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The Archives
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03.06.08Verizon Creates Virtual LoungeFurther proof of the convergence of hardware, worlds, and experiences, and moving towards a time when micro virtual worlds are common features on Web sites rather than distinct destinations of their own, Verizon announced the creation of its own virtual lounge and sweepstakes giveaway. Verizon is, in essence, reinventing the classic prize giveaway by creating a virtual gaming zone that looks like a living room. Contestants aim to win a match three game, which sounds simple enough, but play the game in the confines of a heavily branded Verizon environment. Movie trailers are shown and icons link out to information about ...
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02.13.08Bionic Eyes on the HorizonYour eye may soon be home to a virtual universe.Engineers at the University of Washington in Seattle have revealed they have successfully created a flexible contact lens with an imprinted electronic circuit and lights. In practical terms, this could assist drivers and pilots, who could receive information such as weather and route conditions sent to this screen that would overlay the eyeball. In impractical terms, however, the possibilities of this technology for visual stimulation are far-reaching, as new games or 3D worlds could be developed directly for this small virtual display
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02.11.08Emory Virtual Worlds – Business & Government Session (Panelist Intros)Second session at the Virtual Worlds Conference at Emory covers the 'collision' of virtual business and virtual government. Panelists: Meeting the panelists: Byron Reeves, of Stanford - psychology of self representation - how can we take some of this 'primitive engagement' energy and use it in serious contexts - not so much learning and simulation environment, but how to actually do serious work in virtual worlds - non-visual things you can do...e.g. non visual games, synthetic currency via email Rachel Gibson, University of Manchester - looking at election campaigns online and use of Web and email - moving into virtual worlds opens up new possibilities - more abstract idea that there ...
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02.11.08Emory Virtual Worlds Live Report II – Session 1 SummaryMorning session saw a general discussion of virtual worlds, their potential - CNN chipping in on their success and experience, taking the "right" attitude of recognizing that users are looking to entertain themselves, so how does a news/entertainment company let them do that. Castranova pitching the concept that it's the immersive worlds that hold the deeper source of current economic value and worlds like Second Life isn't meeting its deeper potential. He seemed to be making the argument that virtual worlds are places that you "go" not places that supplement the real, although he nodded sagely as IBM made the comment ...
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02.01.08Augmented Reality: Merging the Virtual and RealSean Fitzgerald summarizes a few examples of integrating virtual worlds and objects with the real, picking up on the work out of Georgia but also showing an example of integrating virtual 'feeds' into video feeds. The following demo shows integration of animated/virtual objects, and you can imagine applications for education. Rather than using a green screen approach to capturing a video feed and then layering Flash or animation layers (either on the fly or in post-production), this allows live capture. Really interesting work, and combined with the "virtual glasses" from Georgia yet more evidence that the terminology of virtual worlds will continue ...
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01.31.08Virtual Worlds Just Like the RealMetaverse reports on Virtual Worlds, a company out of Singapore that will offer accurate 3D walk-throughs of real worldwide locations. Called Mirror World, the technology will launch at the end of this year and will target tourism operators. In essence, the company hopes to create a virtual version of any place in the world that travel interest demands. In the press release, Virtual Worlds touts its ability to to create environments that are as “life-like as possible” and “expects to completely map the globe in phases.” The concept of the Mirror World might make sense if it crosses over to the real ...
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01.31.08Scenecaster’s 2.5% Daily Growth – The Quiet AppScenecaster deserves a second look - with all the talk of virtual worlds, Metaplace, Second Life, OpenSim, Kaneva and There.com, GigaOM reports that Scenecaster is reporting growth at 2.5% a day. I previously covered Scenecaster and included this assessment: What’s interesting (about Scenecaster) is that the object, in this case a stool, is tagged to search results from Google, eBay and Amazon. This is one of the things that’s attracting academia to initiatives like Croquet - the ability to link virtual spaces into shared reference pools. They may not want to link objects out to eBay, but they MAY want to link ...
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01.29.08Harvard Business Review Spotlights Second LifeHarvard Business Review has tagged virtual worlds as "Breakthrough Ideas for 2008" in its current issue (February 2008). In its annual round-up of ideas that "capture 20 transformations at single points in their development" virtual worlds and related development, wide coverage is given to virtual worlds, including a spotlight on Second Life. More commentary to follow, but briefly the issue includes the following topics: The Metaverse as TV of the Future Using Second Life as a specific example, one of their top trends paints a picture of virtual worlds as being a wave that may very well wash away the "traditional Internet" like TV ...
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01.29.08Real World as Virtual – Scientific ViewA scientist answers questions about the maximum speed of light and God's existence by claiming that the real world is actually virtual. ComputerWorld magazine recently profiled Brian Whitworth, an information scientist out of New Zealand who recently published a paper entitled “The Physical World as a Virtual Reality” that has generated tremendous attention and discussion on blogs. The article discusses responses from bloggers at the New Scientist blog and allows Whitworth to respond to some of New Scientist challenges. Whitworth’s article argues that the universe is a ‘virtual reality created by information processing,’ and is a system that requires booting up. Whitworth ...
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01.28.08P2P Virtual World – SolipsisWayne Porter has an extended summary of research on Solipsis, a peer-to-peer virtual world platform developed out of France: Solipsis is a free and open source system for a massively multi-participant shared virtual world. It was designed by Joaquin Keller and Gwendal Simon at France Telecom Research and Development Labs. Its goal is to provide the infrastructure for a “Metaverse-like” public virtual territory. Once again taking scalability into account it relies on a (P2P) peer-to-peer architecture sothat the virtual space has the potential to be populated by an “unlimited” number of participants. Thanks Wayne. I wish I knew what even half the ...
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