blog.msurveys.com

Bebo have gone live with their apps developer program. It's essentially a clone of the Facebook API, so porting existing facebook applications is very easy. Below a screenshot from a prototype app integrating GMI's NetPanel2 panel management software into Bebo - a clone of the NetPanel facebook prototype I first described last year in this post.

I imagine this could be of particular interest to brands or agencies wanting to connect with teenagers in the UK, given Bebo's dominant position in the UK teen/youth market (and I even speak from personal experience here - it's the de-facto standard way of sharing photos, blog posts etc. for my daughter and most of her friends).

I'm very pleased to be working with the University of California Riverside's Sloan Center on their eLab City project in Second Life, see UCR's full press release.

GMI's involvement is along two lines:

- Direct integration of GMI's NetPanel2 panel management software with Second Life, enabling UCR to recruit and manage their academic panelists both in-world in Second Life, and through a conventional web-based interface. Objects inside Second Life are programmed using LSL to communicate with the panel management software through NetPanel2's XML-RPC web services.

- Creating and running survey avatar "bots" (automated Second Life users programmed and controlled by software) that are able to approach and engage respondents inside Second Life. These bots work along the same lines as the ones previously described here (for a video see the bottom of this previous post), so are able to conduct a survey using GMI's online survey software in-world, as well as being able approach potential respondents in a variety of different ways. This means the bot can also measure "meta-data" - e.g. reaction to the way it behaves or approaches people - in addition to the survey data itself.

For additional info, http://www.elabcity.com is updated regulary with updates of the development.