As with most technology trends, the much heralded advance of “social MMOs” has been a little longer coming than originally predicted/hoped for.
But I am feeling the groundswell building.
First, what I would call “first gen social MMOs” are hitting impressive milestones. Habbo Hotel reportedly just crossed 100M registered avatars, while IMVU just announced hitting 20 M users.
Second, and more exciting to me, is a wave of new (not yet announced) startups that are leveraging the intensely social social network platforms to build MMOs for these platforms. I’ve been watching the intersection of social media and MMOs for a while, and am excited to see what is starting to emerge. Check back a year from now, and I think you will see some pretty exciting new kids on the block.
