Why Most Teens Prefer IRL To Virtual Worlds
Posted by anastasia on 10-06-2009
Yesterday MediaWeek reported on the shakeout that’s been happening in the virtual world space including the demise of worlds like vSide and reporting that MTV is reevaluating its virtual world strategy. Whenever I’m moderating a teen panel and ask about whether teens have visited virtual worlds, most say “no,” but one or two recognize or have visited popular worlds like Gaia or Habbo.
While I don’t think this shakeout will be limited to the worlds in the teen space (there are just too many indie kids worlds out there for all of them to survive), I think the idea that this market is more limited for teens is worth noting. Popular worlds like IMVU, WeeWorld, Gaia and Habbo all have healthy numbers of users (a mix of teens AND adults), but I don’t see any of these worlds achieving the mass adoption levels of social networking among teens. Here’s why…
Most teens are too busy. Between school, after school activities, homework and spending time with friends in real life, internet time is typically spent social networking, dealing with email, looking stuff up for school, checking out videos and listening to music (some of which is being done while relaxing in front of the TV). Virtual worlds take effort to customize and maintain your avatar and virtual space, figure out who’s online, play a game or attend an event, etc. It’s less utilitarian and more of an immersive experience. Add the mobility factor (when teens start driving or just going out more), combined with social networks and phones meeting the need for coordinating these outings, and hanging out in virtual worlds again takes a back seat.
If you’re a console gamer, virtual worlds are too social/less directed. For teens who game, walking or flying around a virtual world that is fairly self directed, i.e. you find stuff to do, people to chat with, just pales in comparison to the heavily scripted console games you’re used to, and some, like Halo, that have a social element, or even online games like World of Warcraft that are more self or group directed, but have a definite focus vs. just hanging out. As the article pointed out, for those gamers looking to just socialize, now there are worlds for gamers like Sony’s Home you can access via your console. I do think Teen Second Life appeals to a small niche of mostly male teen scripters who enjoy the creativity of being able to invent their own virtual goods and spaces.
They might feel too babyish or childlike Now we have teens who might have been Club Penguin tweens. Either way, the notion of playing with avatars, may feel a bit like… “playing” or experimenting with identity in a way that is more make believe than the “real” ways you can express what you’re into on sites like Facebook or MySpace.
Social networks have gotten stickier. As the article states, “…social networking—once viewed as static compared to virtual worlds—has only gotten more dynamic (apps, games) and sticky.” For teens who want to play a casual game, they’re all over social networks. Virtual goods are gaining steam there, too, and, lots of sites allow you to port over your avatar if you’re into that.
There will always be teens and adults who want to play in this virtual world space and will invest the time in these communities. Definitely enough to allow the most popular worlds to stay in business. But it will never be a mass audience. I see lots of value in using these spaces in education. And while MTV’s experiments in pairing worlds with popular shows like “The Hills” may have proved hard to sustain over time, I think partnering with popular worlds and holding virtual events for fans in those worlds that are social viewing experiences, seems well worth continuing.
Categorized under: Web
October 6th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Hi Anastasia, this news about teens and virtual worlds doesn’t surprise me at all. In fact, it made me think back to June this year and the Ypulse Mashup. I presented some age-based data on website visitation that showed virtual worlds “peak” at age 11 and then decline precipitously in popularity as kids age and have only niche appeal for teens ages 16-18. “16″, that magic age — not only are teens too busy for virtual worlds, as you point out, but they become much more mobile at 16, and why should they spend their time exploring a virtual world after they acquire their newly-found freedom to explore the “real” world? Time behind the wheel starts to usurp their screen time. Plus, I do feel that developmentally, virtual worlds are not a good match for teens since they are based on fantasy and imagination, which are much more a part of the play of children than among teens.
Still, those that survive attract enough traffic to be of interest for media placements, and I think virtual worlds can be used to complement certain businesses’ user experience marketing efforts.
October 7th, 2009 at 6:46 am
I think there will always be a niche for Virtual Worlds; and this is inevitably set to grow- they have just not yet gone through a period of mass adoption as has happened with social networking sites. One reason for this is perhaps the age restrictions placed upon accessing sites like SL (arguably the best VW of them all today). If we are giving young adults wings to explore the real world, then this should also be the case for VW’s. It’s all a matter of learning to make good decisions in a potentially dangerous world. I think the perfect niche for youth and VW has just not been found yet–when it does (and perhaps this will be tied to developments in social networking sites) you can expect exponential increases in VW participation among teens.
October 7th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Hi Anastasia,
As usual I love to hear your thinking! But at WeeWorld we’re actively witnessing mass adoption by teens.
First as you said, our growth is healthy. But consider that all the growth is organic, fueled by word of mouth from teens to their friends.
One of the key reasons WeeWorld is different than you described in your post, is that we have a large population of younger teens. 80% of these younger teens go to YouTube, while 30% or fewer go to social networks Facebook or Myspace.
We believe this group represents a new digital native that wants a more visual, broadband experience. Consider Asia, always the earliest adopter – first with mobile phones, ringtones, SMS, MMS, and today with billions of dollars being spent on virtual goods in social networking spaces. We see WeeWorld as the leading edge of this movement in the US, led by its newest teens. WeeWorld offers these visually motivated teens a visual way to evolve their identities. That’s something you can’t do on other social networks.
Unlike Facebook, WeeWorld is based on the “strength of weak ties.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weak_tie#Weak_tie_hypothesis) On WeeWorld, 50% of the users know each other, 50% don’t. They use their avatar and the virtual world to experiment visually with their evolving interests, political affiliations, occupations, dating, causes, etc. Take a look at how teens on WeeWorld experienced the presidential election, currently up for a Groundswell Award http://www.weeworld.com/groundswell1.
And for younger teens that are all about evolving their emerging identities, tighter networks like Facebook can be less useful than sites that offer loose connections. Sites like WeeWorld are more likely to present new ideas and opportunities than in closed networks with redundant ties. In other words, you and your Facebook friends already have and share all the same information. But when you connect with new people in social worlds you tap into a wider range of experience and information.
Well, as you can see, we think about this kind of thing quite a bit here at WeeWorld ;-) We see social worlds, ready-made with currency, a thriving passionate community, with game play and levels, etc. as the emerging new norm for social networks – and young teens are leading the way, as usual!
Cheers,
Lauren
October 7th, 2009 at 6:11 pm
Thanks for those thoughts Lauren — I’m not sure I’m completely sold on tweens in virtual worlds now evolving into teens who don’t leave them or end up spending much less time there, but I could definitely be proven wrong! I would also love to see stats showing that tweens have mass adopted virtual worlds. I know they are way more popular with this age group than with teens (explaining what seems like almost weekly announcements of new kid/tween worlds), but what are the percentages? May be a great research topic for Ypulse Insights! :)