Francesco D’Orazio, Founder and CEO, Myrl, Metaverse Social Network
Developed by Extendi Media
Minibar Italy February15th 2008, Triennale, Milano
What is MYRL
Myrl is a social network for the Metaverse totally built around avatars
Myrl is a web-based community for multiple virtual worlds users
scenario
the market/investmentInvestment: 1 billion $ invested in Virtual Worlds in 2007, (Chris Sherman, Virtual Worlds Management data)
"Investors are not just venture capital firms, but also include major technology, media and entertainment companies"
Investors include Redpoint Ventures, Charles River Ventures, Intel, and Rustic Canyon Partners. Media companies are also making sizable investments, including Disney, CBS, Time Warner, and GE/NBC Universal's Peacock Equity Fund.
“33 Companies Raise $196.8 Million; Two Companies Acquired for $810 Million.”
Companies that received funding include Anshe Chung Studios, Areae, Conduit, Doppelganger, , Electric Sheep Company, Forterra, Gaia, HiPiHi, K2 Network, Millions of us, Multiverse, Trion World Network, Weblo, Whyville “Business models of the
companies raising capital vary, ranging from advertising and subscriptions to virtual item sales, to enterprise software licensing, hosting and services.”
who is investing
who’s got funding
their business models
the market/projectionsVirtual Worlds Growth: estimated growth projection in one year (Nic Mitham, KZero, 10 October 2007)
the market/forecasts
“80% of Active Internet Users Will Have A "Second Life" in the Virtual World by the End of 2011” (Gartner, April 2007)
”52% of internet users in most developed countries will use a
3D avatar at least once a week for any purpose other than
entertainment and gaming” by the end of 2016
(Metaverse Roadmap, 2007)
Walled-garden style virtual worlds
Virtual worlds/web Gap
VW information on the web is hard to find and not organized in a meaningful way
Mostly synchronous communication
Problems
More than 200 “isolated” worlds
and millions of “disconnected” users
Brings together multiple virtual worlds on the same platform and builds a cross-worlds community of users
So, here’s what Myrl does
1
So, here’s what Myrl does/2
Bridges the gap between virtual worlds and the web and integrate web2.0 tools into virtual worlds 2
Provides virtual worlds users with asyncronous and real-time communication tools
3
Provides users with social ranking tools to organize virtual worlds information in a meaningful way
Creates a web-based search engine for multiple
virtual worlds 3
So, here’s what Myrl does/3
4
social networking features for avatars and organizations from multiple virtual worlds;
Direct and automatic profiling of the avatar onto the web via light apps called “profilers” 1
2
How do we do that?
social ranking of user-generated information related to virtual worlds
multiple avatar profile integration and management4
3
thatʼs it