the virtual office.

virtual currencies // social banking // && search.

let's face it, things are changing. the question is, are you?

virtual currencies
as virtual worlds continue to grow and expand, "in.world" goods ((&& the production of these goods)) will continue to grow at an exponential rate. w/ the increase in virtual consumers && virtual producers comes the increase in virtual transactions. many virtual worlds have yet to integrate "real world" transaction capabilities, leaving virtual currencies as the main form of currency.

social banking
as more && more virtual worlds emerge w/ their unique currencies, we will eventually need virtual banks where all virtual world currencies can be converted to either other virtual currencies or to "real world" form. the opportunities for this are pretty interesting. virtual banks could be established that allows not only the converting of virtual currency to other forms but also offers "regular" banking services ((think paypal :: credit/debit card, savings account, checking, ability to transfer funds to other bank accounts and other users)).

organic search
w/ the new web, it is important to remember that transparency && authenticity are very, very important. by achieving these ((which is by no means an easy task)) && mixing great content w/ social media, organic seo is sure to result.

how does it all tie together?
while google is hands down the market leader in search, twitter is fast emerging as the hot spot to get the most up to date info. i'd like to see a search engine that fully integrates google && twitter + video + audio && allow'd for "in seach" ranking ((ie moving the results around which would in effect change the ranking of certain sites)). a toolbar that allow'd access to not only the integration of various media types online, but also allowed desktop search would be incredibly helpfull. custom tags would also be a great help. i should be able to land on a site && tagg it w/ what i think are the relevent search words so that if i am looking for those words again in the future i can easily access the most relevent information.

w/ a customizeable search engine that is optimized to deliver the results you want + flexible online ((social)) banking options, the future of digital commerce is virtually wide open.

Virtual.Worlds

Just got done watching a pretty interesting video that gives a metaverse tour. Pretty interesting. There's also a lengthy write up about AI in Virtual.Worlds here. Things are changing so quickly..

Digital Marketing World Spring 2009 Virtual Conference

Summary

Digital Marketing World Spring 2009 Virtual Conference is quite a mouth full! #mpworld is much more convenient, which must be why it was "the number two trending topic on Twitter" ((according to an email I got from Digital.Marketing this morning)).

I alluded to this last night in the video update; Twitter is a great tool for allowing information streaming. What this means is that the information on Twitter is constantly being updated, meaning there is always fresh content ((I'll get more into hash.tags, search.twitter.com & SMO in a later post)).

Though there are many ways a person could have experienced the event, my experience went something like this:

1) Logged into the event.
2) Went to the "auditorium" to check out the speakers.
3) Went to the "library" to check out the information.
4) Went to the "lounge" to chat & interact w/ other attendees.
5) Got on TweetDeck.
6) Tweet'd.
7) Tweet'd.
8) Tweet'd.
9) Took nap after a very high energy morning / afternoon.

Overall it was a very interesting experience. As this is the first "Virtual.Event" that I've attended, I didn't really have any expectations for it; I just wanted to get in there and test the waters.

Trends

A lot of mention was given to Social Media. While many people are still using myspace and facebook, the great thing about Twitter is it's instantaneous nature. While using TweetDeck you can set up different columns w/ different kinds of information ((ie @messages, DMs & search queries)). Using this tactic I added a search for #mpworld so I could stay uptodate on what folks on Twitter were saying about the event.

The biggest complaint in the chat room was that there was simply to much going on! With only one chat box and a lot ((unsure of the exact number, but it was A LOT)) of users getting their type on, it's not hard to see why there were complaints about it being hard to keep up w/ the conversation. That's where Twitter comes in.

Using Twitter as an information aggregator via TweetDeck allowed me to easily track conversations & topics. One of the most common themes when it came to tweeting was quoting. As the presenters would say something that had a lot of value, many "tweeters" would "tweet" the quote along w/ the mpworld hashtag.

I also noticed a lot of talk about what is being categorized as trust, permission &/or loyalty marketing. The concept is basically that we are no longer living in an era were it is acceptable for marketers to pitch AT us. This type of attitude is often sketchy ((who trusts spam?)), unsolicited ((w/out persmission)) and annoying ((not gonna build loyalty w/ me!!)).

In an era were information is currency, we are far from a recession. In fact the information economy is BOOMING!! It is now easier than ever to find out information, be via google, youtube, twitter, wikipedia or any other emerging source.

One of the people I spoke w/ was a man from IBM. We got to talking about interacting w/ users on the web. While B2B and B2C are generally what most businesses think about, I had the realization that Web 2.0 brings to the foreground C2C. It's now easier than ever to interact w/ unbiased users ((or biased by experience, which is genuine)).

To Sum It Up

The Digital Marketing World Conference was a blast!! Not only did I get some great information from some of today's industry leaders, but I also got to network w/ some great people.

I look forward to more Virtual.Events in the future && can't wait for VE09!!

bringing you "the Virtual.Edge"

what's up? my name is flash & i'm virtual.edge's resident flow'ologist. we here at virtual.edge are all about virtual events. if you have any questions, let us know! we're more than open to creatively interacting w/ our community. no questions - just wanna say hello? we'd love that as well!!

(for some reason youtube's live capture offset the audio && video.)