Peering Inside: A media campaign
by Tateru Nino 
Jul 14th 2008 at 10:30AM
Filed under: Opinion, Second Life, Virtual worlds, Peering Inside, Lively
While the announcement of the Google Lively public beta may have taken many by surprise, apparently it did not take Linden Lab unawares -- their Second Life messages were already lined up and ready to go.
Indeed considering that information about Lively's launch was available to a number of people who were close to Linden Lab, either as partners or ex-staffers, it seems silly to suggest that Linden Lab might not have known Lively's public beta launch date, unless those contacts were aflame with considerable, searing resentment.
Wheezing, clanking and dripping oil from dark and unnameable apertures, one of Linden Lab's most neglected subsystems -- the marketing machine -- arose from it's years-long slumber and went about it's ponderous, mechanical business.
On the very day of Lively's launch, at 12:01AM, Linden Lab announced the landmark teleport of agents between the Second Life preview grid and opensim simulators being operated by IBM. Everything was already teed-up with the Wall Street Journal, who published their own piece on it (with quotes from principle figures) at 12:02AM. All of that was organized at least a day and quite possibly some several days in advance.
At the time, we scratched our heads and wondered "why now?" -- after all, the big historic event had already been cooling for about a month by the time of the big media splash.
Then Lively went, well, live, and the reasoning started to become considerably more clear. Linden Lab's CFO John Zdanowksi posted the quarterly metrics far faster than any previous set, to-date. Replete with candy-colored graphs, and considerable simplification. The ordering of data was also changed this time around giving particular and especial emphasis to the aspects of Second Life that Lively just doesn't have, in what was beginning to look like an episode of the BBC's comedy Keeping Up Appearances.
Finally, the following day a message from the new Linden Lab CEO Mark Kingdon, telling the users how great Second Life is and (is going to be), with a specific reminder that such services as Lively, Vivaty and so forth aren't even remotely as nifty and encompassing as Second Life.
Was it all a part of a staged media-campaign in specific response to Lively? Considering this all is what we'd expect of one, it seems a little silly to suggest that these three items came together coincidentally. Coincidences certainly happen, but accidentally having a media-campaign happen? We don't think so.
And if you fear nothing, why have one?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Pavig Lok said on 11:43AM 7-14-2008
Maybe mister Kingdon is getting clever with the marketing now. It could be as simple as saying "queue up a few jolly things to say that we can roll out next time the media says we're dead in the water." After all a simple and responsive media strategy is better than none at all.
Linden Lab's media strategy previously seemed to be appealing to the coolness factor (and somewhat ignoring some of the rather good, sensible, positive things actually happened in SL itself.) This is very much a startup strategy to media - fostering a radical image.
This last bunch of announcements however have fostered an image of a sober solid company, and I think it's a move in the right direction for SL's continued growth. The time has come for LL to "put away childish things" *cough*... actually come to think of it they've a ways to go yet :P
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Graham Mills said on 11:53AM 7-14-2008
I have to say I came to the same conclusion. On the other hand, would lofty disdain have fared any better?
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Rooke said on 4:07PM 7-14-2008
I believe LL was being overly reactive to Lively's announcement.
It seemed like they were doing a, "Hey! Don't look at them, look at us! We were here first, and we're going to be bigger and better than ever!"
In one sense, it seemed somewhat childish. But in another sense it was necessary to draw attention back to themselves. Like always, they could communicated it in a more positive, and less, "me too!" way.
They need to hire a good, proven effective PR person.
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sirhc DeSantis said on 11:37AM 7-15-2008
Actually, I had never heard of the googlies offering until the day. So thousands of people go 'huh?', attempt to try it out and come away going 'what a crock'. I know I did. Smart move. Rock on M lol
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Prokofy said on 11:05PM 7-20-2008
Tateru, do you never stop wishing Linden Lab to fail?
Good for them that they were organized enough -- and likely 30 days before, or 14 days before, not 1 day before, to hit hard on all the media points, with the highest-circulation paper (WSJ) key to the strategy, in order to take advantage of media coverage on a day when everybody would be writing headlines saying "Is Google Getting a Second Life?"
That's all. Just piggybacking strategically and doing some defense thrusts. All good. This is how a normal company does things. Do you want them to remain the dysfunctional object of ridicule that you so cherish for ever, providing you endless blog copy?
If anything, disappointment in Lively can drive some traffic SL's way. So they are arming themselves with their best face forward. I fail to see how this is fear driven. They can't win in your book.
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