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Check out the Grid Review, the new project from the Electric Sheep Company (3pointD sponsor, etc.) and PR agency Edelman. Launched to bring news of the grid via short machinima pieces, the service premieres with, among other things, a hilarious interview with the “avatar” everyone loves to hate, CopyBot. Talented machinimists Nylon Pinkney and moo Money will be the anchor anchors, but the Sheep are also soliciting submissions from residents — and I believe there may be some facility in the works to help you produce those pieces, though I’m not entirely sure. At any rate, it should be a good source for entertaining video news of Second Life. Another first?

The Sundance Channel is coming to the virtual world of Second Life in January, with a virtual premiere of 3pointD’s favorite movie of recent weeks, Four Eyed Monsters, according to a press release. “Sundance Channel’s SL screening room will be used to showcase films, documentaries, shorts and original series and to host unique interactive events with filmmakers and other independent thinkers,” according to the release. The Electric Sheep Company (who sponsor this blog) will be building out the Sundance presence in SL. Like their Aloft project, the Sundance build will also be accompanied by a blog, which will document the construction, provide information on SL itself, and give updates on upcoming events being held at the virtual screening room. All of which sounds very cool to me, especially the opportunity to see new films like Four Eyed Monsters in SL before they’re widely available elsewhere. And how long will it be before we start to see machinima at the Sundance Festival? See you in Park City.

Second Life resident Hiro Pendragon sends word of a new company claiming to be “the 1st market research institute on Second life.” Known as Reperes Second Life, it sounds like the firm will, among other things, keep a close eye on SL trends; offer consultative services, including some form of focus grouping; and provide a space for test launches. The company is the virtual arm of the French market research company of the same name, who seem to be doing interesting work in the real world. I’m not entirely sure if they’re actually the first such firm in SL, or if they’ve just caught a case of the recent first-itis that’s going around, but I’m not too concerned. I imagine there will be a lot of call for such services if SL continues to grow and companies start to find new, better and less intrusive ways of offering their goods and services there. The SL platform also offers unprecedented opportunities for market researchers, since there are many more metrics of interaction than can be tracked in the physical world. In the real world, for instance, it’s impossible to know how many people picked up your product without buying it, unless you do some elaborate work with either surveillance cameras, or clipboards and ergonomic shoes. In SL, it’s a much easier matter to figure out who’s clicking and buying, and who’s clicking and leaving. And there are many more such measurements that can be had. This space will get especially interesting if firms like Reperes start releasing public reports on the SL market. Any other companies like this out there?

Trinity Unviersity professor and Terra Nova author Aaron Delwiche sends word that he and SL resident Adri Saarinen have started up a new metaverse services firm, known as Metaversatility. The company has already recruited a number of SL residents and others to help out, and has a small but growing portfolio of projects — including an »in-world location« for ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, which is a cool client to have. “Our client list continues to grow, and there are more and more projects on the horizon,” Delwiche says. That’s what’s most remarkable to me: There still seems to be a lot more demand for such services than there is supply. Start-ups are immediately busy, notable builders and scripters are still being hired off the Grid, and projects continue to roll out in a steady (increasing?) stream. The market, at least for the moment, remains bullish on SL. (Though one recent report questions whether usage statistics are growing as quickly as registration figures would make it seem.)