Jeska Dzwigalski on Second Life at Community 2.0

Here are my notes from Jeska’s presentation at community 2.0. In other words, these are my interpretations of her words (not my words), and she talks pretty fast, so I might have some typos or other errors.

To successfully build your community:

  • know your audience
  • create an engaging experience
  • iterate, learn & iterate some more
  • realize the value of the feature set & its potential
  • remember, behind every avatar is a real person
  • commit to the long term

Success Stories in Second Life:

  • Training / simulation (Harvard, Stanford)
  • Non-profits – American Cancer Society does a relay for life in second life that raises real money with interesting places for the walk (underwater, etc.)
  • Branding. Pontiac bought a bunch of islands and they let people build cars along with contests, races, customization of the car. Vodafone did a water cooler where people can solve puzzles over the virtual water cool with the focus on interacting with other people, not a focus on pushing their brand, but people see it.

SL is like RL and not

  • Behavior – engaged, but not constrained (less inhibited and behaviors are different)
  • Interaction – All objects can be scripted. Low / No material costs