According to TechCrunch UK (blog post here) Muxlim, the Finnish born Muslim social network, is launching a virtual world especially Muslims in mind. This will be much like the other virtual worlds we are familiar with such as The Second Life apart from the Muslim specific features.
TechCrunch UK reports:
The idea is that something tailored to the Muslim world would be allowed through the IP-blocks of countries like United Arab Emirates which currently stops access to virtual worlds and online games considered unsuitable or offensive to Muslim culture. The virtual world is said to launch in 4-6 weeks
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The revenue model will be VIP accounts, virtual gifts, virtual furniture/clothes, themes/styles, profile applications, advertising, branded communities and physical merchandise like t-shirts.
Muxlim has been very active lately. In addition to the new virtual world, they are planning to open an office in the UK and a big UK launch event at the end of January 2009 to go along with that.
If you look at the TechCrunch UK comments it clearly shows that religion is much more sensitive topic in the UK than it is over here in the Nordics and Baltics. Very few, if any, of the comments actually deal with the product itself, but rather with the fact that the virtual world is for Muslims. Mike Butcher, the Editor of TechCruch UK, decided to shut down the comments since the blog post created so many racist comments. I have not seen such negative approach here in the Nordics or Baltics even though Muxlim has been in the headlines quite a bit. It seems that UK has much more to learn from us than just financial regulation.
Edit: Here’s also Wired’s take on the Muxlim virtual world.
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Hmmm. Finland is not without its problems when it comes to issues of race. I would go as far as to say serious problems.
As far as Muxlim is concerned I think it’s a great idea and I wish it well. However, having experienced terrorism in the UK some Brits are understandably anxious about muslims further isolating themselves from mainstream society. The UK has very serious problems integrating muslims (and I’m not talking terrorism, I’m talking about educational attainment, employment and crime too) and many might perceive sites such as these as being unhelpful.
Of course the UK has its share of ignorant racists and that’s probably the category most of the commenters fitted into. Nevertheless, there is an issue worth discussing here. I’d love to hear what the founder has to say.
Dear Jon,
Thanks for your comment.
We also share your concerns about any form of segregation of Muslims from mainstream society. Muxlim was never created to be an alternative to main stream sites, in fact we encourage our users to be part of both. We just feel that we can provide a complimentary experience and flavor that is currently lacking from other sites (especially from our community’s perspective).
Since we are discussing this on a platform that covers technology, I would like to highlight that Muxlim is currently integrating both Google OpenSocial and Facebook Connect to allow Muxlim users to easily interact with main stream online communities.
Also, everyone is welcome on Muxlim and we are happy about the non-Muslim 2% of users on the site. In fact, we are currently in talks with major international integration, social cohesion and cultural diversity initiatives to reach out to the millions of users who use our site.
And finally, just look at our team. We are people from over 8 countries, with strong respect and understanding for each other, and we are very passionate about making the world better. And Finland has been a great place to make this happen!
With many thanks to our supporters,
Mohamed El-Fatatry
P.S. I strongly concur Ville’s point. We have so far seen an outstandingly positive reaction to the Muxlim concept in the Nordics. Something the rest of the world can definitely learn from!
Jon and Mohamed,
Thank you both for your comments.
I fully agree with Jon that this is certainly an issue worth discussing here. I also want to thank Mohamed for his sincere answer to the tough issue we all face.
I’m certainly not saying we are perfect here in the Nordics, but having lived in London for a period of time I have to say that sometimes it gets to be a very brutal world compared to what I’ve experienced in my time in Helsinki.
Naturally, Helsinki is not nearly(!) as multicultural as places like for example London. And as many of my friends who have visited Helsinki have pointed out, this has also it’s negative implications for culture, economy, you name it. Personally I hope we can get more people with variety of ethnic background to Helsinki and learn from the experiences of London and others that have been showing the way, thus avoiding some of the pit falls that might arise education, employment or crime wise.
That said, I believe the situation is not as bad as the comments in the TechCrunch might make it look. Muxlim, for one, is doing extremely valuable work for Muslims and non-Muslims regarding the difficult issue discussed above. This might not be so clear when we are many times only focusing on all the new functions and tabs that the social networks are build with.
For what it’s worth, it’s great to see that the discussion at least in ArcticStartup is constructive and our readers understand the significance of the issue at hand. I am proud of you guys!
Thanks for the reply Mohamed. I think what you write makes a great deal of sense and my personal opinion is that it’s very natural for groups who share values (whether religious, cultural or whatever) to want to spend time with and interact with one another. It fosters a sense of belonging and it needn’t be destructive. Of course it can cause problems but it is the role of society, schools, parents and so on, to ensure that people do not become ghettoised.
Good luck. I’ll certainly take a look at the site.