It's Christmas Eve (morning), and everywhere I go online I'm reading about avatars. Whether you are heading to the movies or buying last minute gifts, it seems that this new word is becoming more globally mainstream.
Starting with the movie, which I haven't seen yet, Avatar opened to a pretty good $73 million weekend. I won't comment on the movie, except to say that everyone seems to be talking about it at work.
Perhaps even more interesting are the many articles about virtual worlds and buying real Christmas presents for online characters. Many people I speak with don't understand this growing trend, but they didn't understand MySpace or Facebook's attraction a few years back. Now they do.
Take this USA Today article about hot selling, but cheap, virtual Christmas presents. Here are a few significant excerpts that I believe are very relevant for all of us.
"Sebastien de Halleux, COO of Playfish, which owns 11 social games and virtual worlds played on social networks, explained the appeal in an interview with Inside Social Games, a blog run by Inside Network. Some of the 8 million people who bought pumpkins on Pet Society this year said they were doing it so their friends could 'check out their Halloween decorations.'
'How many friends can go to your real house vs. check out how you've expressed yourself in a game on Facebook or MySpace?' he asked. "So the value of a virtual good can be in some cases higher than that of physical goods.'"
The entire article is worth reading, but here are more interesting thoughts:
"IMVU CEO Cary Rosenzweig, a former marketing manager for Tide, says virtual goods 'nvolve you to a greater degree and accelerate your standing in the virtual world.' Users, he says, 'don't think of the world as real life and this as 'fake stuff.'"
And another expert compared purchasing virtual items to the use of eBay in its early days.
One more story: Check out this YouTube video on the first ever marriage between a real man and a video game character. I know this sounds crazy, but so do all of these first time Internet stories. This is a step beyond previous articles on marriages and divorces of avatars.
So what's my point? Virtual worlds and virtual characters are becoming more and more popular. As described in detail in my book, this trend will accelerate over the next decade, until we all have avatars. Avatars will become as popular as IMing and email. This trend raises huge questions for all of us who go online.
A central question will become: how can you surf your values in cyberspace?
What are your thoughts on avatars?