The 39-person team behind "Whirled" is best known for its online game "Puzzle Pirates." The massively multiplayer game amassed $4 million in revenue in 2007--primarily from the sale of virtual items like boots or parrots for players' pirate avatars. The entire virtual goods economy, estimates Parks Associates analyst Michael Cai, is worth about $1.5 billion globally. Injected with $3.5 million in funding last March, Three Rings hopes it can expand its virtual item business to support an entire network of "Whirled" developers and designers.

"It's an interesting idea that combines user-generated content, open source and embeddable virtual worlds, as well as successful business models," says Parks Associates analyst Michael Cai. "All those elements have been tried; it was just a matter of time before someone came in and combined all those [elements]." Whirled's success will depend on how well it manages its user-created content to ensure consumers are finding the best games and items, Cai notes.

From the article, "A Brand New 'Whirled'" by Mary Jane Irwin

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