Second Life’s name familiar to many, gameplay a stranger to most Japanese
Having looked in passing at English lessons in Second Life just a few days ago, this time it’s Second Life in general, with a survey reported on by japan.internet.com and conducted by goo Research, their 6th regular Second Life survey.
Demographics
Between the 24th and 27th of March 2008 1,091 members of the goo Research online monitor group successfully completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.0% of the sample was male, 16.1% in their teens, 18.2% in their twenties, 21.4% in their thirties, 16.0% in their forties, and 28.2% aged fifty or older.
Second Life, or Sadville as The Register calls it, is an online 3D virtual world where you can do and build whatever you want, but most things inevitably end up revolving around sex of often a rather perverted nature.
I personally have never played and have no intention of doing so, not least because my poor PC isn’t up to taking the strain.
Research results
Q1: Do you know about the 3D online world “Second Life”? (Sample size=1,091)
Know about it in detail (to SQ1) 4.7% Know about the key features (to SQ1) 27.1% Heard about it in the media, but don’t know the key features (to SQ1) 32.2% Don’t know anything about it 36.0% In the 10 months since the first survey in June 2007, awareness of Second Life has grown by 10 percentage points.
Q1SQ1: Have you actually played Second Life? (Sample size=698)
Currently playing (to SQ2) 1.3% Used to play (to SQ2) 5.6% Visited the web site, but not played 18.9% Not played it at all 74.2% Q1SQ2: Have you ever seen corporate advertising, promotional campaigns, etc within Second Life? (Sample size=48)
Frequently see/saw them 12.5% Sometimes see/saw them 52.1% Not seen them much 14.6% Never seen them at all 20.8%
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Nick Ramsay said,
April 6, 2008 @ 08:23
It’s interesting to look at the stats here, and see that 1 in 4 Japanese have actually tried Second Life. If only the rest of us were as willing to give it a try, instead of dismissing it because some website said it was “sad” and “perverted”.
I’ve written a couple of posts myself which I wouldn’t mind sharing with people who are interested in Second Life:
- Top Sightseeing Spots in Second Life Japan
- Japanese Cell Phone Providers in Second Life
If you are interested in teaching English in Second Life, visit Mike McKay’s site about 3D virtual language learning in Japan. Mike has helped build English Village, a virtual environment for learning English on the web.