Ahead of our times.

The virtual world is growing to be a major  and huge part of the internet’s future. In Second Life the users create their own story. Second life constitutes  of almost 2 million people where they avatar and can meet and chat with other users. Surprisingly when I heard in my COM125 class that users can do a number of things to earn money in Second Life, I was taken by surprise and wanted to further research on this topic. Designers, Landowners, etc are turning the virtual environment into a real world profit podium. They are business and non-profits taking advantage of the virtual world.

Every user in Second Life gets a weekly salary of a few hundred Linden dollars ($L).Linden dollars can be converted into US dollars at around 250 to 1. This means that 1 Linden dollar is worth about a half cent in real money. The main question however are the types of job offered in the virtual world. The jobs required are divided into four categories- “ Unskilled jobs”, “ Skilled jobs”, “ Freelancers and Entrepreneurs”, and “ Unclassified Jobs”.

·     Unskilled jobs- For performing these jobs one doesn’t need proficient skills to be hired. They aren’t many unskilled jobs in the virtual world of the second life and the pay isn’t too good. For example the job of a model in the virtual world, one needs a gorgeous avatar with special skin, good make up techniques, and cat walking animation

    Skilled jobs- include making use of one of the real life skills towards an activity in the virtual world of the second life. For example Fashion Designers where clothes are designed for the second life avatars.

·     Freelancers and Entrepreneurs- incorporate using skills which are not related to the practical and general things in world, but they can be shockingly used to help a user make a living. For example real estate agents and  renting of lands. Anshe Chung has become Second’s life first billionaire. She has virtual property and holdings worth over $250 million Linden which translates into $1 million dollars in the real world.

Anshe Chung 

·     Unclassified jobs- People in this category include those who use their advertising or marketing skill in the world. For example- Lawyers, economists, etc. Advertising products in the virtual world is one of the problems commonly faced in Second Life

This new business does have its own fears and drawbacks. Veronica Brown performs the skilled job of a successful clothing designer . Her clothing sells widely in the virtual world. However she faces the problem of finding reliable employees to work in her shops. Most second-life users do not take their virtual jobs seriously. "The players are going to do exactly that: They're going to play," said Brown. 

Sheffie Conchran is a virtual banker with over $20,000 in her second life vault. She has never worked as a banker in the real world, but as a virtual character known as Lindsay Druart , she runs the L&L banking trust , providing loads and savings accounts for 400 people. "I've never worked at a bank in my life! I had to pull out Business Week and all kinds of books to learn what to do," said Cochran. She said she earns $500 a month on "Second Life," enough to pay her rent in Augusta, Ga ." Even though the Linden Dollars can be exchanged for real U.S. dollars, her business does not include any contract implementation. She doesn't have the full contact information for many people she lends the money to. At the end it depends all on Trust.  

From the examples of  Veronica Brown and Sheffie Conchran, one can deduct that nothing is impossible. There are always drawbacks and limitation while trying to achieve something. The fear of failure, fear of distrust will always be a hindrance but one has to make their fears their strength and move forward. As earlier mentioned by Conchran, she became a virtual banker with no experience at all. She had the fear within her if she would be able to complete the task at hand and so far she has been successful in performing her job well. The strong presence of second life is moving at a fast speed adapting the techniques and bringing in the tricks of the trade of the real world into the virtual world. 








References: 
http://www.chickjunk.com/make-money-in-second-life/
http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Guide_to_Jobs_in_Second_Life
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=3527537&page=1#.T0pn-YcgeuI

Judge a website by its cover

Since the main intention of an e-commerce website is to sell the products, the aim of this post is to speak volumes about one of the most important and critical element to online success which is the design and structure of the website.“Many e-commerce sites aren’t the most attractive websites”( Vandelay Design, 2008) . Generally the content and images are clustered together giving a very messy design and background to the website. The following picture below is an example of a very messy and inappropriate web design : 

An effective e-commerce website organizes their stocks and products into categories that are easy for online shoppers. It is time consuming to categorise, subcategorise and cross-categorize products but it will be worth the time and effort. Visitors will be customers if they can find what they want and what you’re selling. “One of the myths of ecommerce is that all of your pages should be within a click or two of the home page”( 10 Fundamentals for E-commerce success )  . This is wrong as people will continue to find for a product as long as they think they’re on the right track, even if it requires a couple of more clicks. There should be a logical sequence to follow so that the customer won’t get lost within the different sections of the website.

Make sure the names of the categories are clear and precise. For example “if you sell bedding, avoid cute category names like ‘Fluffy Stuff’ (10 Fundamentals for E-commerce success ). Visitors are more likely looking for ‘pillows’ and ‘comforters’. Shoppers visit an e-commerce site with the hope that they might find the product they want. The more closely the website can match and live to their customer’s  expectations, the better the site will perform. The website should also offer links to the related search items. The suggestion links should be well defined and organized. 

Famous companies such as Amazon  which has established itself as the leader in e-commerce promote helpful reviews on media products such as books, movies and music. Promoting such helpful reviews has caused their sales to increase by 20% ( User Interface Engineering, 2009). The Amazon website that pertains to online shopping for electronics, books, movies, music, etc. has a very simple and subtle web design which creates a wonderful shopping experience. 

The picture above shows the home page where there a just a few , clean, and distinct elements which can catch the customer's eye.  The navigation section in the upper left clearly shows how the user is able to find and purchase  the products needed quickly. "Prominence" and " Usability" are the two main key features of the website's structure.

The " Fix this recommendation" link pops up a window that explains why the item was recommended and gives the user to change it . Usually an item is recommended based on prior purchase or traced shopping habits. 

The following picture echoes a  series of well defined and well placed navigation elements. The first element at the top left screen as seen in the picture shows the store categories, giving shoppers an easy access to products. The second element are links for logging out and recommendations. The section appears at the top, either above or at eye level with the logo. The third element contains the " Cart" and " Wish List" .  Gradually leading to the fourth element which is when a user views a product page , they are invited to add that item to their shopping cart or wish list. The element is placed at the right of the product with product details. Finally the fifth element is called the " used and new"  where customers are given more purchase options at the bottom right of the page. 

This shows a comparison of the various customer reviews and ratings. This allows the users to view both, positive and negative reviews of the product. 

The above mentioned strong features of Amazon should help users understand how a good wed design helps shape a positive online experience. The design and structure of the website is sometimes taken for granted and not considered important in determining the success of the business, however  as read above it does play a vital role in enhancing the organization and credibility of the website. 

References: 

http://www.websearchsocial.com/10-fundamentals-for-ecommerce-success-tip-2

http://vandelaydesign.com/blog/galleries/ecommerce-websites/

http://www.uie.com/articles/magicbehindamazon

Staying Ahead of the Curve

The following video above is a tour to Apple's latest social networking site " ITunes Ping" 

“ITunes Ping” was launched on September 1^st 2010. As said by Steve Jobs" Ping is Facebook and Twitter meets ITunes". Ping is a social networking site where music lovers and fans can come together to follow and get updates about their favorite artists. Unfortunately for Apple, success in the social networking sites is difficult to pursue. Even if the company has about 50 million users making it a success, it cannot be compared to Facebook’s 500 million active users.  ITunes Ping was promoted as a medium where people could connect with artists online. Pings main focus is to influence the social music discovery. The latest ITunes attempt is very smart as it would generate the purchase of music rather than illegal downloading. Another benefit to Ping is that it can be easily accessed via the iPhone and iPod touch allowing mobile use. Ping is not available to mobile devices except of apple, this allows more sales in these products as well. One interesting aspect of Ping is its charts which serves as a recommendation tool regarding the latest and famous songs popular among kids in today's day and age. It shows the most frequent and recent purchased music , not liked, rated or reviewed items. The creation of this product is more of a marketing scheme.

A huge factor behind its failure was the fact that such a concept was already being done by Twitter. Ping is something like Twitter where you can follow the artists that you like. One can find their friends, post about purchases they make from ITunes, and can recommend/ like/ follow an album, song, or artist found within the service. In comparison to the two leading social sites – Facebook and Twitter. People using ITunes Ping can’t do the things they do on Facebook and Twitter like updating their status messages or as most Facebook addicts do, read through other people’s comments and status messages as part of their everyday entertainment. Ping also lacks integration of existing social networks. Some sections of a user's Ping profile might not be easily understood . For instance do not click on " My reviews" when you want to write a review, you'll have to go elsewhere in iTunes for that. Controls for the interface are small and specific. The user has to be pretty accurate "when clicking on that five pixel -wide arrow " or they'll land up in a completely different part of the site and will have to start all over again. 

Even the sign up process for ITunes Ping is very tedious, contributing to its lack of use. Apple says ITunes Ping had attracted more than one million users in the first 48 hours of launch. There haven’t been very few recent sign posts since then. Ping is struggling to attract users because of its wearisome sign up process as ITunes has become so slow with each version. One has to download the version 10 of the ITunes in order to have access to Ping. Ping is applicable in only 23 countries and hasn't gone global. 

Ping never "rolled uphill".  Apple just wanted to release a social network but didn’t think it through. Maybe this is a head start for Apple to start focusing more on quality than quantity. Ping is relatively still a new technology. It has a long way to go as it has the potential to be one of the great social networking sites. Ping can become bigger and better if apple takes the initiative to make changes and update the product. One thing which apple is good at is taking the user's feedback and applying it as soon as possible. 


For a music lover like me, Ping could be exactly what we're looking for as it personifies an open mind to discover new styles of music which contributes to the constant change and evolution in the music industry. 

References

http://mashable.com/2010/09/01/itunes-ping/
http://musicmusic.com/articles/will-apples-itunes-10-ping-music-social-network-be-successful-or-a-failure-will-steve-jobs-marketing-strategy-succeed-or-fail.html

When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Learning and Teaching using Social Media.

The term “Social Media” implies the use of media for “participation, collective activity, transparency, persistence and emergence”. Teaching today’s students has become a challenge as it requires communicating with them and keeping their attention. Within this realm of extensive technology the Internet is one of the communication tools to support and guide students by extending the learning environment outside the classroom.  Only by promoting the tools which are used and are popular  among students in today’s day and age can teachers effectively communicate with them. YouTube has become an effective teaching and learning tool than the traditional methods for students. For example  the “ Mentos and Coke”  experiment which is a test of dropping some mentos candies into the bottle of Diet Coke which causes the Diet Coke to create foam at a rapid rate and erupts into the air causing the scientific process of nucleation. This shows how a silly and zany clip can create so much of excitement and awareness that usual traditional methods do not.  In supplement to video clips, some instructors are videotaping and posting the videos online. This is also known as vidcasting where lectures are posted on YouTube for online and in class learners. For example two professors at the University of Minnesota created a 3-D animation vidcast explaining a mathematical concept that attracted more than 1 million views and a Kansas State University professor of cultural anthropology posted a vidcast about Web2.0 that drew more than 400.000 views. 

Video1: Mentos and Coke Experiment 

Even Facebook now has applications like Washington Post Social Reader, The Guardian , Yahoo News, etc. which speaks volume about interesting articles that includes world news, education, general knowledge, lifestyle, and entertainment. It’s a great way for children to stay in touch with the society and be aware of what is happening around them. Users can view the full article without being redirected to the source’s site or having to be a paying subscriber. Once the user has read an article, the activity and article is shared with friends by including it on the Facebook ticker. 

Facebook and YouTube fulfill all the five key points of an effective social media as mentioned above. They allow participation and collective activity among various users all over the world through the exchange of comments, ideas and information. Both these applications of the social media  are  public forums thus highlighting on the transparency of the information provided. It is transparent to the public and open to independent and individual interpretations.  The social media is emerging at a fast rate. With the increased attention and investments applied in Social media, it has grown to be an established marketing medium.