Most new trends are accompanied by a band of sceptics, and virtual world Second Life is no exception. In an attempt to bring some realism to the debate over the potential of the burgeoning online community, some have questioned whether it provides anything more useful than an opportunity for consumers to live fantasy lives and marketers to enhance their CVs.
While Vodafone's global director of brand and customer experience, David Wheldon, was raving about its possibilities at last week's ISBA conference, some in the audience were wondering whether this was a marketing version of the emperor's new clothes.
But even the cynics find it difficult to argue with the numbers, particularly those that illustrate its booming popularity. In the middle of February, Second Life had 3m users. Just three weeks later, a further 1.3m people had logged on - a tipping point by anyone's standards.
Contrary to assumptions, they aren't all Californian teenagers. Figures issued by Second Life owner Linden Labs in February show that although 31% of 'active users' - those who have logged on for more than an hour in the previous month - are American, 12.7% hail from France, 10.5% from Germany and 8% are in the UK. The biggest proportion of Second Life users fall into the 25- to 34-year-old bracket (38.7%), with 18- to 24-year-olds comprising 27.5%.
Attracted by this rocketing audience and the potential for dabbling inter-actively in a virtual community, marketers have been introducing their brands into Second Life.
Much of the activity so far has been experimental - marketers are understandably cautious about imposing a commercial presence on the community, particularly since news emerged last month about the appearance of a virtual terrorist group, the Second Life Liberation Army.
The priority for most at the moment is gaining the benefits of associating with a movement while it is still in its early adopter stage, as well as tapping into its interactive possibilities to support marketing communications.
Vodafone launched its own island last month as part of its 'Make the most of now' strategy. The idea was to bring the slogan to life without overtly imposing it. The island contains an ice-rink with an igloo that users can upload their own pictures onto, 'flights' on butterflies and a sound garden. In the latter, users' avatars (the 3-D human-like creatures users create as their in-world identity) step on sensors to produce sounds - and a group working together can launch a rocket. 'It's all about entertainment, whether that's experienced as an individual or in a group,' says a spokesman for the company. In the longer term, Vodafone hopes to offer phone services.
Publisher Penguin has also been exploring the potential of the virtual world, although its efforts are a little more closely related to the bottom line. 'We need to become better at marketing the Penguin brand to online communities,' explains Jeremy Ettinghausen, digital publisher at Penguin. 'Consumers make decisions about their opinions of books and music by interacting with others online, so we need to make sure that we are visible in that environment'.
It has made samples of books available on Second Life - a few chapters intended as a taster that link to a discount available from the Penguin website. Later in the year, the publisher plans to arrange for book readings within the world by authors.
Ettinghausen adds that although he cannot envisage selling books on Second Life for reading in-world, he thinks audio books could prove popular. 'It is all about the presence for us at the moment,' he says.
Marketing's decision to trailblaze in Second Life was similarly conceived. We have set up five news kiosks across the virtual world, giving users a way to access our news and features by linking them to www.brandrepublic.com/marketing. Our aim is to keep tabs on this growing area of interest for marketers and keep you informed about its potential.
For many marketers, the primary stumbling block to getting involved are the well-intentioned IT firewalls within most companies that prevent them from even accessing Second Life at a basic level for research purposes, unless they log on at home.
Mark Duffy, 3-D manager at digital developer Fusion Unity, believes that this obstacle will be swiftly overcome.
'A decade ago people used to talk about how difficult the internet was to access,' he says. 'There is no reason in principle why firewalls should exclude people accessing Second Life, as their main purpose is to stop viruses that come in via email.'
Duffy adds that the major potential of Second Life for big brands is its ability to offer an authentic 3-D customer experience, especially for retailers. This is something that Adidas and Reebok are already offering; users can customise and order trainers within Second Life, which are then sent to them in the real world.
One of Second Life's biggest influences could turn out to be as an inspiration for brands to create their own virtual communities. Sony announced last week that it is to create a virtual world, called Home, that will run on its Play-Station 3 console.
One thing is certain - consideration of Second Life's possibilities will feature on a great many PowerPoint slides this year as marketers mull over whether it will be most advantageous to be an early adopter or to wait until its full potential becomes clearer.
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