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Virtual Barbie World Sees Meteoric Rise

by Terrence O'Brien on July 16, 2007 at 02:14 PM

Mattel's Virtual Barbie World Sees Meteoric Rise
We've previously posted about the 'Barbie Girls' virtual world being slapped together by Mattel as a 'Second Life'-esque haven for teens and tweens. Now, the site has entered beta mode and something surprising has happened: The service has racked up three million registered users in 60 days and is still growing. The service is signing up roughly 50,000 new users a day, a growth rate that far surpasses the cultish success of 'Second Life' or the geeky fanatical rise of 'World of Warcraft' (WOW).

According to Tech Crunch, 'Barbie Girls' could be well on its way to becoming the largest online community in the new social Web. To put these numbers in perspective, it took 'Second Life' three years to hit the one million user mark. At current growth rates, 'Barbie Girls' will usurp 'Second Life' sometime between November of this year and January of next. And 'WOW' won't be far off either.

A couple of things are clear based on these numbers:
  • Virtual worlds have officially gone mainstream
  • Virtual worlds, once predominantly male are becoming more heavily female populated
  • Young girls are not above beta chasing
From Tech Crunch

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Tags: barbie, barbie girls, BarbieGirls, girls, kids, mattel, online communities, OnlineCommunities, second life, SecondLife, virtual worlds, VirtualWorlds, world of war craft, WorldOfWarCraft, wow

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