Re: [rp-ml] Desktop Factory

Brock Hinzmann wrote:
> If Pareto holds true, you'll see 20 percent active users, creating new
> designs, running contests and holding auctions, running the
> authentication and payment systems, managing standards, etc., etc., and
> 80 percent passive users.

That's about the ratio you see on Wikipedia too. With enough users, you
can still build an insanely large library of 'stuff'. Wikipedia has
about 1.2 MILLION articles on every subject imaginable - contributed by
about 10,000 core users (who are very active) and 100,000 occasional
contributors with 30 billion page hits and about a million unique
visitors to the site per month.

But Turbosquid is a better example - they store free and almost-free
3D models. They have been in business for five years and have about
100,000 3D models available - probable about a third of those are free
and perhaps another third are under $10. The quality is horribly
variable.

> But that's OK, if it is simple enough for the
> 80 percent to print lots of copies of things and pay for them on line.
> If people are willing to pay real money to buy virtual furniture to put
> in their Sims homes, they might be willing to pay money for copies of
> real objects.

Yep - exactly.

But if you look at places like 'Second Life' - where people can
do online 3D design of their virtual world - there is a huge
and thriving community of 3D designers selling their stuff.
Received on Thu Aug 31 01:33:57 2006