New Apple Store in Second Life?
An anoymous reader just sent me a link to this YouTube video of a replica, built in the virtual world of Second Life, of Apple’s glass cube store on New York’s Fifth Avenue. Keep in mind there were earlier reports of an Apple store in Second Life, but those didn’t show anything half as elaborate as the build on display in the video, which also features fairly high production values for machinima. I’m in Austin at SXSW and can’t get into Second Life very well on this laptop in this hotel, so I can’t go check out what’s at the old location, and there’s no location given for the store in the video. However, the video does end with production credits, and they don’t give any indication of whether or not Apple is actually involved. The video is credited to metaverse services firm AxisVR LLC, which advertises a number of interesting services but doesn’t provide a client list. (I’ve never heard of them before, but that doesn’t mean much.) 3pointD wagers that the new Apple store, which looks very well built out in the video, might have been built out by Apple employees, but hasn’t been approved by Apple’s legal beagles. That or it’s AxisVR spending a lot of time and effort to angle for a highly unlikely contract from Apple. We wonder whether the SL store will be manned 24 hours a day, as the New York location is.
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ugh their website has a cheesy template flash intro that i have seen atleast half a dozen times now.
*realises his firm’s website could use some work as well*
This might be PR. There was some product design graduate who, a few years back, starting designing - on his own - products for a few well-known brands. They were well-rendered and posted on the net. These concepts were so well-received that people started contacting the manufacturers wondering when the fictional products were going on sale.
As a result, the designer got hired at a relatively nice place (unsure where).
This could be a similar effort. I’d expect something connected to Apple to be slicker than this.
@Frans : UGH. Agreed. If I have to look at “Loading…” on a design firm’s website for more than 3 seconds, I don’t look at their website. Period.
And neither does anyone else who would consider working with them.
Hahahahaha. A hideously long Flash load, and then a “skip intro” page? Hello 1997, your sites are calling.
Wow, you guys are really Second LIfe wizards, huh? LOL. Flash loader. Right. heh… What a knowledgable bunch. :-)