In many people’s minds, virtual worlds mean one thing, and one thing only: Second Life. Such was the hype surrounding that virtual world last year, that it’s easy to forget that there are actually dozens - if not hundreds - of rivals, a number of which actually have more users. If you’re a parent, you might already know this, from seeing your kids use Habbo Hotel, Club Penguin or Webkinz.
However, all these virtual worlds are accessed on a PC - either through a dedicated application like Second Life, or through a Web browser. Mobile handsets haven’t had much of a look in, for obvious reasons such as their small screens and the cost of streaming lots of data to the phone as you move around a world.
This, however, is changing…
Continue reading ‘Opinion: Mobile virtual worlds could be the next big thing’
Can I have a quick rant? Second Life is a fairly popular virtual world, even if its active users are dwarfed by those of less swizzy 2D kidworlds like Club Penguin and Webkinz. But still, Second Life has secured enough column inches to make it an ideal way for any company to cop some zeitgeisty cool by announcing some kind of tie-in with it. Any kind. Even if they quietly abandon it a few months later.
Now, I’m not suggesting that’s the case with Samsung, but its decision to trumpet an application that lets users access Second Life from their phones is puzzling. Who would use such a thing? Surely squeezing Second Life down to the level that it’ll run on a phone negates the whole point of being there? And in any case, how many extra handsets is the company really going to sell due to having this application.
Continue reading ‘Samsung putting Second Life on mobile phones… but why?’
