Mtv partners with oddcast to launch virtual playgrounds

Starting today, visitors to Virtual MTV (VMTV.com) can enter online environments for "The Hills," "Pimp My Ride," and "The Real World," where they will be able to create speaking embodiment that interact with others both on and off the site. Oddcast developed the platform, known as Voki, that creates and supports the embodiment.

Users can furnish their embodiment with their own voices and have them speak to others via electronic mail or online posts. The various "playgrounds" will allow users to interact in different ways, such as exchanging gossip about "The Hills," sharing secrets in the "Real World Confessional Booth," or even auditioning for a real episode of "Pimp My Ride."

Voki "allows any consumer, without downloading anything, to create their own embodiment and participate in these thematic galleries," said Shaival Shah, VP of concern development and scheme for Oddcast. "But it also provides a virtual identity, with MTV as the entree point, that they can take to any other sociable network or virtual reality they have."

so, MTV is banking on users embedding their embodiment, or others', on their Facebook pages, blogs, or any other sociable media. Because the web will maintain a grade of content control over the embodiment, it will be able to push messages -- either for itself or advertisers -- straight to that media.

For illustration, after embedding a Pimp My Ride embodiment on one's MySpace page, that embodiment can then deliver spoken messages about an upcoming episode, or directly users to a sponsor's Web site.

exactly how much entree MTV will give advertisers to the engineering is unclear, however. MTV did not respond to petition for an interview, and Shah could not provide information about potential advertising partners.

"Virtual MTV is built on the premise that we offer the latest in technology to our fans in an organic way that deeply engages them on an individual level, and brings them together with other like-minded people," said Jeff Yapp, EVP of program enterprises for MTV Networks Music & Logo Group, in a statement. "Voki's technology is helping us take that experience one step further with an innovative approach that allows fans to take personalization to an entirely new level."

The avatars benefit MTV beyond advertising and audience engagement, however. By allowing users to audition for episodes of Pimp My Ride, the network is able to cast a wider net for the aging show without having to invest more time in receiving and watching physical audition tapes.

The Voki platform is not exclusive to MTV, however. The technology is currently used on many popular sites, enabling the creation of more than 300 million avatars a month, according to Shah.

Voki is the platform that allows for the newly enabled avatar function on Evite.com, and Microsoft began using it in December to help spread the word of its Ultimate Office suite among college students.

Shah said that marketing messages sent through the application typically experienced between a 5 percent and 15 percent click-through rate. "These are spoken calls to action from people you choose to listen to," he said.