Interesting interview with Will Harvey (There founder)

I think that's a very illuminating article, Chip. Two passages really stood out for me:

"When I began There, the notion that people would spend real money to buy virtual items was purely hypothesis ... There Inc. proved that hypothesis true. The business model didn’t just search for consumer traction. It found it! The lifetime value of a customer to There is hundreds of US dollars--almost all of it spent on virtual items!"

and also:

"GS: Does this latest news represent progress or regression to There?

WH: There announced to its users that it is changing its focus to the government and military applications of its technology instead of the consumer product. Obviously, this isn’t good news for the users of the consumer product..."

For those of us who played There, but very rapidly got fed up with paying for tbucks and consequently became more and more disillusioned by the game and the developers' apparent greed, I can't help feeling that the second quote is true because the first one isn't.

I also noted his comments about parting ways and not being on the management/board etcetera, and then I go look at There.com and see him listed on the company info page as being such.

Makes me wonder how up to date those employment listings are, as I figure with a new infusion of funding and new focus they might be hiring.

I doubt they are hiring. They cut 50% of their employees last week.

Not having played There it's hard for me to judge, but there does seem to be a disconnect there. I think the first quote you cited is true, but perhaps not to the extent that There tried to push it. In many ways, SL depends on people's willingness to spend real money on virtual goods also, but it's been handled much more intelligently I think. Having SL be 18 and over only saves LL and their content developers (us) from having to go through an approval process so there's a much smaller barrier between having an idea and realizing it in SL. And LL doesn't try and profit from player created content beyond simple access fees. The impression I got from everything I've heard about There was that buying Tbux wasn't really optional if you wanted to be able to do anything. In SL it's completely optional, and it's very possible to earn L$ without spending RL$ for them. So while SL to some extent relies on the same things that There did it accomodates a much wider range of players. Those that want to have a shortcut to having L$ to burn can easily buy them, and those that aren't comfortable with that can avoid it altogether without it placing a big limit on what they can do in SL.