@dusan Just wow.

Anyone who understands all the positions in this thread is a genius. Anyone who thinks they know which one is “right” is an idiot.

1) The struggle between immersionism and augmentism remains an open challenge, and one that I’d love to have more time to explore more; I sometimes call your notion of “the avatar spilling over to the real world” as post-immersionism — the notion that we’re slowly transcending the concept (and Henrik Bennetsen will have to write a new masterpiece about it!) and basically questioning everything, but backwards: the digital self grows in importance and outshines the physical self.

My immersionist friends hate this definition, because it just addresses the self, not the space — and, according to them, we have to look at both. So the virtual space in itself is the object of immersionism, and post-immersionism, since it “spills over” to the physical world (I hate to call it “real world” since it’s as conventionally real as the virtual one), is a concept that tends to break the “rules of immersion”. In a sense, they claim you cannot be an immersionist if you have the same rules in the virtual and the physical spaces. My own thoughts go more after the definition of immersionism as the relationship between the self and the space this self inhabits. In that regard, the immersionist is someone who accepts that the self that inhabits a different space behaves according to the rules of that space (meaning that different behaviours will lead to different “rules” in a space). But it also means that I’m fine with the notion of a “self” that transcends the convention on what is physical and what is virtual — ultimately, both are merely conventions that we all happen to agree on — and this would mean that not only the physical world (aka “RL”) will shape and model the virtual world, but that the reverse also happens, and this is happening already in Second Life (and possibly other worlds too).

Prokofy is, as always, a pragmatist If your paycheck is in L$ and you can feed your physical body with the earnings you get in L$, you’re an immersionist. That’s an excellent definition, since it’s quite clear to understand without a PhiD The only snag I have with it is that this kind of immersionism requires one of three things to happen: either prices inside SL rise to the levels of prices in RL; or prices in RL drop dramatically; or you’re actually able to create the equivalent of a super-mega-corp in SL which allows you to be a L$ millionaire, but making barely enough to feed your physical self. Like in the real life, millionaires are quite rare in SL — the difference is that people who are not millionaires in RL don’t starve to death

This leads me to 2) which is really the “split” between “Second Life Enterprise” and “Second Life As We Know It”. Let’s skip the technological and commercial aspects for a moment — Nebraska is just LL’s reply to offerings by Forterra or Blue Mars, and their own product to compete with OpenSim as an alternative. That’s the driving force behind it.

Does it make sense? Oh yes, but it might not be so obvious. Let’s face it: Second Life is at least 99% residential use, and at most 1% corporate/institutional. No matter how big the share of the corporate/institutional will rise in the near future, it will not really affect the major use of SL, which is really residential, and will not change — because every employee or student/teacher that comes to SL (inside their “boxed” world or not) will ultimately be a residential user as well. More corporations/institutions will simply make the number of residential users to grow, too — even the more die-hard corporations behind their firewalls will not be able to prevent their employees, once they get the taste of SL is all about, to create a non-corporate alt and log in to the main grid

So neglecting 99% of the market is definitely not going to happen, and it won’t happen for ages, no matter how the “Second Life Enterprise” market grows. Sure, we can imagine that in a decade or two, “Second Life Enterprise” might be such a profitable venue for Linden Lab that they create a spin-off company just to deal with it — but they won’t “kill” their cash cow, which is the residential market…

It’s not just “innovation” that will continue to happen on the “main grid”; what we call “Second Life” will only happen on the “main grid”. Corporations will really not care about it at all, they have their own specific uses in mind — because if they don’t have it, they’d be on the main grid instead

Virtual World Developer: Business-to-business developers who create solutions and opportunities for their clients via platforms like Nebraska. These can be private behind the firewall things or private estates (or, a lesser case now, although I actually see this growing rather than shrinking) a publicly accessible location within Second Life, kind of like a Metanomics for business or whatever.

You are spot on with your comment that publicly accessible locations within SL will be growing–especially in light of the conversation above about evolution. The bulk of innovation is likely to continue in SL proper, making public locations for community and collaboration even more important. I hope that Linden Lab will continue to support this aspect of Second Life, which will be essential to the success of behind-the-firewall environments. Where else will new ideas and new clients come first?

I doubt the majority of people in SL.com will even know it exists. It will have no direct interaction; no touch points and is a totally different proposition.

The one thing we’re all missing here? What do we actually mean by Enterprise? The confusion comes when we mix that word with ‘SL business users’. The reality is that Enterprise – to the majority of the SL community eyes and ears – will be invisible and not in the public domain.

In the same way, 95% of our clients who are using Immersive Workspaces are doing so in a B2B capacity. Therefore, it’s not going to be on the SLer’s radar. Or more importantly, the clients don’t want this in the public domain as it’s under NDA and being run privately. It’s tough for us, as we would love to talk about some of these projects. We do though have to respect the client’s wishes. The majority of what we create as a bespoke solution is based on their own IP, proprietary data or information. I have mentioned this before, for the first time, Second Life is not one thing to all people under one umbrella offering. This is different. Separate.

My suggestion:

I’ve had a few emails asking about supplying prim-based-content for the IWS behind-the-firewall solution. What I think will happen when this all launches? I don’t know all the answers; we’re hoping to learn fully what’s happening on the 4th.

We know something’s, but not everything.

I would though like to offer an educated guess.

As it has been with managed-hosted sales (private estates created with no connection the SL), Content and Objects will be supplied by a ‘solution seller’, who can offer the client the project management, strategic design skills and the overall running of application/tool development.

The opportunity will come from *Artisans* (content developers) who offer their skills as creators of bespoke niche specialty objects. Design skills that are beyond the scope of the SL Developers team.

This is a great opportunity, as it extends the market for content developers.

We employee these designers on a daily rate basis, which means we have a design roster of people who are making a very good yearly salary. What has always amazed me, is how few and far between these designers seem to be. This is a major opportunity, especially when you consider there is supposed to be over 250+ SL Developers as registered developing companies. All trading.

On that note, if you’re a designer, do drop us a line as we’re always looking for good people.

So bottom line?

No ‘Chinese Menu’ options, it will be a “solution sale” with objects being created as and when needed as a specialist bespoke service. The Enterprise clients are not looking to buy individual ‘chairs’ or a ‘business suits’. The solution will contain the ‘given content’ as standard e.g. a chair, desk etc. They’re looking for a relevant application/solution, one that addresses a specific challenge/opportunity within the Enterprise e.g. training, on-boarding, planograms, research space etc.

Justin Bovington
CEO
Immersive Workspaces – Rivers Run Red

For better or worse, the closest media for virtuality being revalued is the open sims beings hacked away at and the unity3d application. Perhaps the O3D or Mozilla3d efforts will expand(though they seem far from offering MU presence) and the actual biz plans for both havent been “transparent”..lol though Google did flood the net with 3d media gotten for FREE, and that WORK has yet to be monetized….i wonder who’ll have the rights and capital to use it..lol?

this last cycle of REALTINE 3dmedia is just about over,the SL version- the labs soci0-economic experiment using real humans – has lost its value to even the most religious it seems as the blogs daily report.

The SL flavor of virtuality has also educated and hopefully illuminated many. The next cycle is only a year away, what will have been learned? What will be done?

Maybe nothing? Corporates do seem to have billions spent today on 3-9 year olds learning how to do work, not for value, but to BE valued.

Im a +36 Doctor. Oh she MUST be good…

another scam. dont you think?

And that means that they must eschew the Linden dollar fantasy and put real value on what they make in world. Immersing themselves in the fantasy has only devalued their work, as Cube always points out. It has given people the false notion that the little virtual toy they buy is worth only RL equivalent of 50 cents when the work and programs behind the toy cost so much more.

There are residents even now pushing for bleeding more funny money Lindens into the world. Which will only cause more devaluation, as products lose value in translation.

SL is not separate from RL. Immersion is fun to an extent. But at the end of the day, we all need to eat and live in real houses.

What companies would like to push is immersion for us and real world profit for themselves.

- Enterprise demand for Nebraska content won’t kill the creative edge of Second Life any more than Big Label music kills the Indie scene.

- Paying higher rates to content creators that allow for a living wage is a GOOD thing.

- Corporate providers of technical services today (coding, design, etc.) customarily charge 5-10x the going freelance rate.

- If corporate worlds catch on, traditional in-house and dedicated multi-media shops will add those capabilities. I would expect it to eventually mirror the freelace-to-agency-to-in house ratio.

I’m glad you brought all that up. You’re right, and I was really trying very hard to articulate that while Nebraska will open up new kinds of opportunities, those opportunities are unsustainable in the long-run if the Lab walks away from the land and content-based economy of Second Life.

If they do, they risk platforms like Blue Mars sucking up talent for ‘casual users’ and students maybe, while Nebraska sucks up content for corporate clients.

I’m not naive about this. And if anyone, myself included, makes the claim that it’s an “all boats rise” or whatever for everyone it’s a lie.

I’ll try to be totally transparent about this. Because here’s how it works:

- Let’s say I get a corporate customer. I’m going to need to make stuff for them, or resell stuff, and I’m going to need to find talent to do that. I’ll probably be able to pay that talent market rates, or at least rates that are above what someone might make selling prefabs or whatever in Second Life.

- Once those projects are done, I won’t need that talent anymore, unless other projects come along, at which point I may have something to resell, or the technology has changed and now I need MediaAPI kiosks or something.

- So, what ends up happening, is we end up with these ‘big builds’ that take talent away from the ‘normal SL economy’ but the talent is happy, because they have decent paying contracts (maybe – depends who you’re working with).

Now, this to me is the living proof that the Long Tail is a crock, quite frankly.

Sure, there’s a Long Tail and we can make bank on it, but the truth of the LT is that power still aggregates in the hands of a few. Power and commerce are like that – stuff doesn’t become universally ‘free’, there’s always someone out there with the interests, resources and power to aggregate that free stuff and make money off of it.

Open source starts free, and then power around open source aggregates in a handful of service providers who make the ‘big bank’ while all the coders and stuff try to pick up scraps in the long tail.

The trick to all this, however, is that innovation isn’t static, and just because power and money aggregates, doesn’t mean that it will stay that way forever – because the innovators aren’t usually the groups with power, they end up with entrenched interests, they want to suck as much as they can out of their ‘usual way’ of doing business. (There are a few exceptions like Apple, say).

So, the benefit of having the ‘little guy’ is that they can still push the envelope of innovation, they can still upend the business models of those who are in ‘power’.

So let’s take your example of content. Sure, you can buy a chair for $2 or whatever. I don’t think there are many content creators today who are charging $500 for a chair. The long tail for that kind of content has been established – there’s a bunch of folks making stuff but the power has been aggregated at Linden Lab, mostly, through XStreet, and maybe the service providers who package it all up and sell it along with ‘services’ or ‘environment design’ or whatever.

But innovation doesn’t stand still. We’ll get a MediaAPI, for example, and the ‘aggregators’ will make some cool stuff with it, but it will be someone on the Grid who’s trying to make a new vendor idea who comes up with that new app that changes the game – Scion Chickens, self-replicating/tweeting flowers, whatever.

So: my bottom line? Yes…you’re right, and I never disagreed with you.

The greatest risk of “business on the grid”, whether it’s behind the firewall or on private islands, is that it changes the balance between craft and commerce, between in-world and out-world sales.

If the balance shifts too dramatically in the direction of corporate interests, it risks choking off the innovations and transformative change that happens because there IS a world, and the world is/will grow, and there’s a robust economy underpinning it.

(Which is why content protection and all that is so critical, and why they can’t pull the rug out on land prices like they did with homesteads).

Anyways….I’m not naive to the fact that Nebraska represents a parallel economy that could undercut the in-world one, and I hope the Lab isn’t naive to that fact either, nor to the true meaning of that.