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Amazon Gets a (Second) Life

Online retail just bounced into the virtual world in a big way. Linden Lab’s expanding online world of Second Life is spawning a ton of new developments that have real world implications.

One of Second Life’s residents, Hal9k Andalso really Mike Buckbee, recently introduced an “in world” (Second Life speak for within Second Life) piece of code that enables you to search the “real world” (where most of us live) Amazon.com website.

Jeff Barr who runs Amazon’s web services has a great overview for novices on Second Life and explains some of the technical nuances of how the Amazon.com Web Services is integrated. Mike Buckbee’s announcement on his own blog can be read here.

Jeff blogs about a store he was introduced to today by Tabitha (her Second Life name) called Life2Life. Jeff has a post talking about his tour of the store. An interesting post in and of itself which can be found here.

Other Web Merchants might consider this a silly and unimportant development. For the more pragmatic folks out there, the true revolution is the power the Amazon Web Services (AWS) brings to letting people use the Amazon product catalog in a way that exponentially increases Amazon’s reach at no cost. Folks like Mike develop using AWS for free which only solidifies Amazon’s position at the top. Any merchant who can make their catalog more “interfaceable” and open source – a platform for others – reaps the benefits of creating an “Internet ubiquitous” presence that manifests as a huge competitive advantage.

One parting question: How long until Lindens (the currency in Second Life with its own US dollar exchange rate) will be an accepted payment method on Amazon? I give it no more than 4 years.

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This post was written by DEP Ecommerce Consultants