Could this be the beginning of a new wave of Second Life users? We shall see.
From Kardashian’s Instagram feed
Turns out that Kim Kardashian Second Life avatar from last week wasn’t just a one-off to promote her perfume brand — Ms. Kardashian-West just posted this pic above featuring three SL avatars on her social media channels. And so many, many years after any major pop brand has integrated Second Life content into their media, Kim Kardashian remains an outlier. I really can’t think of a precedent to this; I mean, Drew Carey used to talk about his favorite Second Life creators on Twitter, but even Carey would agree that this Kardashian campaign is many multitudes more massive. The mystery is how it came to be.
Kardashian’s official @kkwfragance perfume brand on Instagram has even more SL pics
I have, of course, reached out to Kardashian’s social media people, and will let readers know when/if I get a reply. By the way, some have speculated that these SL avatars are from her Kimoji mobile app, but having just downloaded it, that doesn’t seem to be the case. The Kimoji avatars all appear to be from IMVU — look:
And indeed, this was actually announced a couple years ago:
IMVU, the social network with 3D animated avatars, said that it has provided the technology behind a new version of the popular Kimoji paid app created by Kim Kardashian West… “Kanye and I found this amazing social experience company, IMVU, and worked with them on creating some of our latest Kimoji designs and GIFs. They’re such innovators who have helped me really set Kimoji apart,” Kardashian wrote on her site.
So it’s even stranger that she’d switch from IMVU to SL for this new campaign. (Stranger still that her SL avatar looks less like Kim Kardashian and more like Cher, but that’s a topic for another post.)
Update, 4:40pm: Added links and pics to KKW’s perfume brand on Instagram (hat tip: Kirsten Corleone).