GigaOM

[...] blog. Materials, figures and disclosures what else one wants to be assured. I admire the peppy feel of the blog. I am charmed by pithy and clever headlines that attract me into the post. Savoring the liberty, [...]

[...] of Warcraft (WOW) podría dejar su corona como el juego multijugador masivo más jugado del mundo a Habbo Hotel, el MMO social de la [...]

[...] James Au, writing for GigaOM, gives some interesting details on teen virtual world Habbo Hotel’s ongoing growth. With 9.5 [...]

[...] WoW No Longer World’s Biggest MMO? - GigaOM (tags: virtualworlds) [...]

[...] Read the rest of this post Print all_things_di220:http://voices.allthingsd.com/20080627/wow-no-longer-worlds-biggest-mmo/ Sphere Comment Tagged: GigaOm, Habbo Hotel, Sulake Corp., Voices, Wagner James Au, World of Warcraft | permalink [...]

[...] avatar and “attracts close to 10 million monthly visitors to its services worldwide”, reports Wagner James Au on [...]

[...] reported on Gigaom, Habbo Hotel is soon to surpass World of Warcraft in unique monthly visitors. A Habbo [...]

[...] WoW No Longer World’s Biggest MMO? - “World of Warcraft will lose its undisputed status as the most popular massively multiplayer online world. It’s struggling to defend that title as Habbo Hotel, the web-based, social MMO from Finland” [...]

[...] of Warcraft has cartoonish graphics, while the web-based, teen-oriented virtual world Habbo Hotel, which is just as big, is in [...]

[...] the virtual world Habbo Hotel is dominated by teens, and with 10 million monthly active users, is about as popular as World of Warcraft– and of course, far more popular than SL.  But like Second Life, it’s also a non-game [...]

[...] seeing the success that an MMO like [Sulake] Habbo has had. The success is just astonishing — a recent blog post had them equal with or slightly greater than World of Warcraft for total numbers, so you’re talking [...]

This is quite useless imo…we are talking about two different things here…. and MMORPG with an online little game ….they are in different categories that need not be compared in any way…

Actually, WoW has never been the “most popular massively multiplayer online world”.

If you measure by registered users, the old Korean MMO’s like Kart Rider or Mu online with each 50+ million easily beat it.

If you measure by players online at the same time, then ZT online easily beats it with 2,1 million players online at the same time in China alone!

Amazed! I’d never thought that it would come to this point, but nevertheless…Habbo is huge and widespread, especially here in Scandinavia.

Subscriber counts are so 1999. The real questions are revenue and cash flow. WoW is mind blowingly profitable by most calculations, both from their subscription model and their expansions. I was under the impression that Habo, like most social networking sites is free. “Blizzard/Vivendi might have added more subscribers since reaching 10 million last January” - you think?

Wow, I remember when this site was just a experimental project mainly only known by web designer community.

The better comparison would be between how many “avatars” or “alt characters” that populate WoW versus Habbo. Habbo claims 100th million avatar but I’m sure the 10 million WoW players don’t only have a single character on their account. (I have 5 on my single account)

Also, WoW is doing 150 million a month in revenue, what kind of numbers is Habbo pulling for all of its 100 million Avatar numbers? Or its 10 million regular users?

I just read your previous write up about Habbo. 77 million in Revenue on 6.5 million users. Although the numbers will not be a direct comparison to each other I can make a semi connection of 10 million users equaling out about 118 million in Revenue reflecting their previous numbers.

WoW turns 140-150 million in Revenue a month and a staff of 300.
Habbo turns 118 million in Revenue a Year and a staff of 2700.

When comparing raw data it is relatively interesting to see the numbers but when it boils down to it the target markets are not the same.

Correction to my above, should read :

Habbo turns 118 million in Revenue a Year and a staff of 300.
WoW turns 140-150 million Revenue a month and a staff of 2700.

Oh come on, Habbo Hotel is fucking free. WoW is a paid service. Let’s see how far Habbo Hotel goes if they start charging.

The lolcat meme has been overplayed. Just. Stop.

Ummm. This is a silly insight from what is normally an insightful blog.

Wow costs money and is real. Habbo Hotel is free, if fun. You’re saying that spending money on making a cool game and giving it away for free is hard? Umm, no. If WoW went free, what do you think would happen…maybe MySpace size numbers. But they want to make money. Good for them.

If you want to take shots at WoW, you should try a more genuine comparison and analysis.

Unfortunately this article suffers from Web 2.0-itis as the commenters rightly point out.

Dollars and cents are what matter in business and you are reporting on the business of massively multiplayer online worlds.

Smart companies choose revenue and profits over sheer user numbers. Kudos to Habbo for what they are doing, but they aren’t even in the same league as WoW - and this is coming from someone who dislikes these virtual online worlds.

Is it just me or is Elvis making a rather german hand gesture?

“Smart companies choose revenue and profits over sheer user numbers.”

Read the write-up I linked to at the bottom, Habbo is also making a lot of money. The service is free to join, but they have a lot of other revenue streams.

They aren’t even close to being the same thing, what a dreadfully misleading title and analysis.

MMOs, in my opinion, can die the same horrible death that Reality TV does when that comes. (Please, God, Let it be soon.)

Well its good to see that wow isnt the biggest mmo ever.
In my opinion wow should be pay to play.. why?
because.. look at all the other games that are being made… sure they cost 70-90 dollars more than wow but that company has actually put effort into that game rather than blizzard… just sell for a cheap price and demand more money if they really had some brains they would atleast have spent more time on it and put it atleast 70-90 dollars.. and not pay to play.. because if they really have 1million or 10million subscribers what ever it is instead of 10-70 dollars a month wouldnt they just be like everyother company?
sell for $100
when its reached its maximum income start/release a new project to make more money

EDIT:
2nd line
*should* was supposed to be *shouldnt*

have you even taken a look at WoW versus Habbo? I mean christ, they don’t even seem to be in the same category. If we want an avatar count, you’d have to find out how many alts everyone that plays warcraft has. I’ve got three on blood furnace, 2 on crushridge, and four on aggrimar. Needless to say none of them are 70 besides one, but i doubt you level in habbo anyway. Seems like you sit around and drink e-java with people that can’t socialize without a computer. I play warcraft for the fun, not as my means to meet people. Check out the habbo home page if you’d like. “Hangout for teens” and then you’ll notice links that say things like “love, party, MEET” can anyone say pedophile much? People think that myspace is bad with that, well it’ll be even worse when children are getting raped by the avatar that claims to be the same age that they are.. society is going to hell, and Habbo is just another stepping stool to lead you there

James, you miss my point.

Habbo Hotel has lots of revenue streams and ONLY generates $118 million per year. WoW is doing upwards of $150 million per MONTH.

Lots of revenue streams does not change the fact that Habbo Hotel when compared to WoW has clearly chosen user numbers over revenue/profits.

My point is that WoW is smarter than Habbo in my opinion because they are generating far more money by focusing on charging customers directly instead of looking for all sorts of other revenue streams and hoping some of them become major.

Ah, the epic struggle of who is more profitable…

I don’t play either. I played an MMORPG for 2 weeks, and that was my tenure into that realm of gaming. But so what if Habbo chose user numbers over revenue? $118 million a year off of a free product is pretty damn successful if you ask me. $150 million a month makes sense when it costs 10 million people $15/month to play. I can see where WoW’s revenue comes from with the most basic of mathematics. Habbo has obviously been more creative with their revenue earning strategy and in my opinion, more successful because they found a way to deliver their product to a massively expanding user base for free and still turn a tidy profit.

Two words: Network Externalities.

And yes props to Vladimir. I appreciate Habbo for its ability to generate revenue from an age group that wouldn’t otherwise pay any amount for online games.