Inspiration #1:

Second Life release census data
With a virtual land mass of 361 square kilometres, housing 3million registered residents globally, second life seems like quite a small world. However it registered 6.1 billion transactions between it’s residents in January, up 37% on December and reflecting a 47% increase in user hours (10% of residents spent 40+ hours living in the virtual world in January)

These transactions in the local currency, Linden dollars, equated to $5 million, an average daily volume of $158,000. Small in terms of the GDP of countries and cities on Terra Firma, but no small number considering the population size and the fact it’s a virtual world! It’s said, probably not unjustly, to be the fastest growing economy in the world.

The top five countries are the US, France, Germany, the UK, and the Netherlands.
Electric Sheep, employs 30 people to build products and brands within virtual communities such as second life and has just secured $7m in funding from CBS corporate.

As audiences are increasingly being invited to participate in brand development, second life represents a relatively low risk testing bed for new products, taking learnings from the virtual world into the real world. Whilst the physical restrictions & requirements are removed, understanding how a product is received by the virtual community could shape how the brand is communicated in the real world.