"What is the reason for Second Life's failure?" is an interesting question I just noticed on Quora, the popular query-based social network that's sort of Reddit-meets-Wikipedia-meets-Facebook. The answer with the most votes so far is from Treet.TV founder Gary Wisniewski, who wisely re-frames the answer to, "What is the main reason that Second Life failed to meet growth expectations anticipated in 2007?", then follows up with a long and cogent analysis, ending with this passage:

A respected VC friend of mine referred to companies such as Linden Lab as the "living dead", having enough profit to survive and maintain their niche market, but not having enough revenue potential or strong enough management to take the daring moves needed to reinvent themselves and move to the next level.

On this part, I don't quite agree. I'm more than willing to see what daring pivots Rod Humble and his advisor Will Wright are planning for the next year. But I do agree the need to be daring is needed now more than ever.