Second Life's economy grows 65% to $567M. Virtual worlds no longer shine as they once did, but Linden Lab, the owner of the Second Life 3-D online virtual world, says that its virtual economy has never been bigger. The company said today that the total size of the Second Life economy grew 65 percent in 2009 to $567 million. By the company’s own estimate, that amounts to about 25 percent of the entire U.S. virtual goods market.
Residents of Second Life cashed out $55 million in real money last year, up 11 percent from 2008. The top 25 residents of Second Life collectively earned $12 million. Meanwhile, monthly repeat visitors reached $769,000, an all-tie high and up 15 from December 2008. Total resident-owned land in Second Life reached 1.85 billion square meters in December, up 27 percent. Be sure to check out our latest announcements on GamesBeat@GDC, our video game conference taking place March 10 in San Francisco. 47% of UK online population don't like targeted ads based on social media activity. Google, Yahoo! Emoticons Leave Money on the Table. Love those smiley faces? Investors may like them even more if Google (Nasdaq: GOOG ) , Yahoo!
(Nasdaq: YHOO ) , and the like were to begin charging for using emoticons. Come April, Israel-based Zlango, which launched its icon messaging service in the U.S. last fall, will do just that for its premium content -- such as its Valentine's Day pack -- and through the sale of virtual goods. The startup is also looking to create a second revenue stream through the sale of branded words.
The notion of selling advertising should resonate with Google, Yahoo! And Facebook, given that it's their sweet spot for generating revenues. An icon-based form of advertising would be an additional way to squeeze out revenues beyond a search or display mode of advertising. What's behind the Z? Since entering the U.S. market in October, Zlango has attracted more than 1 million U.S. users, pushing its total customer base to 5 million worldwide.
Say a user wants to ask somebody out for a cup of coffee. Yahoo! Plimus Survey Finds Virtual Gifts Top Everyone’s List This Valentine’s Day. Fremont, CA (PRWEB) February 14, 2012 Plimus Inc., the leader in complete, configured and connected hosted e-Business solutions, today released the results of its Plimus Virtual Valentine’s Day survey. The random, at large survey highlights consumers’ behaviors towards giving online goods this Valentine’s Day and what barriers prevent them from completing the transaction. The “Plimus Virtual Valentine’s Day” survey found: 43 percent of consumers would like to receive a digital gift this Valentine’s Day Nearly half of respondents indicated they would like to receive an electronic greeting card for Valentine’s Day One in five survey participants plan to purchase social media game credits for their Valentine this year Two out of three consumers would be more willing to purchase a virtual good for Valentine’s Day if the order page was intuitive and required limited personal information Purchase the perfect Valentine’s Day gift from one of Plimus’ thousands of online sellers.
Les marques ne maîtrisent pas les réseaux sociaux. "Gagner et conserver ses clients devient de plus en plus compliqué", déclare Frédérique Bonhomme, directrice de projet au sein de la Digital Factory de TNS Sofres. L’institut d’études dévoile, en exclusivité pour E-marketing.fr, les principaux résultats de l’étude internationale "Digital life" (72 000 consommateurs online interrogés dans 60 pays), qu’elle présentera avec Adobe, le 2 février 2012, à Paris.
L’étude révèle que 57 % des habitants des pays développés(1) ne veulent pas s’engager vis-à-vis des marques sur les médias sociaux ; un taux qui est légèrement supérieur en France (59 %). De plus, au plan international, 47 % postent des commentaires en ligne sur les marques, alors qu’ils ne sont que 29 % en France. "Le monde du digital représente des opportunités de croissance importantes pour les marques. "De nombreuses marques ont identifié le fort potentiel d’audience sur les réseaux sociaux. Comprendre le marché français Miser sur les marchés à forte croissance. US Virtual Goods Market To Hit $2.9 Billion In 2012, With Facebook Games Maturing, Mobile Booming. The business of selling virtual goods in games has been around for a decade, but it only came into its own in this country when developers started building social games on Facebook’s developer platform in 2007. Since then, it has been one of the fastest-growing types of businesses online.
But it may be maturing, according to a new report out today — at least on Facebook. In the meantime, mobile virtual goods are taking off. The overall market for virtual goods in the US is headed towards $2.9 billion for 2012, according to the Inside Virtual Goods report. That’s up from $2.2 billion this year, and $1.6 billion in 2010. Virtual goods on Facebook are continuing to comprise more than half of that, going from $835 million in 2010 to $1.2 billion this year to $1.6 billion next year. Speaking of Facebook, you can also use this data to estimate its virtual goods revenue going forward, because it began taking a 30% cut of all virtual goods sales on its platform beginning this past July. "Expeert réunit le meilleur des forums et des réseaux sociaux" L'éditeur de Copains d'Avant et du Journal du Net lance une plate-forme de communautés baptisée Expeert.
Son PDG et son DG présentent ce service. JDN. CCM Benchmark (éditeur du JDN, ndlr) annonce le lancement d'Expeert. En quoi consiste ce projet ? Benoit Sillard. Jean-François Pillou. A qui s'adresse ce produit ? Benoit Sillard. Expeert est-il un concurrent de plus de Facebook ou de Google+ ? Jean-François Pillou. Benoit Sillard. Comment allez-vous monétiser Expeert ? Benoit Sillard. Combien de communautés visez-vous pour Expeert ? Jean-François Pillou. Benoît Sillard est le président-directeur général CCM Benchmark Group. Jean-François Pillou est le directeur général de CCM Benchmark Group. CHART OF THE DAY: Amazingly, Ringtones Are Still A $2 Billion Business. Here's a breakdown of online music sales from Gartner, by way of Peter Kafka at All Things D. The most insane thing about this chart? How important ringtones are.
Kafka says it better than we can: "To sum up: More than 10 years after Napster, one of the key pillars of the music business is ringtones, a business that peaked around 2005, when some of you would have recognized the image at the top right of this post. If you’re reading this, you probably haven’t paid for a ringtone since 2007, and you probably don’t know anyone who does. But there it is, generating two-point-one-billion dollars. " Virtual Goods Mean Real Money This Holiday Season. Amid economic uncertainty in the U.S., many shoppers will hold back on spending this holiday season.
Research firm Kantar Retail predicts that overall retail sales will increase just 2.8%, half the 2010 rate. E-retail sales will grow 13.5% compared with the 16.5% increase registered last holiday season. Within this subdued holiday outlook, shoppers planning to purchase virtual products – ebooks, game downloads, Facebook credits, and the like – are a bright spot, according to Elastic Path’s latest research Virtual Goods Mean Real Money This Holiday. Download a free copy of the full research report. 27% of holiday shoppers plan to buy digital gifts Of the 1,012 holiday shoppers surveyed, 27% intended to buy digital gifts this November and December.
Digital shoppers will spend more in a ho-hum holiday forecast Over the past several months, U.S. consumers have experienced wild fluctuations in the stock market, high unemployment, and mounting government debt. Interested in more details? "Social Virtual Goods" Market to grow by 50% to $4.6 B by 2016. A new report from Juniper Research finds that increasing usage of social gaming – is been driven primarily largely by the sharp rise in smartphone adoption - will push the global market for virtual goods bought from mobile social media services from $3 billion this year to $4.6 billion by 2016.
The report found that sales of virtual goods via mobile social media services are flourishing in Japan and China; as social gaming familiarises consumers with virtual goods, this trend will quickly become global. Increasing tablet usage is also expected to provide further momentum as these devices offer a significantly better user experience for social gaming than smartphones. The Bottlenecks in Social Gaming supply side is that The Apps store rules the distributio n channels, and hence has a stranglehold on the revenue model .
Any services wishing to sell virtual goods from within their app risk losing 30% of the payment value to the app store . Key Trends in Social Gaming Adoption. Report: For Social Media Users Privacy Is a Huge Concern. What do social networking users worry about most? According to a new survey the answer is privacy. A study conducted by Barracuda Networks reveals that social media users report significant concerns about privacy. Barracuda Networks is “a global multi-disciplinary research and threat analysis team that fulfills a critical role in developing innovative technologies across Barracuda Networks’ business areas. Barracuda Labs’ threat research areas include email, Web, network and cloud security and technology.” According to the press release, the study focused on “hundreds” of social networking users from over 20 countries.
The study was conducted over a period of two weeks between September and October 2011. According to the survey a staggering nine out of 10 people have received spam via a social networking site. While the “living in fear” may be a little extreme, the fact that 9 out of 10 people on social networking sites report receiving spam is a significant statistic. La publicité ciblée doit tenir compte des prérogatives du consommateur. Les internautes apprécient globalement la communication des marques, mais se montrent plus réticents à des réclames personnalisées passant par le stockage de leurs données.
Alors que la personnalisation de la publicité est proposée comme un moyen de mieux répondre aux besoins véritables du consommateur, il semble que ce dernier émette encore des réticences sur le sujet. Selon le "Baromètre de l'intrusion" édité par Market Audit et ETO, 77 % des personnes interrogées ne souhaitent pas recevoir de publicité dite ciblée. Selon le rapport, les internautes ne se sentent ainsi pas très à l'aise quant aux moyens utilisés par les publicitaires pour mieux les connaître. Les trois quarts se disent dérangés par le stockage d'informations privées, et près de 80 % ne sont pas du tout d'accord pour que les marques puissent les localiser grâce à leurs mobiles afin de leur faire parvenir des offres.
Appréhension de la personnalisation Des évolutions. Coup de fatigue pour les réseaux sociaux. Certains se lassent, d'autres restent accros. Les réseaux sociaux sont actuellement en phase de stabilisation. Une certitude toutefois : les contenus originaux et créatifs restent la clef. Après plusieurs années de croissance galopante, tant en volume d’utilisateurs qu’en présence par pays, les réseaux sociaux semblent subir un certain ralentissement auprès de leurs utilisateurs. C’est en tout cas ce qui ressort d’une récente étude menée par le cabinet Garner auprès de plus de 6000 personnes âgées de 13 à 74 ans. Plus précisément, 24 % de ce panel affirme utiliser moins souvent leur réseau social favori qu’au moment de leur inscription sur ce dernier. Des chiffres à relativiser Mais si on constate un léger mouvement de recul sur les premiers adhérents aux services en ligne, une frange d’utilisateur plus jeune et technophile, soit près de 37% du panel, continue de consulter les réseaux sociaux avec la même assiduité, voire d’augmenter leur fréquence d’utilisation.
Réseaux sociaux : les utilisateurs prennent conscience des risques. Alors que le nombre d'attaques est en pleine croissance, les internautes sont beaucoup plus prudents qu'auparavant, et savent modifier leurs paramètres de confidentialité. Les experts l’assurent, les attaques sur les réseaux sociaux ne ralentissent pas, bien au contraire. Et la question du partage de données privées est, quant à elle, toujours plus que jamais d’actualité. Mais la nouveauté, c’est que les internautes commencent enfin à prendre conscience du danger. C’est la conclusion d’une étude menée par Research Now, pour le compte de Webroot, dans la troisième édition de son rapport annuel sur la sécurité des réseaux sociaux. Selon celle-ci, entre 2009 et 2011, les utilisateurs ont de plus en plus fait attention à protéger leur vie privée. Le nombre d’internautes qui n’ont jamais accédé ou jamais modifié leurs paramètres de confidentialité est passé de 37 % en 2009, à 8 % en 2011.
Plus grande maîtrise des paramètres de confidentialité Augmentation des attaques. TRUSTe-TNS Study: Consumer Attitudes about Behavioral Targeting. Nielsen Wire: 37% Access Social Media from a Phone, 3% from an iPad. Nielsen Wire aimed their survey at social media with special attention paid to the access from mobile devices. It shouldn’t be any surprise that social media access from mobile devices now accounts for a significant proportion of people. 40% of the people who access social media content to so from their phones.Social Media Report: Spending Time, Money and Going Mobile 37% of people access social media using a mobile phone. A surprisingly small 3% of access came from people using an iPad. Despite the rise of mobile apps, mobile browser usage is up 47% in the past year.
Mobile access to social networking sites rose by 62%. The top 5 U.S. Social Networking sites access from mobile web browsers are: Study Gamescom: European market for virtual goods in games is growing rapidly | Skrill Corporate. Nos cadeaux nous trahissent. A quoi servent les cadeaux ? A faire plaisir à l’autre… et à soi. Enquête sur une vraie-fausse générosité et décryptage de nos comportements au pied du sapin. Laurence Lemoine Au début du siècle dernier, Marcel Mauss, ethnologue, entreprend d’étudier le don dans les sociétés dites archaïques. Il se rend notamment chez les Maoris de Nouvelle-Zélande et chez les Kwakiutls, peuple amérindien du Canada. Ses observations, consignées en 1925 dans son fameux Essai sur le don ( In Sociologie et Anthropologie - PUF, “Quadrige”, 2004), restent curieusement d’actualité pour comprendre ce qui se passe sous nos sapins, lorsque nos petits souliers s’emplissent de tasses à fleurs, de boutons de manchettes ou de CD par milliers.
Des demandes d’amour Sur le plan psychologique, ces règles ont quelques conséquences. « En principe, nos cadeaux sont des témoignages d’amour, note le psychanalyste Samuel Lepastier. Des miroirs de l’âme. More gamers are spending real money on virtual goods, and women are spending more than men. Online games, social networks drive virtual goods - Internet - News. Facebook snags patent for social gift giving. Online Personals Watch: Virtual Goods. The rise of the 99-cent Kindle e-book | Fully Equipped. The Internet is a 99 cent store - Jesse Brown, Technology. A Portrait Of Who Uses Social Networks In The US (And How Social Media Affects Our Lives)
» Virtual Goods Boom in 2010 | mcvaynewmedia.com. Men Buying 90% of Virtual Goods in Mobile Apps, Says Study. Why Digital Consumers Buy Virtual Goods. Report: Asia/Pacific Accounted For Two-Third Of Global Virtual Goods Revenues In 2010. The Virtual Goods Ecosystem. The Year In Virtual Goods By The Numbers. Virtual currencies are coming for your cash | Prism Money. Crowdtwist CEO Analyzes Gabe Zichermann’s Gamification Theory: Status, Apps, Power and Stuff.
Virtual goods on mobile games to top $11B. Brazilian Virtual Goods Sales To Double To $320 million By 2014. Would Quora be a much more compelling service if it integrated game mechanics to incentivize user engagement (e.g., have a score, gain badges, etc.)