Disclaimer: As with everything on my blog, the opinions expressed here are mine and do not reflect on Clever Zebra, the vBusiness Expo, my friends, my family, my blip channel, any of the other “Jack of All Strange” stuff that I do, etc etc etc… k here we go:
Want to Hold a Virtual Event of Your Own?
Clever Zebra offers event support and white-label services for anyone interested in a branded gathering in a virtual space. Everything from venue setup and hosting to VIP orientation to speaker coordination.
Sulake Bringing Bobba To Mobiles
The “Habbo-killer” hits mobile devices. Are parents really buying kids cellphones and subscription packages that support online play?
What is Second Life?
Examiner.com introduces Second Life to its readership using the metaphor of a garden. The machinima is quite nice.
Second Life finding new life
A fun overview of the very stupid press Second Life has been getting. Interesting statistic: “The number of “active users” at Second Life has grown 25 percent since September of last year, while the amount of time and money spent in the virtual world has climbed by similar percentages.” If this wasn’t proof that Valleywag jumped the shark some time ago I don’t know what is, and CNET continues the compulsive nose-picking expedition.
Massive amounts of news for Training, Education and Events this week, and very little elsewhere with a few notable exceptions. By an interesting coincidence this weekend was the “Virtual Worlds – Best Practices in Education” conference, which people are really enjoying.
Important links:
Archive page of past weeks of Business in Virtual Worlds News
Disclaimer: As with everything on my blog, the opinions expressed here are mine and do not reflect on Clever Zebra, the vBusiness Expo, my friends, my family, my blip channel, any of the other “Jack of All Strange” stuff that I do, etc etc etc… k here we go:
Just a side-note here about the vBusiness Expo: I had been hoping to make a major announcement this week, but we decided to change a few things around and we’re not quite ready yet. Ultimately this will all make the expo more accessible and easier to attend, but at the moment you’ll have to wait. Sorry!
Want to Hold a Virtual Event of Your Own?
Clever Zebra offers event support and white-label services for anyone interested in a branded gathering in a virtual space. Everything from venue setup and hosting to VIP orientation to speaker coordination.
Fundraising Conference Takes on a ‘Second Life’
Grizzard Communications Group holds a session in Second Life that gets transmitted to the real-world event Winning Strategies in Challenging Times.
MBA Students Learn Power Systems in Second Life
University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Iowa State University, and Wright State University collaborate to expose business managers and executives to Power Systems.
Panopticon
I just had to link them for this quote: “The essential irony of virtual worlds is that populations seeking to build new lives away from the public eye are moving into an environment that is subject to constant surveillance.”
Gaikai Bringing 3D MMOs To The Browser
The concept: all of the software runs on someone else’s computer, the video is streamed to your desktop, and your keystrokes are captured and sent back as if you’re on the other machine itself. I’d love to see how much something like that costs, let alone how they manage latency!
Avatar Reality Releases SDK For Blue Mars
Ah here we are, actual developments from Blue Mars! We’ve been hearing rumors about this world for awhile that made it sound like something between Entropia and SL, but there hasn’t been anything anyone can actually do with it until now. See the articles for the fancy features that lie in wait inside the SDK.
This was the week of non-news news. There were more stories about nothing of significance than I have ever seen. I’ve done my best not to post any of them. I may have failed here and there. Apologies.
Oh, and for those of you who had been celebrating it on Saturday, I hope you had a happy Pi Day!
Disclaimer: As with everything on my blog, the opinions expressed here are mine and do not reflect on Clever Zebra, the vBusiness Expo, my friends, my family, my blip channel, any of the other “Jack of All Strange” stuff that I do, etc etc etc… k here we go:
Worlds.com CEO: We’re ‘Absolutely’ Going To Sue Second Life And World Of Warcraft
Yes, Worlds.com is actually filing lawsuits over ownership of the concept of virtual worlds. No, Worlds.com is not making any friends anywhere on planet Earth. Yes, there are more opinions about this whole thing than you can shake a stick at… no point in augmenting the pile with mine.
Want to Hold a Virtual Event of Your Own?
Clever Zebra offers event support and white-label services for anyone interested in a branded gathering in a virtual space. Everything from venue setup and hosting to VIP orientation to speaker coordination.
Training and Education
Second Life a tool for teaching in 3-D
University of Western Ontario does some Psych classes in SL. Nice overview at Canada.com, but I’m mostly linking it for the picture of these photogenic fellas. Smile!
Webcam Brings 3-D to Topps Sports Cards
Ok, that’s a pretty cool gimmick. I might even buy some baseball cards this year. Haven’t done that since I was a kid!
Gaming
SOE Introducing LiveGamer RMT Service To Vanguard
So basically, you can now buy yourself the super-powerful character and equipment you always wanted with a little USD. Anybody have word on community backlash here?
No, There Were No “Terrorists”
The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) drops the whole notion of terrorists in virtual spaces. See the official report (PDF). I remember being completely baffled by all of these people warning of terrorists in virtual spaces back when it was in vogue to scream “everybody panic”! Glad its over.
Even as mega-banks topple, Juan Enriquez says the big reboot is yet to come. But don’t look for it on your ballot — or in the stock exchange. It’ll come from science labs, and it promises keener bodies and minds. Our kids are going to be … different.
Headlines about virtual worlds just from the last week. See the archive page for past weeks.
Seems like it’s numbers week this week. Everybody is tossing around figures relating to usage, investment, and whatever else they can think of. I’ve only linked a small number of them as it starts to all feel a bit like marketing hype rather than real information. Just remember what Mark Twain said: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
Disclaimer: As with everything on my blog, the opinions expressed here are mine and do not reflect on Clever Zebra, the vBusiness Expo, my friends, my family, my blip channel, any of the other “Jack of All Strange” stuff that I do, etc etc etc… k here we go:
Top Stories
Moggle Raising $10M for Development Platform
Moggle is working on a platform to develop at the convergence of MMOGs, virtual worlds, and social networks. Need more? They’ll be “thee first truly end-to-end browser based online game development and delivery platform”. I still don’t get it… will need to hunt down more info here. Somebody thinks the platform is worth $10M anyhow.
IMVU Picks Up $10M in Series D Led by Best Buy Capital
Whoop, I think that’s it. Looking back over the last couple of months we’ve seen constant VC investment in virtual worlds, and with IMVU getting Series D from Best Buy Capital you can pretty much call this a “virtual worlds gold rush”. “Tough economic times” be damned, investors are seeing something in virtual worlds.
Meetsee Simplifies Collaboration for Small Businesses
I don’t know much about it yet, but it seems to be a very basic meeting space that enables webcams and file trading. No idea how practical it is in the face of things like Qwaq, and jury’s still out on the effectiveness of 2D/2.5D interaction. Perhaps worth a closer look though. Screenshot:
Industry Leaders Predict Growth for Virtual Goods in VWM Industry Forecast
60+ executives and analysts from the virtual worlds industry are surveyed here and they predict growth. Of course, if you survey any professional from any industry they generally predict growth. Still, interesting reading FWIW.
Predicting 2009: Channel consolidation, more virtualization, less Second Life
Always good to hear differing opinions. IT pros have a bit of a history of detesting Second Life, preventing employees from logging in and telling executives there couldn’t possibly be any good reason for them to want to do something that’s so hard on the machines. Again, FWIW.
Acklam Grange launches 3D virtual school
A private school launches a 3D space, but really I’m just into this story because of this pic of how cool these guys look in modern polarized 3D glasses. Here they are mid-rap:
Government and Military
Obama’s Is First Web 2.0 Inauguration
If you owned anything running electricity, chances are you heard all about the details of inauguration day. Bit of a contrast from when Bush had to be rushed to the White House away from an angry mob on the day of his inauguration…
Moderne Interactive to Launch Adobe eLearning Experience in Second Life
Press release. Adobe launches a presence to promote Captivate 4 and the eLearning Suite products. Live events for the first few days, no idea if the plan is for their island to become a ghost town afterward. This is as much an ad for the marketing company, Moderne Interactive, as it is for Adobe.
Sony Electronics holds a virtual trade show
Notably not held in the Home platform, but rather in the InXpo space. Guys, if you can’t fake confidence in Home then how are the rest of us supposed to? Anyhow, interesting quote here:
Normally, Shapiro said that the company would do a road show across 15 cities, talking to 200 to 400 people at each single-day event. Shapiro guessed that the virtual trade cost less than 50 percent of a real world event, not to mention that most of the virtual trade show material can be reused.
Meta-Mole Launching Searchable Index for Virtual Worlds
“a searchable directory of developer-submitted information on virtual worlds,” along the same lines as MMOGCHART I suppose but with user-submitted content. We’ve seen projects like these come and go over the years, but this one may have a shot. We’ll see!
IBM Demoing Sametime3D for Brainstorming in OpenSim
IBM translates Lotus Sametime into 3-space. Interesting that they’re throwing support behind OpenSim rather than that firewalled Second Life experiment they had run awhile back. Demo video:
