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    Muxlim plans Muslim world's first virtual world

    Mike Butcher

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    Mike Butcher is the European Editor for TechCrunch. A former grunge rock drummer, he became a long time journalist, and has since written for UK national newspapers and magazines including The Financial Times, The Guardian, The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The New Statesman. Mike is also a co-founder and shareholder of TechHub, a co-working space/service/community with several locations... → Learn More

    Monday, October 20th, 2008
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    Muslim social network Muxlim.com, live since late 2006, is planning to launch a Muslim-oriented virtual world not unlike Second Life. 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 and will “allow the opportunity to wear a hijab, and go to prayer rooms.” Muxlim itself is your standard social network offering community features, blogs and video sharing. 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.

    Although there are well over one billion people who identify themselves as Muslim, I see this site as appealing primarily to slightly more ‘westernised’ Muslim world. In the UK alone there are over three million Muslims with an estimated £21 billion annual spending power (with a fair proportion of this oil-related money Ok I concede that in fact, in the UK, most Muslims are not from the Middle East).

    Ashar Saeed, vice-president of Muxlim.com reckons that by setting up a Muslim virtual world they’ll be able to attract sponsorship from the likes of brands like Coca-Cola, which already advertise in other online worlds. Launched in December 2006 in Finland, the site 1.5m unique monthly visitors and is backed by Finnish and Swedish money, sepcifically Swedish VC Rite Internet Ventures (also backer of Nebula, the largest Finnish hosting provider and Nyheter24.se, the Swedish online tabloid).

    • http://nmk.co.uk Ian Delaney

      Smart work – providing they can keep out the ‘flying cock’ brigade – which may mean not allowing Western Muslims in.

      (explanation: http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?in_article_id=30420&in_page_id=34)

    • http://handelaar.org John Handelaar

      “The bulk of this is oil-related money”?

      Cobblers, matey. And rather embarrassingly so. That’s less than seven grand per head.

      The UK’s student population of about 1m people has a discretionary spend of £5bn per annum. I suspect the difference between that number and the £20bn that British muslims are spending would have rather more to do with the fact that they work for a living.

      And dramatically under-earn per capita for the UK.

    • huh

      Why is it that oil, one of the most important substance in the world, are mostly found in Islamic countries?

      • http://www.animatelogo.com Logo Animation

        Not that they are found in Islamic countries, but it happens that oil is mostly found in deserts, and most islamic countries have huge ones.

    • mwrar

      breaking news, muxlim recalled because of references to koran passages.

    • http://imranali.name Imran Ali

      But I’ve *already* been promised a Second Life!

      • Simon

        LOL- awesome… best comment of ’08!

    • http://www.dune.com Paul Atreides

      Huh. Wonder if a ‘Muhammad Avatar’ is off-limits in a Muslim virtual world? If cartoon gets them a in twist …

      • mona

        look Paul, prophet Muhammad Avatar is not accepted at all even in Muslim Virtual world, it’s a matter of belief and we are asking for nothing but to respect this.

    • Nas

      “The bulk of this is oil-related money”? where did this enlightened ‘fact’ come from?

      • oil-related

        I saw three edits. From “the bulk of this is oil-related money” to “much of this…” to “a fair proportion.” Please cite ANYTHING that makes this relevant. I would not doubt that UK Christians have a larger proportion of oil-related money than UK Muslims. UK resident Roman Abramovich (Jewish) himself has $11 billion, mostly from oil – over half of all the Muslim wealth in the UK according to your figure.

    • M

      This really has to be one of the most ludicrous ideas. The great Electronic Umma…. They can’t even get along in the middle east, what makes them think they’ll do it online? Western Muslims are VERY different than Eastern Muslims. They interpret the Koran differently, and frankly don’t get along. So who will have the ‘ban’ functionality? And will it be called Jihad instead? Will Sharia law be the rule of the site? According to whose standards? Will non-Muslims be allowed to join, if not how will they know? Will virtual missionaries be allowed? Will the great e-umma persecute any Christians online? What about freedom of speech issues? I bet within a year of it’s start there will be a fatwah against the people running it, and certainly a death warrant. Look out Saldan Rushdie, something even more controversial is coming.

      • Huh?

        Huh? Everything you said could apply to any Christian website. Remember how the United States was originally populated because European Christian sects couldn’t stop killing each other?

        Shia Muslims (the ones who like declaring death fatwahs) are common in exactly four countries: Iran, Iraq, Bahrain, and Azerbaijan. I don’t think people in those countries are big into Web 2.0 yet.

        • http://www.whoopass.com Roy Mercer

          Huh? when is the last time a christian some killed over a cartoon of jesus?
          Or a movie?
          Or christians killed an unarmed aid worker?
          http://www.wral.com/news/national_world/world/story/3771382/

        • M

          Actually Shias don’t declare fatwahs often, Sunni Muslims do. Most famous recent fatwahs were issued by Osama Bin Laden and his crew, which are all Sunni.

          And yes, Al Qeda does use the internet quite a lot. (I am not saying all Muslims follow the Wahhabi beliefs that he does, but that doesn’t make him wrong or non-Muslim, or extreme almost all of his beliefs are very well documented in the Koran and the Hadiths which Muslims follow )

          Finally there are already many many Christian portals. None of my statements above would or could apply to any of them.

          Also we are not discussing Christians here. If we were, we could discuss the fact the the Christian religion and the Bible do not support Jihadist mentalities. Nuts do, but not the religion. Islam on the other hand does.

          FYI, I have lived in the middle East for quite awhile. They are VERY tech savvy, very intolerant, and very bigoted. (Luckily, the common person doesn’t care unless pushed into mob mentality) They will protest over cartoons of Muhammad, but at the same time will make disgraceful cartoons of Jesus, who they are suppose to call a prophet. I saw no Christians killing people over what I saw.

      • huh

        I beg to differ.
        The worst idea in history so far has got to be the one that led to the credit crunch.
        Which country is it? It’s the US of A.

    • http://sqij.com Sqij

      Can I fly a virtual jet into a virtual building in Muxlim?

      • Jiqs

        No, but you can wage virtual genocide in a virtual foreign land for their virtual wealth in the name of virtual Jesus.

        • Anti-dhimmi

          What would Jesus do? And what would Muhammad do?

        • http://www.zombietime.com Sal Lami

          KABUL, AFGHANISTAN — Taliban assailants on a motorbike gunned down a Christian aid worker in Kabul on Monday and the militants said she was killed for spreading her religion…..

    • Rupert Gretsky

      I want to see the “Virtual Virgins” so when I die, I know what I am getting.

    • name

      xya

    • http://mikemanfrin.com Mike Manfrin

      Isn’t this sort of going against Islamic law? No ‘false idolatry worship’ has been interpreted to mean nothing that portrays a human (i.e. paintings, video games), hence why you never see paintings of Muhammad. Isn’t this strictly against that ruling?

      My muslim history is a bit hazy, but I seem to remember this being a big deal.

      • LOL at you

        Numbers of ignorant comments on this page alone makes me want to cry

    • http://dailymarauder.com/2008/10/20/online-servicesinteractive-media-324/ ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA « Daily Marauder

      [...] like Coca Cola cannot afford to ignore, and the Finland-based Muxlim plans to capitalise on this. (http://uk.techcrunch.com/2008/10/20/muxlim-plans-muslim-worlds-first-virtual-world [...]

    • http://mattmaroon.com/?p=560 MattMaroon.com » Blog Archive » Muxlim, Like Second Life but With Jihad

      [...] there’s now a virtual world for Muslims. Is it me, or do the jokes just write themselves [...]

    • M

      That is correct, imagery (copying God’s art) is forbidden. Hence why Islamic art is geometric. Which is why I said this thing is going to have fatwahs written against it…

    • http://homebiss.blogspot.com/2008/10/virtual-world-for-muslims.html Virtual world for Muslims?

      Virtual world for Muslims?…

      That’s all I know for now since details of the so called virtual world for Muslims are still under wraps. Mike Butcher from TechCrunch UK has some ridiculous remarks about Muxlim’s virtual world. He said Muxlim’s virtual world will allow Muslims …

    • RacistMoFo

      Sweeet. Now I can learn how to make real bombs. I was talking about (stink bombs) farts — what were you thinking?

      Anyway there will be a FatWah against this and the founders will be dead in days. Literal deadpool?

    • Marki

      What a shit idea, virtual world only for ‘Muslims’. Why divide people based on their religious belief. I heard in UK a guy started ‘Pizza Halal Hut’ and made the entire interior of the place just like ‘Pizza Hut’ but changed the color from Red to Green. I was like WTF. Btw it got closed down in two months and when bankrupt.

    • http://www.tvosz.com Ahmed Samir

      I think it is a nice step , we all want our arabic communities to Excel and grow faster , with stable steps.

      GO Guys and hope tvosz.com grow also.

      • Mat

        Also Focus on making your community to be in Peace with people of different faiths and beliefs, rather then simply Growing them. Just as an indian philosoper has said “Growing a tree very tall is of no use, if it can’t offer any fruits….”

    • Vrfer

      You people don’t need to attack Muslims just because some of us doing something stupid. We believe there is only 1/7 of all Muslims that will go to heaven. So, simply saying that you are Muslims without doing the appropriate thing is not enough to make you accepted by god.

    • http://insicdesigns.com insic

      are they serious?

    • anon

      I think this is just a bit of fun. It is not something that will increase a muslim’s religion in any way. I see it as more of yet another marketing tool (much like facebook) that will tap into a largely misunderstood market: muslim market. It will be used to tap into the ideologies of the muslim and what affects what, how and when they buy. Soon enough we’ll have some marketing data telling us Shias drink Coca Cola and Sunnis drink Pepsi or something equally irrelevant.

    • Epic Fail

      And, just like some of their more extreme brethren, this will bomb!

    • http://www.scred.com/ Kristoffer Lawson

      I have to say I’m utterly shocked by some of the responses to this blog, and extremely surprised by the amount of ignorance. When I heard about this idea it immediately worked for me (and no, I’m not a Muslim). I can easily see how the Muslim communities would like to keep in touch with each other and discuss issues, and to bring their family along into an environment more geared to their culture than perhaps the generic Facebook stuff.

      I’m actually surprised there has been so little mention of Muxlim in the past considering the huge potential for them, and their current rate of growth. Perhaps the guys have been too busy working on the site to convince the rest of us.

      And to certain individuals: grow up and forget the stupid stereotypes.

    • http://arabcrunch.com/2008/10/muxlim-plans-the-world%e2%80%99s-first-virtual-world-for-muslim.html Muxlim Plans The World’s First Virtual World for Muslim. | ArabCrunch

      [...] 2006, is planning to launch a  virtual world like SecondLife  but for Muslims. Unlike second life TechCrunchUK reports that this idea will be more tailored to the Muslim [...]

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