Monday Memory: How Suzanne Vega Singing in Second Life in 2006 Helped Shaped the Virtual World's Culture

When Caroline Mimbs Nyce of The Atlantic asked how much Taylor Swift is like the Metaverse, the question seemed pretty bizarre at first -- but then got us talking about Suzanne Vega performing in Second Life, the first platinum-selling artist to do so in any metaverse platform. While's Vega's appearance did help inspire a rush of other real world brands appearing in SL, it also helped shape Second Life's culture going forward, cultivating it as a virtual world popular with women and indy creators. I have to think if another, very different artist had performed in 2006, Second Life would have evolved in another direction. 

Relatedly, Taylor Swift's massively massive fanbase (229 million followers on Instagram alone) has many tens of millions of gamers/metaverse users. Which is why I said:

Nyce: This is maybe me just being silly, but I’m also actually kind of serious: Is Taylor Swift doing a better job at building a metaverse than Mark Zuckerberg right now?

Au: Well, in the sense that Mark Zuckerberg is almost totally failing, yeah. People building metaverse platforms, most of them think it’s a technology question. But it’s really a community and culture question. That has to be built. Horizon World only has about 200,000 to 300,000 users. So Taylor Swift could launch a Fortnite island on her own, and she would have 100 million users within a month.

She has what Zuckerberg does not have. She has a brand and an aesthetic and almost, like, a worldview that literally millions and millions of people—like, they have this world that is in their mind and that they share with people. And that’s something that Zuckerberg doesn’t have. People who play Roblox, they all share that. People who play Fortnite all share that. And people who are pervasive across social media, such as Taylor, have fans who also have that. They don’t necessarily have the 3-D-technology part, but she could do that if she wanted to...

It's not enough, by the way, just for a recording artist to have a metaverse presence -- it has to be designed as a thriving, dynamic community with constantly refreshed content. But seeing as Taylor's team already does that on Instagram et. al., I have to imagine they would succeed doing that in a 3D space as well.

Comments

[sirhc desantis]

'Helped Shape' =^^= Although don't rely on me - I spent my first 3 months not realising there was sound