Who are the people creating their own virtual worlds, and why?
Raph Koster: Actually, it’s quite a lot of people. We already have lots of folks who are using to to create games and that kind of thing, but we’ve also got families who are using it to stay in touch. We’ve had users using our software to create a “virtual dinner table”–where there is a husband deployed overseas in the military, and this allows them to have a virtual dinner with the family. We’ve got classrooms and teachers who want to use it to enhance the learning experience, and hold virtual workshops. We’ve got friends from college, who use it to be able to keep in touch, hang out, and virtually do fun things in the evening–even though they live thousands of miles apart. It’s a testimony that it allows such a wide array of people to use it in many ways. It’s not just gamer types, building games–what’s fascinating is it’s people who are not gamers, and who are mass market consumers. They’re doing all kinds of crazy stuff. It’s been really fascinating to see what happens when the
