metanomics

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This week's session of Metanomics was focused on retail, and specifically featured two people who are doing quite well selling adult paraphernalia. Professor Robert Bloomfield quoted rule #34 of the Internet: "If it exists, there is porn of it." Certainly the adult entertainment industry is a major economic driver, and any examination of retail in a virtual environment would be incomplete without taking that into account.

You can view the event in its entirety via the links above, and I've done my best to summarize what was said below. When you're done, give us your thoughts in the Comments section.

Stroker Serpentine

His business is internationally known, partially due to lawsuits he filed against copyright infringers. His "Sexgen" bed has received several hundred thousand hits on Google, and he feels fairly confident that those hits aren't all coming from Second Life residents interested in his product line. He owns Eros Island among other locations around the grid, and earns well into a six-figure income USD from his products.

Stroker has 20 employees in real life. Some are paid in USD, some in Linden Dollars, but they are registered employees of the company earning regular paychecks. He also has 14 in world employees who are compensated in Linden Dollars or land.

For marketing he likes the new classifieds, but didn't like the old ones as they were heavily gamed. He sees most of his business coming from events and expansion of his in-world groups use of groups since they encourage interpersonal interactions based on his products. He believes that peer-to-peer marketing is the most powerful way to sell anything anywhere.

Stroker is cautious about new employees. He frequently has people sign contracts or non-disclosure agreements, and puts new scripters / representatives on a probationary period before determining how they might fit into his company. He sees customer service and customer interaction as cornerstones to his business, and so he watches for those things with his new employees.

To a large extent this has to do with the technical problems surrounding Second Life. With frequent lag and crashes there are big challenges in keeping customers happy, and customers in Second Life are much more impatient and demanding than in real life. They demand immediate results. "You can't script customer service," said Stroker, and put an accent on how important it is to reply to each customer in the face of a problem with, at the very least, a personal "we're working on it, thanks for your patience".

This, of course, was more in relation to Linden Lab's relationship with its customers than his relationship with Eros' customers. He feels that the JIRA is convoluted and complex, and blogs aren't doing the job for customer service since they push a single message rather than inviting interaction with the residents.

Stroker is far more interested in working in virtual worlds than on the web because they are focused on social interaction. Customers can develop a relationship with the product creators, and they can feel a sense of connection with the products themselves. This is all helped by the great sense of immersion that virtual worlds give that is completely missing from the experience of surfing a web page.

Temporal Mitra

His first business in Second Life, an escort club, wasn't turning a profit. While others out there seemed to be making it, he found that it was too easy to circumvent payment systems. Looking at the problems related to running these clubs he began to develop tools to help run them, and soon found that he was a much more successful tool maker. His "escort HUD", for instance, automates chat, tracks a client's whereabouts, hands out notecards, and even looks at an avatar's profile to see how likely they are to be a good client in the first place.

The Temporal Mall now displays a broad range of products that he and his staff have assembled, and he has observed that 50% of his sales come from people who have already purchased something else from him.

His employees are all paid a percentage of profits in Linden Dollars, the virtual currency of Second Life. They take care of their own taxes as independent contractors when they withdraw funds from Linden Lab.

While he comes up with the ideas for the products, his employees take care of the scripting, graphics and document creation. He also handles all of the marketing. Temporal uses in-world advertising companies for billboard ads and spends a lot on the Linden Classifieds to drive traffic to his stores.

Anonymity has been a problem for Temporal in the past. There were instances where he asked for a specific object to be created from a scripter, they would take his money, and then disappear. Some weeks later the idea would show up under someone else's name. Because of this experience he now divides projects up into small pieces and assigns them to individual scripters as a way of keeping things secure. He works with one other person who has access to all of the content, and he has the full details of that person's identity.

From a technical standpoint Temporal finds that Linden Lab is very slow to respond to any complaint, even when it comes to attacks from malicious users. As a result he tries to be self-reliant, but has noticed a direct negative correlation to his profits and the number of unplanned outages on the grid.

Still, he'd rather be here than trying to create products for sale on the web. This is where he sees the future of the Internet occurring. Business online will be avatar to avatar, not webpage to webpage.

New Grid, New VISA

When asked about legal jurisdiction with regards to adult content, Stroker was very forward about it. "Adult content is adult content," he said, whether it's a video, animation, or even a new skin for your avatar. This means that Linden Lab have quite a bit of content to account for, and it's extremely difficult for them to be sure of anyone's age under the current setup. He didn't see their future plans for "Identity Verification" as much of a step forward either: "Age verification is going to be an albatross for them."

It's for reasons like these that he has partnered with the Electric Sheep Company to create an entirely separate grid for adult content. This way they'll know that the client base has been properly age verified, they have payment info on file, and they're in compliance with the vast majority of international laws. They'll able to control content as well to keep things legal.

Stroker followed up these comments by also mentioning that he has been working with several European banks to create a VISA that will be able to offer merchant accounts to virtual businesses. These will be genuine VISA merchant accounts specifically tailored to accommodate micropayments; something Paypal has yet to find a solution for.

What did you think?

What questions would you have asked our guests? Is there anything you would like to add? Leave a comment below and join in the discussion!

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On November 26th we held the latest session of Metanomics, focused this time on higher education. Our guests were Chris Collins of the University of Cincinnati and Benn R Konsynski of Emory University. (You can read more complete profiles about them on our previous post.) You can use the links above to review the event, and see the attached text file (below this article) to read the backchat.

Below I've attempted to summarize the discussion in brief, but the event was so rich in information that covering every topic would be beyond the scope of this article. The event generated a tremendous amount of enthusiasm and the full session recordings will prove to be valuable to all educators looking at entering the virtual world.

Chris Collins

Chris Collins (Fleep Tuque in Second Life) began with the MUD and BBS community in the mid-90's, eventually graduating to video games like WoW and Everquest. Most of her recent efforts have focused on Second Life.

In April / May of this year she was working with Nancy Jennings to build an island for their university. When trying to work out what form it should take, they decided to survey what other educators were doing. It took a long time to find everybody. Often land was named after mascots or local figures, so tracking everyone down was a challenge.

They started with SimTeach Wiki, and combined with the in-world Search tool were able to find 170 listings. Only 71 institutions, however, actually had land in Second Life. 70% of these institutions were physically located in North America, followed by another 20% in Europe. Many were dedicating space to student socialization in addition to galleries, auditoriums and libraries.

When they held the "Best Practices In Education Conference" in May, they got an overwhelming 1300 RSVPs. There was a huge contingent of individual faculty members doing work in Second Life without institutional presence. Since then the numbers have been growing, with a current estimated 200 institutions establishing formal Second Life presences worldwide.

Distance learning is really on the rise, but with the increase of interest in that area comes the discovery of hurdles. "One of the complaints that students of distance learning programs have is that they feel isolated," said Collins, "All of us who are involved in Second Life now realize how much of a benefit it is to be able to visualize another person. Even if it isn't an exact replica of the person you get that sense of co-presence. And that carries across to collaboration and research."

Benn R Konsynski

Benn R Konsynski (Rejin Tenjin in Second Life) has been monitoring emerging technology for a few decades. He was involved in virtual reality activity in late 80s and early 90s, and watched MUDs and the first virtual spaces (Imagination, The Palace, Larryland). In his opinion technology is very close to catching up to the aspirations people have had for virtual worlds over the years.

Currently at Emory he's putting together a new class entitled "Virtual Worlds And New Realities". They're interested in social norms, commerce, politics and law, and what the similarities and differences are between how those things operate in a virtual world as opposed to the real one.

Emory's island in Second Life is called "Simsim", and serves four purposes: display of branding assets, basic orientation and building / scripting tutorials, a center posting best practices for virtual business and government, and a space to look at emerging technologies in real life as well as Second Life.

In studying the way groups interact in virtual worlds, he's been able to discover what works and what doesn't. Very large meetings can work well, and so do very small meetings. Outside of these two areas, however, we can run into some trouble: "The historic classroom groupings don't often work well," said Konsynski, "especially if you try to take advantage of mobility. Moving groups from one place to another is a disaster waiting to happen."

Educational Hybrids

A question from the audience prompted a discussion on collaboration of external organizations and educational institutions. "Too often we think of the 20th century model of education separated from training and learning," Konsynski said, "I think that just as we mash-up in our web space we can readily see mash-ups that create new hybrid learning environments that involve both the historic institutions and other providers"

"I would definitely echo that as well," responded Collins, "There is a nice crossover between a lot of non-profit institutions and educational institutions. [...] As far as business education there are so many opportunities here. I think all of us are facing the same challenges with the platform itself and as we find something that works in one environment they're likely to work in another environment."

Internships are one possible area of expansion in this regard. A big box store opening an outlet in a virtual world would benefit from having some student interns staffing the space, and the students would benefit from the in-world experience.

Challenges

One big difficulty is that you often have students more comfortable with the environment than the teachers. "How does that affect your authority as a subject matter expert," Collins commented. A partial solution in that regard is to emphasize that this is happening in a larger context, and that the technology is only a small part of a larger concept at work.

The expense of getting upgraded machines to access the virtual world is a problem, as are the logistics of keeping a lab full of systems updated with the latest client. Students can't be expected to purchase the high-end systems they would require either, so what's the solution?

Discussion along these lines continued, bridging into subjects like multitasking, attention span, the lowest technological common denominator, and even a certain amount of criticism with regards to our previous session with Castranova. You can view the session in full through the links above.

Upcoming Metanomics Event

The next Metanomics session will be on Monday, December 3rd. Robert Bloomfield will host, and he has arranged for two in-world business people to come and speak: Stroker Serpentine and Temporal Mitra. We'll explore the challenges of managing virtual businesses, managing virtual employees, marketing in Second Life, adult entertainment, and intellectual property issues.

Yesterday's Metanomics event featured Professor Bryan Camp, a leading expert on tax law from Texas Tech, giving us all huge insights into what the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is likely to say about the Linden Dollar.

See the video at SLCN.tv
Listen to the Audio

This was a special event as well as it was the first time we had Event Partners. The live video was fed to several locations around the grid where audiences gathered and participated in the Metanomics group backchat. A special thanks goes out to those who hosted events surrounding this talk. (Above photo taken at Muse Isle, courtesy of JenzZa Misfit)

Professor Camp will be publishing The Play's the Thing: A Theory of Taxing Virtual Worlds (59 Hastings L. J. 1 (2007)) in late November.

Have a Question About Taxation in Virtual Worlds?

Meanwhile, it was felt that there were many questions from the audience that were left unanswered due to time constraints. Professor Camp has offered to watch the comments thread under this posting and answer any questions anyone might have regarding tax law and virtual worlds. After reviewing the video or audio, post a comment and join the conversation!

Metanomics - Fashion! began this week with a full fashion show pre-event. Models walked the runway showing off Raven Pennyfeather's RFyre designs and made a big impression on the audience. JenzZa Misfit provided a fantastic photo set of it over on her gallery, and is definitely worth taking the time to peruse. You can now listen to the audio of the discussion and watch the footage over at the SLCN Metaversed channel. (Direct video download here.)

The event was hosted by Robert Bloomfield of Cornell University (pictured above on the right) who ran the panel of three guests: haute couture designer Nyla Cheeky (pictured above, left), gothic fashion designer Raven Pennyfeather, and pop culture media maven Jack Myers. It was an impressively well-balanced panel, with each contributor adding their own take on the critical role of emotional response for business in virtual worlds.

After the event I managed to catch up to the two designers for a post-interview. First up was Nyla Cheeky. Her real-world clothing line, featured on the website House of Nyla, features expensive custom designs for a clientele interested in one-of-a-kind haute couture. For the past year and a half she's also been selling her designs in Second Life, and concentrates on a single location. People go out of their way to find her store (click for SLurl), and she sells well despite being very high priced.

She made a conscious decision not to open multiple outlets to spread her name across the grid, as her entire product line is based on "destination shopping". People go to her to get something unique, and they'll go out of their way to do it. Couture is one-on-one, and for the interaction to work, she needs to be there.

I was able to catch up with Raven Pennyfeather soon afterward. Her ornate gothic clothing line exists solely in Second Life, and in contrast to Nyla, is available at 111 locations across the grid. Her main store (click here for SLurl) is filled with outfits featuring the three big colors of virtual world fashion: black, red and blue. (There are some very dark greens, but few other colors seem to sell well.) She rarely does custom work, but does look for inspiration directly from her customers. Most of her designs are inspired from conversations with her customers. She spends a lot of time finding out what inspires people, and it comes out in her designs.

While Nyla and Raven couldn't be more different in how they approach fashion, they both told me the exact same thing about success: what the customer feels is paramount. They were both big supporters of Jack Myers' take on the issue: while in previous generations we were taught not to think with our emotions, younger generations are learning to give equal footing to both the intellect and the heart. Nyla echoed this sentiment later: "Emotional issues rule in SL," she said, and that if customers weren't reacting instinctively to the designs, nothing would be selling. Raven said the same kind of thing: "It's about the relationship, it's about the passion [...] it's about the emotional response."

Ignoring this phenomena when it comes to creating a brand experience may explain why so many companies have failed in Second Life. The key to success for business in virtual worlds may be an entirely emotional issue.

Metanomics starts a little earlier than usual so that we can bring you a special feature before the main discussion: a full fashion show! Models will be walking the runway of Metaversed Island displaying the ornate gothic fashions of Raven Pennyfeather's RFyre line.

She will then be joined on-stage by Nyla Cheeky, real-world fashion designer behind House of Nyla. Nyla Cheeky has found a new audience for her fashions in the virtual world of Second Life and will tell us a bit more about how fashion translates from one to the other.

The third guest to join us today will be Jack Myers of the pop-culture hub JackMyers.com. He is well known for his unique spin on the pop culture and business of media, and will give us a sneak peek at his upcoming book Virtual Worlds: Rewiring Your Emotional Future.

This will all take place at the discussion area of Metaversed Island in the virtual world of Second Life. Get there as early as you can as the sim tends to fill up, and join the Metanomics group where we'll announce alternative venues.

For those of you who still want to participate without logging into the virtual world, watch us on the web at Second Life Cable Network who will be providing their expert video services. You can see some examples of their brilliant work in the Metaversed's video archives.

See you all there!

Yesterday's Metanomics event with Dan Miller has already generated some post-event analysis from Reuters, highlighting the fact that while Congress isn't likely to pass tax laws for virtual worlds, the IRS might determine that trade of the Linden Dollar is bartering and falls under fair market value rules.

If you missed it, the video is now available at SLCN.tv and a great photoset from JimmyJet is now available as well. Audio-only versions are also on the way.

To learn more on the topic of Metanomics you can check the Metaversed video archive, and explore even further at the Metanomics.tv website.

Today's Metanomics session will be with Dan Miller, a Senior Economist at the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress taking a close look at virtual worlds. He'll be telling us about not only the legislation that's being formed for taxation of virtual goods, but also about the Department of Homeland Security's interest in virtual worlds.

As usual the event will take place in Second Life on Metaversed Island at the new discussion area. Do be certain to arrive early as these things tend to fill up fast, and watch the Metanomics group chat (free to join!) where we'll announce alternative venues.

If you don't feel like logging into Second Life but still want to experience the event you can watch it on the web! Second Life Cable Network will be there as usual, both providing a live video stream to their website and providing an archive. We'll announce it here when the event appears in the Metaversed's video archives.

We're looking forward to seeing you there!

This Monday the Metanomics series is pleased to present Dan Miller, Senior Economist at the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress. His latest study, Costs and Consequences of the Federal Estate Tax, investigates one of the more controversial debates in taxation today. He'll be talking about the legislative outlook on virtual worlds, from taxation to the Department of Homeland Security. Though Dan is speaking as an individual, not for or on behalf of Congress, it's nevertheless a significant milestone for the Metaverse, and the Metanomics series.

Around this time last year he indicated that many economists were struggling with issues of virtual taxation: “I found that talking about this issue with some of the other economists on the committee, they are not really familiar with what a virtual economy is. The idea of Second Life or World of Warcraft or some of these other synthetic universes, they have trouble wrapping their head around it. So there’s an educational hurdle to overcome here,” he said.

This didn't mean that taxes weren't going to come to virtual worlds. "Given growth rates of 10 to 15 percent a month, the question is when, not if, Congress and IRS start paying attention to these issues," he told CNet last December. In August he met with Mindark, creators of Entropia Universe, in what by all accounts was a very productive meeting on the topics of tax evasion, money laundering, and terrorism.

As usual there are many ways for you to participate. Join us in Second Life on Monday at Metaversed Island, or watch the live feed on the web at SLCN.tv. You can also ask questions ahead of time at the Metanomics website.

Part 1

Part 2

Despite a rolling restart of the Second Life grid just before the event and a variety of technical troubles throughout, the Metanomics event was widely regarded as a success by attendees. As usual SLCN.tv was there recording the event, and you can watch it right now on our blip.tv channel.

JimmyJet created a great Flickr set from the event if you're interested in photos. If you just want the audio, click here for streaming or here to download the MP3.

The event was introduced by Robert Bloomfield, who as usual had some announcements for future Metanomics events:

• October 8th - Dan Miller, Senior Economist of the Joint Economic Council of the US Congress talks about the legislative outlook on virtual worlds, from taxation to the Department of Homeland Security.
• October 15th - Raven Pennyfeather, in-world fashion maven, talks about Fashion and the Metaverse, starting out with a fashion show before the official opening.
• October 22nd - Brian Kemp - Taxation in virtual commerce
• November 5th - Gene Yoon, Vice President of Business Affairs at Linden Lab

More details on upcoming speakers will appear at Metaversed.com as they arrive!

Our Metanomics session today will be with Julian Dibbell, author of the infamous article A Rape In Cyberspace and the books Play Money: Or How I Quit My Day Job and Made Millions Trading Virtual Loot and My Tiny Life: Crime and Passion in a Virtual World. He'll be offering his insights on the people who live in virtual worlds and what they experience while sitting at their keyboards.

The event will be held in the virtual world of Second Life on Metaversed Island in our new amphitheater. People have been arriving an hour early so do be certain to arrive as soon as you can. If you think you might not make it be sure to join the Metanomics group, where we'll announce any alternative venues.

Of course, you can always watch it on the web! Second Life Cable Network will be there broadcasting the event live through the website. You can see some of the excellent work they've done in the past at Metaversed's video archives.

Professor Robert Bloomfield has offered a list of Suggested Readings if you'd like to bring yourself up to speed.

See you all at the event!

Yesterday's Metanomics session was very illuminating. Associate Professor Joshua Fairfield (Indiana University) spoke on "Anti-Social Contracts", highlighting what contracts can and cannot be used for. He made a fascinating point about Terms Of Service Agreements in virtual worlds: they attempt to do things that contracts were never designed to do. Property law, common law and tort law need to be included here too, or the whole thing is at risk of falling apart.

He was a remarkably engaging speaker, and far more capable of explaining the details on this topic than I could ever be. As usual we packed the sim with 80 avatars, and in addition to people watching the live video stream on the SLCN.tv website we also had event partners SAP and the Otherland Group providing in-world space for the other 50 or so avatars wanting to attend.

For those of you who missed it, SLCN.tv was there recording the event and has already made the clip available. You can watch it right now at the video archives. Additional pictures were taken once again by JenzZa Misfit, and the full event will soon be archived (along with slides) over on Metanomics.tv.

Robert Bloomfield made some interesting announcements at the event as well:

• Next week, Monday October 1st, we'll have Julian Dibbell, author of the article "A Rape In Cyberspace" and the book "Play Money"
• October 15th - Fashion And Marketing in virtual worlds (speaker to be announced)
• October 22nd - Brian Kemp - Taxation in virtual commerce
• November 5th (unconfirmed) - Gene Yoon, Vice President of Business Affairs at Linden Lab

More details on upcoming speakers will appear at Metaversed.com as they arrive!

Today's Metanomics talk will be Anti-Social Contracts in Virtual Worlds, an analysis of how useful (and sometimes useless) contracts can be in virtual worlds. This event is a must for the many Second Life residents who are interested in creating governance structures (like Metaversed Republic) to people interested in the scope and power of Linden Lab's Terms of Service.

As usual this latest session of the Metanomics Series will be held on Metaversed Island in the virtual world of Second Life. The speaker will be Professor Joshua Fairfield, one of the leading names in law of video games, online regulation, and the law and economics of virtual worlds.

As usual, Professor Robert Bloomfield has supplied us with a suggested reading list to get you up to speed.

For those of you unfamiliar with Second Life or unable to enter the sim, SLCN.tv will be there doing a live recording and broadcast to video of the event. Of course, there's nothing like being there! Be sure to join us live on Metaversed Island at 11am SLT today!

Yesterday's Metanomics event was bigger than ever, boasting a full sim as usual, a larger group in the SAP-hosted overflow site, and an audience spanning not just Second Life but avatars in Activeworlds, web surfers at the SLCN.tv website, and a live audience at Cornell University. A full gallery of photos of the event taken from inside Second Life can be found here courtesy of JenzZa Misfit.

As Duncan Riley commented on TechCrunch: "participating in the session live provides a superior experience to watching the recorded video of the event later." There was something about "being there", knowing that this was all happening live, that made the event so much more potent to the participants.

Ian Hughes (epredator) of Eightbar had the unique experience of being in two worlds at once. His blog entry has several photos of him participating in both Activeworlds and Second Life at the same time, one avatar watching the other on the video screen. "This feels like another watershed moment as the virtual worlds collide," said Hughes.

He also offered up some valuable thoughts about productivity in virtual worlds:

There were some great questions from the SL end. One about were employees of IBM being productive in virtual worlds. My back channel comment was that I was sitting at home at work at 9pm still representing IBM, but think slicing with some other things like twitter. Sandy answered very much the same about trust and passion for virtual worlds and metaverses being such a big driver. Organizations have to allow people to want to do good things for them.

Duncan Riley's TechCrunch article covered another moment in the Q&A session that told us more about whether we are looking at a future of living in isolation, only relating to people virtually:

The first question from the audience came from me and I asked Kearney what she thought of Paul Twomey’s suggestion that the future of global commerce is in virtual worlds. She didn’t agree, saying that ultimately nothing will replace face to face, however there was scope for virtual worlds to provide an alternative when face to face isn’t an option.

The video coverage of this event is available at SLCN.tv and is definitely worth a look. Sandra Kearney delivered an absolute top-notch talk on virtual worlds in the workplace, offering insights into how IBM has been using them and why they work so well.

You can keep an eye on all of Metaversed's event videos at metaversed.blip.tv. You can also see the tremendous archive over at SLCN.tv.

Today at 12pm PST IBM, Cornell University and Metaversed.com will be staging a trans world, tri-reality event in 4 seperate locations, two of which will be 3D virtual world platforms glued together by virtual camera crews and IP telephony. A packed Metaversed Island in Second Life will interface with IBM's ActiveWorlds platform via Skype, inworld video and streaming web, as Prof. Robert Bloomfield speaks in front of a real life audience in Cornell's Sage Hall with Sandra Kearney, IBM's Director for 3D Internet about the companies vision for the Metaverse.

Got your attention? Good.

Kearney will be speaking on the use of virtual world technology for global business, effectively in 3 separate, but connected realities.

The whole event will also be streamed live to the web, courtesy of SLCN.tv and into other Second Life locations once the Metaversed Island reaches capacity. SAP's Craig Cmehil has kindly offered to handle the overflow should there be need (and we've no doubt there will) at the SAP offices in Second Life where you'll also be able to see the live session.

The audience in both Sage Hall, and Second Life will be able to participate by asking questions through the Skype moderators, and the whole event should prove not only interesting in terms of global business, but of the technology and technique involved in bridging realities.

Details to Follow

More details, including landmarks will be posted nearer the time, but if you wan't to camp out on Metaversed Island, you can find the event listing and SLurl here.

Many Metaversed readers have likely heard that CCP has hired a professional economist, Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson, to analyze the data from their highly sophisticated economy in EVE Online, and also advise them on economic policy. His first report covers the mineral markets.

I had an opportunity to chat with Dr. G today (which I find easier to say than Eyjól, which he prefers), and he has agreed to appear on Metanomics sometime soon. We are arranging the date, and hopefully will include some residents active in EVE's business community.

On the other hand, maybe I will try to get Stanford Professor Michael Boskin to join us, who has just agreed to become chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors for Gaia Online. Hmmm....the possibilities for this series are endless....

Metanomics 101, the kickoff event for the Metanomics Series, will be held today on Metaversed Island in the virtual world of Second Life. The speaker will be Beyers Sellers, or as he is known in the real world, Cornell University Professor Robert Bloomfield. He'll be defining the key issues facing those who study business and policy in the metaverse. We'll also get to preview some of the speakers and topics that will be presented over the coming months.

Of particular interest to long-time debaters in all affairs metaversal will be his investigation into the tensions between Immersionists, Agumentationalists and Experimentalist. First of all, if you don't know what any of these things are, this is definitely the event for you! If you're strongly in favor of one side over another, you'll surely want to come by and join in on what will be one of the more interesting discussions Second Life has seen.

Meanwhile, Bloomfield has supplied us with a suggested reading list to get you up to speed, and I'll be sure to make all of the materials available through the Metanomics.tv website including the presentation slides and the SLCN.tv video.

Of course, there's nothing like being there! Be sure to join us live on Metaversed Island at 11am SLT today!

Life behind the scenes around Metaversed has been hectic as we prepare new events, new experiences, and new ways of bringing you the latest in business and technology news in virtual worlds. While we can't always reveal what's coming up until it's ready, I'm pleased to be able to officially announce the details surrounding something we think you're really going to love. It's called Metanomics '07.

Metanomics '07 will be a landmark series of events in Second Life that will explore virtual business and policy in the Metaverse, hosted by Cornell University's Robert Bloomfield, and Metaversed.com. While the events will take place in Second Life, SLCN.tv is going to be broadcasting them live for anyone unable to attend in-world. We also have planned several mixed reality events where presenters will interact with the virtual world via live video feeds.

Speakers for these events will be academics, industry leaders, regulators and influential virtual-world residents. We'll have representatives from a number of key businesses including Sun Microsystems, IBM, Intel, SAP, and Cisco. We encourage you to come to the event, listen to some of the true luminaries of the industry, ask questions and join in the discussion!

Here's a closer look at a few of the speakers we'll have over the next few months:

Robert Bloomfield, Monday September 17th - Professor of Accounting at Cornell University's Johnson Graduate School of Management, where he directs the Doctoral Program and the Business Simulation Laboratory. In Second Life, Professor Bloomfield is Beyers Sellers, and is the host of the Metanomics series. He will be opening things up with the first event Metanomics 101 where he defines the basic concept of what Metanomics is and how it can shape our thinking about virtual worlds. To learn more take a look at Metanomics 101 Suggested Reading, and keep an eye on the Metanomics web site.

Sandra Kearney, Thursday September 20th - IBM’s Global Director for 3D Internet (3Di) and Virtual Business, Sandra Kearney will be speaking at our first truly mixed reality event: IBM in the Metaverse. She will actually be speaking from Cornell University's Sage Hall, broadcasting into Second Life, and the event will then be broadcast back out through SLCN.tv.

Joshua Fairfield, Monday September 24th - A member of the faculty at Indiana Law, Professor Fairfield is regularly quoted in the media on topics including the law of video games, online regulation, and the law and economics of virtual worlds. You can view Professor Fairfield's research at the Social Science Research Network. He will speak to us on the uses and limits of contracts in governing interactions in virtual worlds. For details see Anti-Social Contracts in Virtual Worlds.

Dan Miller, Thursday October 11th - Senior Economist of the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress, Dan Miller is at the forefront of research into how government should handle virtual world economies. He will be discussing congressional involvement in virtual world regulation. His talk is officially entitled The U.S. Congress Looks at the Metaverse.

Julian Dibbell - Author of the famous 1993 article A Rape in Cyberspace detailing LambdaMOO's early struggles with virtual world issues, as well as the later book My Tiny Life: Crime and Passion in a Virtual World. He also attempted to make a living playing MMORPGs and chronicled the journey in the book Play Money: or, How I Quit My Day Job and Made Millions Trading Virtual Loot. Currently he is a journalist for Wired Magazine

Anshe Chung - The famous avatar of Ailin Graef represents a virtual world empire spanning Second Life, IMVU and Entropia Universe. Her online business deals in all aspects of virtual land, items, and currencies, and has been featured in a number of prominent magazines such as Business Week, Fortune and Red Herring.

Richard Bartle - Richard Bartle is the author of Designing Virtual Worlds , and was one of the co-designers of the "MUD," the Multi-User Dungeon, which forms the basis of virtual worlds today. "The MUD was to MMORPGs what the Beatles were to rock and roll. And by all accounts, Richard Bartle was (and remains to this day) a man ahead of his time. "

Edward Castronova - Professor Edward Castronova of Indiana University is author of Synthetic Worlds and the paper Virtual Worlds: A First-Hand Account of Market and Society on the Cyberian Frontier (2001). He is a recipient of a MacArthur Foundation grant to develop the virtual world Arden - The World Of William Shakespeare. He will discuss his new book as it launches in November.

In a recent article on Terra Nova Bloomfield commented: "We hope to get pearls from constructing a way for people interested in metanomics to engage with the speaker and with each other in serious discusion before and after the session, and create an archive that future can serve as essential reading [...]." The goal here is nothing less than to create a body of work that will change the Metaverse. Be sure to join us.