What We Can Learn From Our Kids

With all the buzz about Second Life seeming to grow each day, I remembered why I thought it wasn’t such a big deal when I first heard about it. I thought, “Well, my kids have been spending hours playing an avatar based role playing game in a 3-D environment where they can earn and spend for years”. I’m talking about World of Warcraft, but there are many other examples.

Back in April, Chad Stoller did an interesting blog post on how web-savvy kids are today. And not just how computer oriented they are, but how the internet is teaching them the basics of being a good consumer. While revisiting this blog post today, I remembered thinking about the parallels between Second Life and World of Warcraft. And I wonder, will my kids continue to expect this kind of online environment as they grow up? Or with they “grow out of” the need to be entertained this way?

How should marketers use the examples of today to predict the future? Which way do you think it will go? I’m interested in your comments.