There Today, Gone Tomorrow
I heard today that Makena Technologies’ There.com will be closing for good on March 9. In a media release, CEO Michael Wilson said, “…There is a business, and a business that can’t support itself doesn’t work. Before the recession hit, we were incredibly confident and all indicators were ‘directionally correct’ and we had every reason to believe growth would continue. But, as many of you know personally, the downturn has been prolonged and severe, and ultimately pervasive.”
I looked at There as a possible platform for a business client 18 months ago, and it led the pack among all the immersive platforms that we evaluated with a hard business eye. One of its appeals over Second Life and Active Worlds was the hooks for the more stringent security needs of a large corporation. Another was its recognition of the value of the intellectual property of the users. There has a submissions review system, which ensured that user generated content didn’t infringe on existing brands or the content of other users.
Perhaps it’s because so many businesses have slumped and virtual worlds just lost the little priority they had gained in recent years, as the media release noted. Yet Active Worlds has continued to produce an adequate 3D product since…1992 (?)…in the same economy, and is still working to capture the same business market as There did. And Second Life still feels like a dynamic and viable place when one goes there. Or perhaps there are private reasons. For example, Forterra recently sold its OLIVE 3D platform to SAIC, and that was the There sister product. Maybe part of the deal was that There would close, and not compete. although Forterra’s market was always corporate and governmental training/education, and not consumer based. Maybe Makena’s private ownership, having parted with Forterra and its OLIVE, was ready to get out of the virtual world business and on to the next big thing. Or maybe not. :) It’s a pity for the users who invested time and energy to build a social network there. Once again, social contracts bite the dust to investment-backed expectations.
Reflecting on There made me think about Second Life. Could it be that simple market factors within the SL environment (wild west tho it is) keep it vibrant and profitable for enough users to make them want to keep coming back to create or play? Could it be that IBM’s support of SL carries a lot more clout than most people give it credit for? (But IBM also supports Active Worlds, and likely supported There to some extent as well in its search for the “right” virtual world platform.) I know that I’m oversimplifying, and that Linden Lab does a lot more behind the scenes to maintain its product than is readily apparent to users.
I think it has to be that There failed for more than the graphics, although their graphics were largely unsatisfying to many users. SL’s graphics aren’t great, but they are getting better, and There always looked more washed out and rigid. The avatars look cartoony and more two dimensional than SL’s avatars. Plus, in There users had to pay for character alterations like hair changes, while in SL, anyone can change their avatar’s total look, gender and even shape at the drop of a hat for free. (And this has huge appeal to users!) SL developer Fiona Berry commented that “I think that people value the individuality which other worlds give them, and dislike being clones… and having to pay to change their hairstyle. I think (There was) greedy to charge for changes which actually never stopped all the avatars looking the same… and that the over-controlled model of virtual world will always be less appealing for creators and residents alike.”
I don’t know if we will ever know for sure, but it looks like SL will have a sudden influx of new avatars this month because of this. Why do you think There failed?
March 5th, 2010 at 1:32 pm
See Raph’s latest post: “Are virtual worlds dead?”
He says that embedded web casual gaming has absorbed almost every important feature of classic virtual worlds.
There.com has been amongst the walking dead for years. MetaPlace couldn’t platform it either.
I agree with him – place is a feature, not a business model.
Randy
March 8th, 2010 at 2:30 am
Randy, I disagree that virtual worlds are dead. There will always be a need for places where the user has creative freedom. MMOGs don’t provide that…by nature they must be highly structured or the game aspect would soon be overwhelmed by the economic transactions or a clutter of lousy user creations. I agree that There.com didn’t get it right, but I think virtual worlds will be with us still in another decade or two. We go to MMO games to experience the game environment and compete with it. We go to virtual worlds for a different experience, even though both are highly social. I think casual games are in a class all their own. While they *can* offer a social dimension, that is not their main purpose. I happily played Yo Ho Ho! Puzzle Pirates for nearly a year, but it was essentially me walking my avatar through town to a building, where I played their little one player games solo. There were other players in the world doing other things, and you knew you were not alone, but we rarely interacted. I think that is what made it enjoyable for me. I played a little poker in groups of six, but the experience of the interactions was way different from what I have experienced in either virtual worlds or MMOGs over the past two decades.
I guess I need to go post on Raph’s blog…I don’t see how he could say that web casual gaming has absorbed almost every important feature of classic virtual worlds. I can see how virtual worlds can (and do) absorb casual games. I’ve played chess, Simon Says, darts, trivia, mahjong, checkers, Whack-a-mole, and many other traditional casual games in Second Life, alone and with others. I’ve also rowed and ridden horses in races, and played basketball. It’s hard to imagine that a person would like to play Bejeweled or Sudoku with another player as a social experience. It’s way more fun to become a fully animated 3D avatar and dance to live music and be around beautifully dressed and scripted others, or be a custom designed space tanker trolling for loot in EVE Online, if I’m looking for a social experience. To me they are two entirely different environments for entirely different purposes. I don’t see any way that the “important” features of virtual worlds could be absorbed. I think they can be mimicked, but not replaced. I’ll go see what he has to say. :) Thanks!