Virtual Goods Summit, Supernova

I’ll be speaking at the Virtual Goods Summit 2007, which takes place June 22 at Stanford University. This is one of those fortuitous coincidence things — I was going to be in town speaking at Supernova, which I’ve mentioned before as being one of my favorite tech conferences, and the chance to show up at the summit luckily slotted in right before I have to catch a plane back home. 🙂

In both cases it’ll be panels — the Supernova one will be more general, about virtual worlds overall, and folks like Reuben Steiger of Millions of Us and Clay Shirky will be on it. The one at the Virtual Goods Summit will be about brass tacks — the issues you run into when diving into the whole microtransaction world — and oh boy, it’s an interesting mix of folks on it. Details:

Virtual Life or Virtual Hype? (Supernova)

(Moderator Sandra Kearney, Clay Shirky, Raph Koster, Reuben Steiger)

Do most people really want to be immersed in 3D virtual worlds? And what are the real business benefits of these massively multiplayer environments? This session will examine which activities will migrate to virtual environments, and when physical forms will continue to dominate.

Making Virtual Economies Work: What Does it Take to Get it Right? (Virtual Goods Summit)
Whether it’s the virtual or physical world, successful economies don’t happen by accident. What does it take to build and foster a thriving virtual economy? What lessons can we learn from folks who are on the forefront of tackling these issues? We’ll explore what it takes to get a virtual economy right by tapping into the collective expertise of our audience and panelists.
» Gene Yoon, Second Life
» Joshua Hong, K2 Networks
» Brock Pierce, Affinity Media (IGE)