The most dramatic example is happening now in China, where a consortium
of government and private capital is investing $30bn in a 100 square
kilometre site - that's around six miles by six miles - to build the
Beijing Cyber Recreation Project. Among other things this will house
the infrastructure (computer server farms, electricity, online banking
links, transport logistics etc) to host nine or 10 virtual worlds, each
of which will be capable of supporting over 150m avatars. The Chinese
are not constructing virtual worlds for fun; they are deadly serious.
Although online games will be part of the mix, the underlying strategy
is strictly economic: to boost the profits from the country's booming
industrial base.