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Identity, Community, Status, and the fun problem.

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animats

animats

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There's another metaverse book out - "The Metaverse Handbook", published by Wiley. The authors are the co-host of CNBC's Business Bootcamp, a prominent DJ, and Paris Hilton. Really. Three people whose business is being popular. This is a delightfully cynical book about the nuts and bolts of what people want and how to make them want something. A key section:

"Our assets are a large part of what we are for three reasons.

  • Our assets reflect our identity. We buy stuff that represents who we are or what we want to become. ...
  • Our assets reflect our community. We buy things to show what tribe we are a part of or want to be a part of. ...
  • Our assets reflect our status. We purchase certain brands because they signal status in society. ..."

People thinking about the new user retention problem should give this a read. You may hate the book, but it's worth reading anyway. It bears on the rather crass motivations needed to get people onboard.

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Seicher Rae

Seicher Rae

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4 hours ago, animats said:

There's another metaverse book out - "The Metaverse Handbook", published by Wiley. The authors are the co-host of CNBC's Business Bootcamp, a prominent DJ, and Paris Hilton. Really. Three people whose business is being popular. This is a delightfully cynical book about the nuts and bolts of what people want and how to make them want something. A key section:

"Our assets are a large part of what we are for three reasons.

  • Our assets reflect our identity. We buy stuff that represents who we are or what we want to become. ...
  • Our assets reflect our community. We buy things to show what tribe we are a part of or want to be a part of. ...
  • Our assets reflect our status. We purchase certain brands because they signal status in society. ..."

People thinking about the new user retention problem should give this a read. You may hate the book, but it's worth reading anyway. It bears on the rather crass motivations needed to get people onboard.

As gawd awful as this sounds, it actually does sound like an... interesting? ... read. Paris is getting to be a bit long in the tooth but she certainly helped usher in the Influencer Era. I don't understand any of it, because I don't want to understand any of it, but... :::sighs and makes a bookmark of this title:::

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JeromFranzic

JeromFranzic

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Nah, I'll respectfully pass. If I want to associate myself with some wealthy elites, I'd prefer Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Dan Price, Tom Steyer, Oprah Winfrey and Steve Wozniak. 

And of course Linus Torvalds for the giggles and s××ts.

But ok, might gander at the first chapter before I burn/'delet' the book...

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diamond Marchant

diamond Marchant

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The book might be good at describing the past hype (one of the authors also wrote an NFT handbook) but cannot be expected to chart a future course. For example, it is unlikely that blockchain will succeed as the general purpose interoperablility technology that people think it is. It is difficult to predict the future based on extrapolations of the past. One never knows when the right blend of new technologies will converge to make something happen.

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Spiffy Voxel

Spiffy Voxel

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7 minutes ago, Love Zhaoying said:

Maybe the "I can has Cheezburger" guy would be a better choice?

Sounds good to me, it would just be pictures of cats asking WTF is up with all the hoomans going gaga for blockchain-crypto-VR hype. 😛

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Arduenn Schwartzman

Arduenn Schwartzman

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Posted (edited)
On 8/16/2022 at 8:37 AM, animats said:

The authors are the co-host of CNBC's Business Bootcamp, a prominent DJ, and Paris Hilton.

Alarm bells went off when I read Paris Hilton. Checked out a more detailed description on the website. Turns out she only wrote the foreword. Still, the whole thing reeks of Facebook and crypto. I'm extremely prejudiced towards those, so, by fully embracing my Desire Of Missing Out (DOMO), I'm going to respectfully decline.

[Update] I saw what they did there. There was an attempt to get Paris Hilton fans to read a book.

Edited by Arduenn Schwartzman
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Love Zhaoying

Love Zhaoying

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39 minutes ago, Arduenn Schwartzman said:

Alarm bells went off when I read Paris Hilton. Checked out a more detailed description on the website. Turns out she only wrote the foreword. Still, the whole thing reeks of Facebook and crypto. I'm extremely prejudiced towards those, so, by fully embracing my Desire Of Missing Out (DOMO), I'm going to respectfully decline.

[Update] I saw what they did there. There was an attempt to get Paris Hilton fans to read a book.

Easy Translator:  "Forward by Paris Hilton" = "Ghost Writer".

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Love Zhaoying

Love Zhaoying

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On 8/16/2022 at 2:37 AM, animats said:

Our assets reflect our identity. We buy stuff that represents who we are or what we want to become. ...

I've seen people write before for RL situations, "I am my stuff!" I have no idea if they were being facetious but, it certainly does reflect a "consumerism gone mad" in my opinion. To me, it means "my stuff is more important to me than other things" (implying other people, etc.)

On 8/16/2022 at 2:37 AM, animats said:

Our assets reflect our community.

It is sooo common in Second Life that it doesn't even need mentioning:  if you don't have the right type of avatar (mesh, human, whatever), then you're not welcome or respected.

On 8/16/2022 at 2:37 AM, animats said:

Our assets reflect our status.

Obviously, so many people in Second Life think: If you can't afford a "good" avatar, or can't be bothered to get one, then you are a lower status.

So, none of this is "good" to me, even if it is all "true".

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EliseAnne85

EliseAnne85

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 8/15/2022 at 11:37 PM, animats said:

There's another metaverse book out - "The Metaverse Handbook", published by Wiley. The authors are the co-host of CNBC's Business Bootcamp, a prominent DJ, and Paris Hilton. Really. Three people whose business is being popular. This is a delightfully cynical book about the nuts and bolts of what people want and how to make them want something. A key section:

"Our assets are a large part of what we are for three reasons.

  • Our assets reflect our identity. We buy stuff that represents who we are or what we want to become. ...
  • Our assets reflect our community. We buy things to show what tribe we are a part of or want to be a part of. ...
  • Our assets reflect our status. We purchase certain brands because they signal status in society. ..."

People thinking about the new user retention problem should give this a read. You may hate the book, but it's worth reading anyway. It bears on the rather crass motivations needed to get people onboard.

I've read there is a lot of money waiting to come into the metaverse in the next 5 years or so.  However, with some of the new metaverse stuff I think they just want to make money because SL creations are light years ahead of the 'new' sillier looking metaverses, such as Decentraland.  Yet, there is still institutional and retail "money" and yes as somebody suggested in this thread it's about crypto metaverses, not SL, where the new money wants to go.  I believe the above is talking about 'virtual assets', most of which are too expensive such as owning virtual land for five thousand and up plus outrageously priced NFT's for thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars.  I don't believe this book would be talking about the assets we have in SL because most are not resalable nor will they increase in value like Decentraland land or NFT's which are the buyers own personal property.  

I got to thinking this because most of the shoppers of the world are women and only rich women or investors think in the ways you high-lighted above.

I buy all kinds of things in RL and SL but am not into status symbol type of clothing.   I like what I like period.  I don't care who made it.

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Istelathis

Istelathis

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On 8/16/2022 at 2:37 AM, animats said:

"Our assets are a large part of what we are for three reasons.

  • Our assets reflect our identity. We buy stuff that represents who we are or what we want to become. ...
  • Our assets reflect our community. We buy things to show what tribe we are a part of or want to be a part of. ...
  • Our assets reflect our status. We purchase certain brands because they signal status in society. ..."

I'm afraid SL is not going to generate many of those kinds of people, because not many people want SL to reflect their identity, and for those who seek status, SL is not going to provide very much for those outside of SL.  LL would need to push out an image for Second Life that made people desire to be part of it, perhaps if they add "metaverse" to the name😜 

Second Life: Metaverse edition

:D j/k

Although in that spirit, the word Metaverse is becoming a bit like the number 2000, at least how it was used in the 90s.  Just strap it to any project or product you are using, and viola!  SuperVac 2000, is not so futuristic sounding anymore.  SuperVac Turbo Metaverse sounds pretty exciting though, surely it has nothing to do with the metaverse, but such a word is ambiguous and can mean anything now so anything goes.

It does look like an interesting read though, and I don't disagree with it.  For those few who do try SL, it might work.  

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Harper Held

Harper Held

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Please wake me up when we get to the "fun" part of the proceedings...

Honestly, and this might be inappropriate sentimentality (ie rose colored glasses) speaking, but it seems to me that things were a lot more fun pre-mesh. If nothing else because people could be shooting the ***** and then just whip together some wacky ephemeral build that had nothing to do with anything but what they'd been talking about. I mean injokes and things. As mesh upped the barrier-to-entry (skill needed, time needed, upload costs) it feels like SL (and Opensim) has lost the majority of that "wacky"/"because we can" fun energy that it used to have.

SL is now srs bsns and srs bsns sux

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Akane Nacht

Akane Nacht

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This book won't tell us anything we don't already know, I think. SL has gone from a quirky geek sandbox to an instagram backdrop. Not that the quirky geek is totally gone but take a look at SL on flickr, and the stuff that's sold - static poses, pose props, 2d backdrops complete with lighting, static pose clothes and hair frozen in the wind.

A few people use all these to make pictures that are akin to paintings, or that tell a story, but the vast majority are just influencer fashion stuff, chock full of consumerism. I'm not criticising that, as some people obviously find it fun and they're spending money which keeps SL running.

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Love Zhaoying

Love Zhaoying

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12 minutes ago, Akane Nacht said:

This book won't tell us anything we don't already know, I think. SL has gone from a quirky geek sandbox to an instagram backdrop. Not that the quirky geek is totally gone but take a look at SL on flickr, and the stuff that's sold - static poses, pose props, 2d backdrops complete with lighting, static pose clothes and hair frozen in the wind.

A few people use all these to make pictures that are akin to paintings, or that tell a story, but the vast majority are just influencer fashion stuff, chock full of consumerism. I'm not criticising that, as some people obviously find it fun and they're spending money which keeps SL running.

Someone needs "A Coke and a Smile"!

* enters static pose offering a Coke can while wearing a toothy grin mesh head facial animation *

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