Brands Inspiring Creativity and Transpiring Meaning: An Ethnographic Exploration of Virtual World Play
Sara Steffes HansenUniversity of Wisconsin Oshkosh
INTRODUCTION
Media companies and advertisers increasingly enrich consumer engagement through online virtual worlds or social videogames, a form of massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs). These games offer expanded platforms to reach consumers as avatars-or digital representations of the self-who can interact with the virtual world and other players online. Virtual worlds include Second Life, as well as brand-specific versions launched by MTV and Disney (Wilson 2008).
By 2011, 80% of active Internet users (Gartner 2007) and 53% of child and...