ShadowRAM: May 7, 2007
HEY SECOND LIFE! GO AWAY. REALLY
IBM, we were told, has acquired 24 Second Life "islands." The most of anyone. No! You don't say! No, really, don't say it. GM, Toyota, Dell, Cisco, Sun and Reuters also are wasting, er, investing their money in a Second Life presence. Next step: These companies will start reporting earnings in Linden dollars.
Also on tap from IBM: Tours of partner islands and access to "experienced virtual worlds partners." Oh yes, don't forget IBM exec avatars for the cover "photo."
Insult to injury, IBM's PR agency is staging a Second Life panel and tour this week in Boston (the real Boston, presumably) to help attendees enter Second Life for the first time.
If we're not now officially in a bubble of epic proportions, I'll eat my virtual hat. How many tech buyers do you know that will base their IT spending on a demo they saw on what appears to be a videogame? If you like that kind of thing, stick with Myst.
Two words for these companies and their minions: Go away. Really. Not virtually.
TO LIVE AND DIE BY TWITTER
Not to be a complete naysayer about this social networking stuff. Some of it has its place. Twitter, for example, is the perfect way to register delight, or disgust, with keynotes. This is a realtime feedback loop that extends far beyond the auditorium.
Just ask TechCrunch's Michael Arrington. He led last week's onstage Q&A with Microsoft's Ray Ozzie at Mix07. The response was immediate—and brutal. A non-twittering attendee IM'd that this was "truly one of the worst keynote train wrecks ever. The twitterers are going nuts."
And so they were: One sample twitterer wrote, "Michael Arrington needs to work on his interview skills. Slouching. Not looking at interviewee. Not prepared. Ugh!"
SEEN AND HEARD
• Early arrivals for the Polycom partner confab late last month were titillated (or appalled) to find they were sharing a hotel with Anime Boston 2007. That would be 8,000 teens celebrating Japanese animation, many dressed as their favorite characters. "They partied all night long," said one Polycommer who'd gotten the lowdown from hotel staff. But we have it on authority that some Polycom folks donned colored wigs of their own and joined in the fun.
• Rumor out of Redmond is that a big rivalry has developed between one longtime golden boy exec (he'll go nameless, but he's credited with getting Office out in time for years) and the latest golden boy, who shall also remain nameless but you know who he is. Sources say the vet is even being wooed by Sun. Suffice it to say, if this guy goes, it will be very big news.
This sitch illustrates the tension between "old-world" but money-making, on-premise software and the Microsoft Live "pie in the sky" now being pushed. Stay tuned.
• Intel HQ was abuzz about Conan O'Brien's visit last week. The NBC funny guy was doing research for upcoming shows from San Francisco. Asked what kind of PC he had, he said he got it in 1988 and was hoping for an upgrade. He said NBC execs were always asking him about how to "stream entertainment" into the home where it'll show up onscreen. Conan's reply: "Yeah. It's called television, and it's been around 55 years."