The Weekly Wrap: Dom Raban, MD, Corporation Pop

I am of course talking about this year’s dernier cri, the social networking killer application, Twitter. Once described to me as ‘Facebook on steroids’ it’s an addictive mix of the banal, the obscure, the irrelevant, the pertinent and the profound. It particularly appeals to me because, according to the excellent Strengthsfinder 2.0, I am an ‘input’ person, which means I like to ‘collect and archive all kinds of information’. I use Twitter on a daily basis, mostly for business, but also as a repository for random thoughts and I LOVE IT.

And now Jobs & Co love it too, if last week’s rumours of a $700m Apple buyout are to be believed. Apple has an enviable track record for producing truly cool and wonderful products that achieve market dominance (forgetting the Pippin, Newton or Cube) and there are a lot of synergies between the two companies. The iPhone and Twitter is a marriage made in heaven with Tweetie playing the role of celebrant, but I’m not sure I understand why Apple would feel the need to put corporate hand in pocket.

I’ll leave that debate to the analysts, but the story reminded me of the similarities between where Twitter is now and where Second Life was a couple of years ago. As Second Life developers we’ve kept a keen eye on the press as it has variously described the platform as both ‘the future of the internet’ and ‘a deserted wasteland populated by flying male genitalia’. It is neither, but back in 2006/7 when media interest in Second Life peaked we observed a gold rush as companies desperately tried to find value by marketing to virtual communities.

There’s a wonderful graph called Gartner’s Hype Cycle, which describes in very poetic terms the five phases that typically occur when new technologies are introduced.

The first phase is the ‘technology trigger’ when a product is launched. This is followed by the ‘peak of inflated expectations’ which is where Second Life was in 2007 and perhaps where Twitter is today. As people realise that the technology isn’t the universal panacea they first thought it to be we reach the ‘trough of disillusionment’ and interest in the product rapidly falls off, but as some businesses continue to experiment and understand the true value we enter the fourth phase, the ‘slope of enlightenment’. Second Life is currently here, exploring the many opportunities virtual worlds can offer to businesses. The final phase is the ‘plateau of productivity,’ where the benefits become widely demonstrated and accepted and the product finds its true niche in the marketplace.

I believe Second Life’s plateau will be as a valuable tool for corporate communications and education. I look forward to seeing which summit Twitter will finally inhabit.