Chapter 8. Customers: The new community

 

WE ARE THE TRUE CONTENT OF OUR MEDIA.

 
 --MARSHALL MCLUHAN, MEDIA THINKER

Media is community

What does the future look like? Think chat! In October 1999, the first version of the fantasy world Dobedo, where you are a fantasy figure chatting with other fantasy figures, was launched. The environment is fictive, but the communication is real.

At the beginning of 2000, Dobedo had 300,000 members in Sweden, and the newly started Dobedo in England had 125,000 members. And they had just launched in Germany … One day when I tried Dobedo and was chatting as my fantasy figure, someone wrote to me: 'Come on, let's go to the UK!' We did and continued chatting with the English. That is when I realized that Dobedo ...

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