A week ago we posted the presentation that highlights most of the research; it had very little text in it. Now we just received clearance to share the full research document – 30 pages covering key virtual worlds with a focus on Asia. The document is bilingual English/Chinese, which is a great opportunity to update your Mandarin with cutting edge vocabulary.

So here it is for free after filling out the following form. We hope you will enjoy it and look forward to your feedback!

To summarize the summary:

• The 2D web of virtual worlds is doing well, while the 3D web is recovering from the “Second Life Aftershock“
• Regulation is going to be very complex as 2D and 3D environments allow the conduct of various “activities” from creation and remix of content to commerce, gambling and more. Of course, Internet is global which makes things VERY hard to regulate.
• Most “digital immigrants” do not understand that the term “virtual” simply means “digital” and that there is no special magic there. Great post here on this topic by Bill Gurley at Benchmark Capital
• Our hopeful conclusion promoted awareness campaigns about the risks associated with digital identities and the celebration of the benefits of what is becoming a “digital third place”.

The presentation is hereunder without the 60 minutes talk but the full report should be made available soon.

We are very close to Cmune as we share not only office space, meals and some capital, but also because they are – to us – the most interesting 3D play out there. And we benchmarked almost all major SNS, virtual worlds and online games we found worthwhile, especially Asian plays: Second Life, There.com, IMVU, Lively (r.i.p.), Habbo Hotel, Stardoll, Cyworld 3D, PuppyRed, HappyCity, Nurien, HiPiHi, iPart, 1D.com, Mobile Game Town, Mixi, Gree, QQ, Xiaonei, Kaixin, 51.com, Kart Rider, Dance Audition and many more. Of course each of them has its own strengths, but are very much “now” services. We think Cmune might define “tomorrow”. Here is a previous post on why we think Cmune is onto something right “The Trouble with Virtual Worlds” (a column we wrote for Asian Business Leaders).

From Robert Scoble’s Friendfeed:

> This is a cool company I found at LeWeb. Funny enough it’s a Chinese company.
> Don’t miss this. Very cool 3D and nice collaborative environment. Looks like Second Life done right. Oh, and check out @garyvee giving his own interview. Heh, that’s what the speaker room at LeWeb was like.


Part I

Part II

Thanks Robert!

The conditions for presenting were sub-optimal, especially for demonstrating multiplayer 3D Internet stuff with no Internet and only one computer. As we were navigating the crowd, meeting new people and catching up with old friends after the pitch, we recovered from the disappointment of not having been able to show what we prepared by realizing how great the gathering was, especially the speakers line-up. And it’s not even about the talks, which we only listened to sporadically – relying on Internet and “social filtering” to watch the best ones later.

What was absolutely fantastic is to be able to discuss with so many amazing people in the same place and in such a short time. We met or re-met with Jeff Clavier, Thomas Crampton, Joi Ito, Danny Kim, Masashi Kobayashi, Kaiser Kuo, Dave McClure and even Robert Scoble in the midst of a French paradox (the interview he conducted with the Cmune founders will probably not be made public ^_^; has been made public!). Of course, there were also dozens of non-speaker participants we met and exchanged with.

In those digital days, moving people is harder than anything, all the more if they have to fly over 10 hours to come, and meeting in person is – so far – so much more powerful in building relationships that YES, despite all the trouble LeWeb had with logistics, it was definitely worthwhile. The closing panel with the Gillmor Gang even provided a great US-style entertaining talk show that cheered up many attendees.

To conclude this event, Cmune will be posting a video of “the presentation we wished we could have done if we had had Internet” in the coming days.