its 57 million blogs--be significant of anything?

Beyond the hype

The answer to this question can be found in IBM's response to Second Life. The company has built a dozen islands, some for interfacing with the public and others for employees only. At the same time, Big Blue is building its own virtual world for employees, a sort of next-generation intranet.

And therein lies Second Life's significance. It's not that Second Life itself will become a dominant Internet destination like the Web. Instead, it represents a model that is likely to become the next approach to online content.

Second Life, after all, is not the only virtual nongame world. There.com is a more sanitized, easier-to-learn version. In South Korea, 90 percent of the under-30 population has accounts in Cyworld, which has recently opened a U.S. world and will soon launch in Europe. And there are others.

Ultimately, it should be more natural for people to navigate virtually to a geographic location, to a particular building, to a numbered floor, and through the right door than it is to navigate through nonintuitive hyperlinks and search engines, and more natural and intuitive to engage with people than with text. Whether Second Life is the world into which the Net evolves is immaterial. It represents an opportunity for businesses to figure out how to conduct business in such an environment so they can be ready when it becomes the norm.

In fact, there are many arguments against Second Life's evolution into the Next Net. The engine that drives it is outdated. It is privately owned. It cannot be linked with other virtual worlds the way Internet servers can be connected with one another. But someone--if not Second Life will overcome these obstacles, and the Net will most likely move slowly into the 3-D realm. Second Life has taken steps to ensure that it will be the model by releasing its source code to the world for anyone to use and improve.

Some communicators--myself included--may be baffled by much of what Second Life represents. It certainly is an easier environment to master for experienced video gamers, but I am not one of them. There is little doubt, however, that Second Life offers a glimpse into the future of online communication, interactivity and commerce. Communicators ignore it at their peril.

Shel Holtz, ABC, IABC Fellow, is principal of Holtz Communication + Technology in Concord, California. With his co-host Neville Hobson, ABC, Holtz produces the podcast "For Immediate Release: The Hobson Holtz Report," available at www.forimmediaterelease.biz.