http://secondlife.com/beta-viewer/download.php

Igor, forget about research.
Doing a self-published survey of your own existing users doesn’t mean much. What are singles saying in general? As I said, I want to hear from dating sites saying they are making more money with virtual dating. Otherwise, they’re not going to offer it, plain and simple.

I want to see virtual dating take off, as it should, in a niche market. I’ve outlined much of what you need to do to get closer to success, time to go do it.

I welcome Weopia to the industry and wish them success! The practice of virtual dating is clearly gaining popularity and there is room for a number of players and business models.

You raise good questions about monetization, usability, and effectiveness and I too, look forward to seeing more dating sites experiment with virtual dating and share their results. As with any innovative technology, it takes time to iron out all wrinkles and answer all questions. The good news is that the data we have to date speaks consistently to the effectiveness of virtual dating, including the Harvard University study you mention in your blog, but certainly more research would be great!

Paradoxically, while from the perspective of an industry analyst/commentator additional research is exciting, from the business perspective waiting for more public research equates to missing out on a major source of competitive advantage – the First Mover Advantage. In our industry, the biggest success stories belong to those who were decisive enough to move confidently with an innovative model… try dislodging eHarmony or Plenty of Fish now.

Btw, I’d like to share with you the results of a survey we had recently conducted with several hundred singles about their virtual dating experience. Three-quarters of respondents stated that they “prefer dating sites that offer virtual dating” and 89% of respondents indicated that they would “recommend virtual dating to a friend” http://www.free-press-release.com/news-survey-online-daters-enjoy-avatar-dating-1263328502.html .

Again, my congratulations to Weopia.

Best regards,

Igor

Loved your article.

We’ve had fun making Weopia. It fills a need as you’ve said. What we wanted to do was provide a companion tool to the whole world of online daters so that we could help bridge the gap between text chatting and that scary first meeting.

Second Life is a fun place. But, Weopia is peer-to-peer, where you date with the person you invite only (actually you can get more people in and we’ll implement that soon). There are no distractions and griefers and people trying to steal your date!

Meeting someone to date in Second Life is like real life. Your options are limited. Few ways to find compatible people. Online dating expands that world dramatically and Weopia gives them a place to go and build a deeper relationship.

Research shows that virtual daters like each other more in their first offline date and are more likely to have a second date, so we think it will work.

We looked at flash and browser-based, but it limited our ability to produce great graphics and stability. Video is coming and so is internal voice. Also, we have a lot of new interactive features coming very soon on our next releases.

Thanks,

Mark
http://www.weopia.com