One of the issues that came out of the recent Virtual Worlds Forum in London is, rather sensibly -- how to categorize virtual worlds? It's clear there are a lot of players in the space, and not all of them are "true" virtual worlds -- in other words, 3D environments with an avatar. At her Wonderland blog, Alice Taylor muses on the different classifications that are emerging in the space, in the hopes of defining "camps" into which the broad offering at present can be currently defined.

She correctly notes that 2 and 2.5-dimensional worlds are one of the most populous categories -- some of the largest, thriving and most widely known virtual worlds (Habbo, Club Penguin, BarbieGirls) fall into this category.

Then, there are the realism-focused, 3D worlds, where as Alice says the avatars are "almost humanoid" -- In this camp we've got Second Life, HiPiHi, Kaneva, There.com and others. 3D worlds for business purposes are another camp, and finally, MMOs, which are less represented in the space because they've got a foot in the video game world, too.

Other key facts Alice gleaned from the event: as Lord Puttnam pointed out, the issue of marketing to kids in virtual worlds will continue to be a tricky one, and both There and Second Life have said that the 50+ audience comprises their biggest users -- who'd have thought?

[Via Wonderland]