As you may (or may not) know, second life is not the only of the virtual worlds around. You can also live in World of Warcraft, There, Croquet or some of many other more. Each has its own look and feel, its own rules, plots and opportunities which partly affect one’s choice of the world(s) to live in. But the plot line is not the only thing to consider when planning one’s future residentship. A whole lot of other factors are there: popularity, technical issues (like stability, speed, security), media coverage, business opportunities… For most of the press, analysts and in general opinion Second Life by Linden Lab is the number one. But also, most of us are aware that there are followers just the step or two behind.
The race for the leader in the metaverse world is coming into peak phase. After couple of years of developing out of the spotlight media grabbed the hot new story and even if you’re not into walking your avatar around virtual land you got the glimpse of how virtual living looks like and what is going on there in the metaverse. Just as Linden Lab announced there are two million residents in Second Life thousands of people joined the party. And in two months there were three millions of us. One month latter – four millions.
No point in stressing that a such sudden overpopulating of any world leads to ecological problems. Lagging, crashing, freezing became more and more of a problem with each new thousand of residents with default hairs and clothes from the library. Lots of feedback is running towards Lindens on that matter. On one side we see world getting buggy, unstable and almost unusable. On the other, we see more and more real-life marketing calling new people to join. We see new features (like voice) announced too.
It is understandable when old residents rant against strategy like this. Instead of resolving current problems they are introducing new features we might don’t even need or want. And new features are, as always, source of new bugs and problems, not to mention new loads for the servers to cope with. It is not just putting new servers and expanding the farm as world is getting bigger. It is not question of size as much as complexity of the network behind the meshes and prims.
I’m not to defend politics of Linden Lab, but there is a glimpse of sympathy for their situation. Being the leader in the race that comes to its peak is not an easy situation at all. Followers are just one or two steps away and their position is much more favorable. They can learn from leader’s mistakes and situation, they can develop under much less pressure. They can leave LL to lead the race and to worn itself out until the last round. Being where it is, Second Life does not have the opportunity to choose its path and speed. They have to put the pressure on both themselves and followers in hope that future is for the brave and that their gambling will pay out.
And then, if we take a look on the situation with cold heads, this is the race with no winner. Not that none will come to an end, most of the runners will. It is not that two or more will come in the same time. It is that once they cross the line they all should give up their laurels and connect. Just remember how BBS’s and closed networks formed the internet. There are years to pass and avatars to be born till we don’t see the real, one and only metaverse. But even then, the new, true metaverse will need its leaders. On whose server capitol building will be built on?
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