Tameside Council wastes £36,000 on Second Life flop

Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council was enticed by the glamorous virtual world of Second Life

IT chiefs at Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council in Greater Manchester squandered a total of £36,665 building a virtual town hall in online world Second Life. The council scrapped the project after one year due to the low levels of interest shown in the service.

The council said it was “looking at innovative and modern ways to communicate with citizens” at reduced costs. It thought that online transactions would be the cheapest way to do this.

The figures were revealed due to a Freedom of Information request put forward by digital marketing worker Liam Billington, who asked for a breakdown of costs including monthly rent, the number of staff using the project and the cost of their time.

The information, supplied by Norman Crawford, head of ICT services at Tameside, also showed that the council spent £6,150 on a virtual museum and a further £400 on a “black knight on a horse”.

“It was a proof-of-concept project with a finite resource so we did not continue the project,” said Crawford.

He added that interest in Second Life did not grow, so the council decided to abandon plans to go to the next stage of the project.

The site ran from early 2009 and was not retained after the contract ran out on 31 March 2010.