There.com inks Capitol Music Group deal

In a deal that showcases its ability to bring name talent into its virtual world, There.com announced Thursday that at least five Capitol Music Group (CMG) bands will make appearances there in the next few months.

Among the acts that will be appearing in There will be rap artists MIMS, Korn and the Beastie Boys.

MIMS will come in-world on July 10, There said.

The deal is good for enhancing There's status as an online public showcase. Already, There has built several virtual presences for MTV, but those were private, gated environments unconnected to its main grid.

This bodes well for There also because much of the attention being paid to social, 3D virtual worlds goes to Second Life. So for a major label to bypass Second Life and choose There is a sign that major names are willing to look elsewhere for their virtual world setups. Thus, the CMG partnership is important if There wants to establish itself as a bona fide, viable alternative. Whether it can do so, of course, remains to be seen.

When the bands come in-world, they will go to special clubs where fans can meet their members, chatting one-on-one for a few minutes. Further, the bands will sell all manner of merchandise in the virtual world.

[csven]

Of greater interest to me

... is that this doesn't sound tied into Makena's work with MTV (Virtual Laguna Beach, Hills, Pimp My Ride).

With MTV's latest offering, vLES, being developed by Doppelganger, is this deal with There sign of a rift between MTV and Makena?

[Chagally]

No rift :)

...Makena is just branching out with different partnerships. As far as I know, everything's going well with the MTV partnership.

[Atari05]

Thats actually pretty cool

When it comes down too, when your look at communication, THERE beats SL hands down. Sure SL has the more "real" look to their product but there's voice and bubble chat communication system works well. So I think THERE will be a good experience for these artists to take a virtual dive in.

[play7]

You know why they bypassed Second Life?

OMG they are so smart not to deal with Second Life and the never ending abusive copy write and other BS that Philip Linden and the rest of that So N So group 1960`s version of anti social people..These days LL wants a larger cut of the possible money making possiblities, so the reason why they are not dealing with LL and the money chain gang . SO they can pay their worthless and at times totally useless UI coders and builders. If you are following the Second Life drama, they are in the "SELL AT ALL COST" to whom ever is welling to pay commerical prices for their (VR land) Which you never really own..If you real the Terms of Service of LL).If anyone been inthe game on Second Life, they will tell you its getting worse and worse. Playablity is at a all time low and slowly getting worse.