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Did Elon Musk really buy free speech for $44 billion dollars? What a bargain. @dfroomkin on Twitter commented “Musk won the money economy. Now he wants to win the attention economy.” |
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| May 18 | 4:00pm EDT | ZOOM |
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Selling a digital event to a sponsor requires a new mindset, some out of the box thinking and a real understanding of the power of digital reach. We share the best ideas from an A-List line up of speakers including Lisa Farrell of MeetYoo, Joe Federbush of Evolio Marketing, Arianna Black of Women in Product, Nick Rosier of 2Heads and Jennifer Baranowski of SIIA. |
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| How Long Can You Remain Dark Before You Enter Oblivion? |
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Calling a “go” or “no go” to hold an event has made reading tea leaves look like child’s play. COVID-19 variants, rising inflation, the Russia-Ukraine war and internal budgeting issues have caused many exhibitors and sponsors to either delay their decision to attend or decide to put their participation on hold. Many events have been dark since 2019, and now
2022 is shaping up to be a mixed bag.
I was a bit surprised to read that E3 announced the cancellation of its June event. E3, the gaming expo created by ESA, has been active since 1995, but attendance and buzz waned in recent years with
events like GDC and VentureBeat Gaming nipping at its heels. The word is that E3 will focus on building back better in 2023, but it begs the question of relevancy. The show has been
canceled three years in a row. Voids get filled. Can E3 survive until 2023? Weigh in on our community board.
NAB, which is taking place as I type, is reporting 55,000 attendees, a respectable number for this post-pandemic era, especially after a two-year dark period. The last NAB was held in person in 2019 and the event had a reported attendance of roughly 91,000. The shiny fruit
for NAB is relevant content. As remote production, remote events and remote workforces become the norm, NAB has seized the moment to emphasize new production tools, the cloud and virtual production.
On the other hand, with fewer than two months to go, Cannes is scrambling. They’ve reported that the show will be smaller and that many agencies are still undecided about whether to make it to the Riviera this year. But they did announce a cool TikTok partnership, so global reach is assured. |
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| The Metaverse Meets the Enterprise |
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The smart money says that metaverse events will entertain consumers and turn us all into gamers, but the big money in the metaverse will be at the enterprise level. And it’s already happening in a metaverse near you. Mytaverse, rooom, MootUp, Virbela, NewSky
XR and Headroom are actively creating enterprise solutions. How can an enterprise use the metaverse? Here are just a few brain-starters: |
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Customer Support
Visit Soul Machines where synthetic digital humans provide customer support. Or check out Ruth, the virtual human from Toll House that teaches you to bake. |
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Sales and Marketing
Check out what Drest is doing with virtual try-ons. They’ve created an interactive styling game, which gives players a chance to curate the perfect wardrobe, test out runway looks, and brainstorm what we’ll all be wearing next
season. |
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Ruth is a digital human who gives baking lessons on the Toll House website. Credit: Toll House
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Advertising
Read my column at Techonomy. If nothing else happened at Metaverse Fashion Week, it was a huge advertisement for all 70 fashion and beauty companies that participated. |
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Collaboration
The metaverse offers new tools for creating prototypes, learning surgical techniques, sharing ideas, and understanding different departments within your company. |
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Education and Training
You’ll be able to complete that degree, with the world’s greatest instructors. According to the University of Maryland, users retain information more effectively when presented in virtual reality (VR)
rather than with more traditional tools. A PricewaterhouseCoopers report states that employees can be trained four times faster in soft skills using VR than traditional in-person classroom or other online training. Walmart has deployed 17,000 VR headsets to enhance employee training. It has cut training time for certain activities from 8 hours to 15 minutes without sacrificing effectiveness. |
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Government
Singapore, Seoul, Dubai, and Victoria (Australia) are leading the way to bring government
services into the metaverse. Town halls, driver’s license renewals, court disputes and basic health are all possibilities. Seoul has announced that it will offer services in the metaverse, allowing citizens to
interact with public officials, resolve civic complaints, and receive consultation services in a virtual world without visiting City Hall. |
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In Dubai, the Minister of State for Happiness offers medical counseling in the metaverse.
Credit: The Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP) |
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City Planning
Virtual twins of IRL cities are letting governments monitor and solve problems such as traffic congestion and air quality. Architects are being employed to take CAD designs and drop them into the metaverse to make important design decisions before spending any money on physical production. |
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Corporate Events
From large corporate meetings to smaller meetings, there are strong arguments for meeting in the metaverse (allow time for the uncanny-valley feeling to dissipate). For example, Accenture has embraced the
metaverse as part of its corporate culture. Here’s a starter’s guide on how to build your office metaverse. |
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The list could go on and on, but if you’re following the money, think enterprise. |
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| The Taxman Cometh for Virtual Events |
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Even the virtual world cannot escape the inevitability of taxes. But it’s complicated. How you determine what you owe for US taxes on digital events is outlined in this free guide: Swoogo’s US Guide to Sales Tax for In-Person, Virtual and Hybrid Events.
Much of it depends on the state where the event is initiated. “If you don’t hit the threshold for that state on either gross receipts or transaction amounts, then you don’t have to worry about taxability or collection of sales tax for that state.” An article in Event Manager says that “You’ll need to focus on where you’re located, where your attendees are located, what they’re doing, what kind of currencies they’re using, as well as a range of other factors.” As more events take place virtually and include in-event transactions, the situations will get even
loonier. The bottom line? You’ll want your registration system to be able to handle taxable events accurately and according to the latest rules. |
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Community is the New Black
The philosophy that events should feel more like ongoing communities that periodically come together IRL is gaining serious traction. If you’re still thinking of an event as a one and done, you’re not thinking. Hello Endless compiled the 5 easy pieces of building a community. |
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Shaping Virtual Events
Volumetric Capture is going to give virtual events a dose of realism and adrenaline. All of those great looking hologram-like photorealistic people you see speaking at virtual events are
usually done in a studio with volumetric capture. Basically you’ll be surrounded by a bunch of cameras shooting you from different angles, all at the same time. Then the images are algorithmically stitched together to create a human-looking person that you can view from any angle. Scenery and objects can also be captured volumetrically. |
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Credit: Mixed Reality/Auganix News |
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Sustainability and Events
Let’s double down on our efforts to create more sustainable events (both digital and in-person). If you missed our Earth Day Town Hall or forgot to take good notes you can rewatch it here. And this handy resource guide will help you head towards a carbon neutral event. Also, read Freeman’s statement about how to greenify your events. |
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Panic in Platform Park?
The Financial Times reports trouble in Hopin land. Hopin’s founder, Johnny Boufarhat, once bragged that there were 15,000 monthly events available on the platform. Today, says FT, there are fewer
than 500. |
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How to Make Money in the Metaverse
The promise is for a unified experience where you can move seamlessly between different metaverses, but for the moment it’s more like nation-states, each with their own currency. Is there a Euro for the metaverse? I ponder this question for Observer.com. |
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