BBC Radio goes virtual

Filed in archive Marketing on May 16, 2006

The BBC has rented a tropical island for one year in Second Life, a virtual online world. The promotion is in conjunction with BBC Radio 1's real-world, One Big Weekend event. The Radio Network will use the island to introduce new bands and will stream live music and video to island visitors.

From the article:

""What we'd like to do is use it as a place for people to put on public music events," said Daniel Heaf, interactive editor at Radio 1.

"We'd really like to use it for unsigned musicians. [But] we're open to invitations as to who wants to use it and how they want to use it."

The virtual music festival is not the BBC's first foray into the virtual universe of Second Life.

Last year, Newsnight presenter Jeremy Paxman and business correspondent Paul Mason broadcast TV's first ever face-to-face studio session from inside the computer game.

Second Life is one of several online games, known as "massively-multiplayer online games" (MMOG) that allow people to inhabit alternate virtual worlds as a character of their choosing. "