The Community's interest at heart?

A pretty nice article was posted on CNET this morning, giving a much better description of the "announcement" that was made by Linden Lab this past week concerning a new partnership with IBM and how both are working to make it possible for your SINGLE AVATAR to pass seamlessly between Second Life and other virtual worlds. Again, let me point out, this announcement had absolutely NOTHING to do with IBM agreeing to help "stabilize the grid" of Second Life, no matter just how badly worded Everett Linden posted.

In the article it talks about the major companies that are coming together to make this seamless operation happen. Then a foreboding note is struck, when the writer brings up that Raph Koster, of OSI/UO Fame and SWG Fame, comments in his blog:

"I was a bit bothered by (the assumption) that seemed to exist in the room," Raph Koster, the founder of virtual world platform developer Areae, said in a posting on his blog after the Tuesday meeting, "that moving avatars or objects across virtual worlds is actually much of a market need." Indeed, Koster added in his blog post that it struck him as odd that at the meeting, "entertainment, which accounts for 98 percent of all virtual world users and revenue, was not really represented well in the room."

It really is interesting to see someone of Raph's stature tell it like it is, and trust me, Designer Dragon has never had a problem with telling it like it is. Raph Koster is probably one of the most devoted game developers I've had the pleasure of knowing. He has definite ideas on what he wants in the worlds he creates, how he wants them, and above all else, he places them there because he wants it to be FUN for the Players/Residents, not just to be the next "Cool Thing" in the gaming world.

It is also very telling that Raph Koster saw right through this so called "conference" and quickly pointed out that the Residents weren't included. It's very hard for me to imagine that someone who doesn't spend time in the virtual world could express how I or YOU feel about what we want. As Raph Koster states, 98% of those in these virtual worlds were NOT REPRESENTED, so just how does Uncle Philip and Aunty Robin think that they are best serving the Residents of Second Life by participating?

The Community's interest at heart? I don't think so, more like, "how can we make MORE money off this!"