The Inferno is Back

Back in July ,2007, I posted an entry about an educational sim that had brought Dante's Inferno into Second Life. Not long after, it disappeared and I thought: "ho hum, well that's that then." However, while off exploring today I noticed it is back. Now, it may have been back for ages, but as this is a welcome return, I thought it worth blogging about. Rather than forming part of the large NMC cluster of sims, it is now proudly on it own as the Dante's Inferno sim.

It is very much like the earlier incarnation - but rather than describe it myself, I will be lazy and quote one of the many, many notecards at you, instead:

This exhibit is meant to engage all of your senses... On each level, there are activities where guests are asked to contribute content...

Please explore all the circles of Hell. You will find notecards, activities, displays and as the course develops student generated content too. If you reach the centre you will also find details about the "Build Lucifer" contest we are running, with a L$10,000 prize. You are welcome to just walk down each level, the fall here will not hurt, but you may also catch the flying gondola ride down a level at a time if you wish.

On each level you will find rocks which offer you a chance to chat to Virgil and Dante. The conversations that result may seem to ramble, but the points they raise ask you about features of the circle that you are on, and give you hints about further learning you may wish to explore. Alternatively, they can be used just for fun!

Gloria Naylor used the concept of the Inferno to frame her modern African-American novel, Linden Hills.

The novel, and the Inferno, celebrate the results of life choices. Linden Hills focuses on the choices of modern blacks in their quest to reach "equality" and urges that "equality" is in the heart and not the pocketbook. Likewise, Dante's tour illustrates that life is a series of choices about virtue.

Unlike Dante and Virgil, once you reach the centre of Hell, you can step through the wall to enter student displays about Linden Hills. This will help you understand the book, and help you and the students understand the links between the structure of the two novels.

Dante's Inferno and The Linden Hills Classroom are property of Literature Alive! in Second Life Credits: Eloise Pastuer, Design and Content Creation, Desideria Stockton, Academic Content Designer, Daliah Carter, Assistant.

When I last saw it, students had already been contributing their own ideas as to the denizens of the various levels. However, at the moment this amusing and potentially thought-provoking aspect of the sim is missing. I didn't see any Lindsay Lohans or Adolf Hitlers! The notecard quoted above is right though. There is a lot to learn here, and many activities that should keep the Infernally Minded busy for a while. Here's a small selection of images to give you a taste:




PS: I left the reference to The Gluttonous as a warning to self!

An Avatar, By Any Other Name...

.. might be a lot happier with Second Life.

Most of us who came into Second Life out of curiosity, and have stayed ever since, are probably happy with our avatars. We instinctively associate our avatar name with ourselves - regardless of where we sit in the 'Spectrum of Involvement' that goes from the fully-immersed digital beings at one end, to the augmented reality users at the other. Incidentally, if these terms mean nothing to you, then I'm afraid you will have to Google them if you want to know more. The subsequent romp across the blogosphere makes for a long and interesting diversion!

For the more prosaic purposes of this post, I want to consider names. It hadn't really occurred to me just how out-of-step Second Life is, compared with other virtual worlds. Everywhere else - as far as I know - you are pretty much free to select your own avatar name. OK, it may need to be unique in the World, which can be a challenge. But in principle, you have carte blanche. For example, I am used to a semi-digital existence thru' my avatar, Aleister Kronos. Therefore, in all the virtual worlds I am signed up to - and there are many - I am happy to use this name, or variants that may be forced by a local naming constraint (like no spaces in the name). Importantly though, I could instead have opted to use the name I was given in the atomic world, Tim Kelly (again, subject to some basic constraints). I'm hardly blowing away any great atomic/digital divide here, since anyone who was remotely interested could have garnered this information in about... ooh... one Google hit.

So where am I going with this? Oh yeah...

Second Life marches to a different tune. It forces you down a path of pseudo-anonymity by compelling you to select a surname from a predefined list, rather than allowing you to elect for anonymity or openness. And what a bunch of surnames you get! If your aim in Second Life is to have a laugh, muck about and generally use it as a purely social environment then the disproportionately high ratio of "wacky, zany" surnames may be just the ticket. It means you don't have to employ too much brainpower of your own in order to appear interesting, when you can get instant charisma, off-the-peg, just by choosing a suitable surname. Maybe most Second Life regulars are happy with this arrangement. Personally, as a resident, I'm perfectly happy with my avatar name.

But it is as a corporate resident that issues arise. I have recently been hosting or assisting with a number of internal presentations for various company folk. The aim of such presentations is to show that you don't need to waste time and money travelling to meetings when they can be done, at least adequately, in a virtual environment. And virtual meetings are far better than the other alternatives: video and teleconferences. Most of the attendees are not out-and-out Second Lifers, but rather casual visitors, looking at the potential for using the environment as a work tool.

Now then - in proper Blah 2.0 fashion I have been eliciting feedback, to understand their experiences and see how I can help to improve them. Oddly, the recurring concern was not the awkwardness of the user interface, or the lag, or indeed any of the technical issues that I had anticipated. Instead, it was the avatar naming constraints. The general view was that the absence of real names lead to confusion and lack of clarity, while the names that were used could not really be characterised as 'professional'. When you have large numbers of colleagues using virtual worlds on an occasional basis, for specific activities or events, they are not likely to know each other's avatar names - leading to confusion and lack of effective communication. While this will change over time, the process is unnecessarily slow, when all you ever wanted was to use your own name in the first place.

There are cumbersome ways around this, usually involving a dumb-ass surname but putting your full name (without spaces!) as your avatar's first name. Don't get me started on the ludicrous costs associated with having a user-defined (in this case, corporate) surname. The point is, it should not be necessary to go to these lengths.

Second Life is coming across as somewhat antediluvian, a primitive throwback to a time when happy-clappy early adopters wanted to look funny and have hilarious names. While I accept that many, more recent residents also share these aims - it is time for Second Life to grow up, grow out and make better provision for those who don't share these aims. I am sure that it is not just business users who have this frustration.

So a note for Linden Lab: if you are still trying to be taken seriously by the business world then changing the naming system would be a small, but non-trivial step in the right direction.

(And God knows... it seems that right now Second Life could do with all the help it can get)

The Neuromancers of Google and their Burning Chrome

A lame title, for cyberpunks everywhere. I don't normally write about this kind of stuff, but as there seems to be seismic rumblings of positively Cyclopean scale in the intertubes, I thought I should make an exception. I refer, of course, to the net-wobbling news that Google have opened a new line of attack on the old World order and launched Chrome, their first web browser.

If you are a techie and into comics (and let's be honest- "techie" goes with "comics" like "Laurel" goes with "Hardy") then you can read the background documentation in cartoon-form here; some thirtymumble pages of it. But why am I telling you this? If you've got this far, you know this already!

Now in truth, the average web user is probably not going to get much to get excited about from Chrome. As one chum pointed out: what new and exciting stuff can you do to a browser? Oh, it has some clever gubbins under the bonnet - and much of this clever gubbins may well go to make for a faster, more stable and more secure web experience. But at the moment it's kind of hard to tell. I will certainly give it a reasonable run... but my first impressions are: "So it's a browser. And...?"

Of course, I am a technical Philistine, who fails to appreciate the subtlety of the Javascript implementation, and who finds the interface a little too bereft of familiar friends. However, I suspect in the coming months I will come to love and cherish this newcomer - in marked contrast to Lively, Google's foray into virtual environments, which leaves me completely cold.

Dubailand

Last week I took the opportunity to pop into Dubailand, not really knowing what to expect. Well that is not entirely true. I was expecting to find recreations of the Burj Al Arab, that huge hotel that looks like a sail, and the Palm Island, the artifical island shaped (as one would expect from the name) like a palm tree - and I did. In fact, there's not much more to it than that.

I'm not clear who this is aimed at. It has the feel of a privately-owned, non-professional sim.

Here's a few snaps:


I know it's a cursory post - but there didn't seem to be much to say about the sim.

+++

In my last post I mentioned the disappearance of the Logica island from the oceans of Second Life. A few days ago I was chatting with a colleague and suggested to her that she might want to check out the virtual offices of our parent company. These had been hosted on an island belonging to French digital media marketing company, The Blast Machine. However, when I came to search the map, I found that this island, too, has disappeared - taking with it the aforementioned offices. So is this just part of the normal wear and tear of Second Life? Or is it the case that increasing numbers of companies are choosing to abandon this first foray into virtual worlds? I'm frankly intrigued...

Whither Logica?

You may have noted that my rate of posting has dropped somewhat in recent times. Now while I admit that I am spending less time in Second Life, and when I do I am often engaged in building and scripting stuff - I think there is something else going on here. I do still spend way too much time looking for new (or at least, new to me) non-residential islands. However, the chances are few of stumbling upon something new and of sufficient interest as to justify the hassle of putting a post together. Oddly, there's actually a clutch of places I really like, but have not written about (yet). However, I sort of 'missed the moment', failed to write about them and now don't feel fired to do so.

But I digress... I think the main reason why I am finding it a struggle to locate new corporate sims, is that the flood has slowed to a trickle. Sure, I am probably missing many thrilling new sims - but I don't get the impression there is that much happening out there. In fact, it looks like the tide may really be receding - for now at least. I recently noted that BWM had left Second Life. Today, while doing a routine search I noticed that the sim belonging to Logica CMG no longer appeared on the Second Life map either.

I have not seen any announcement about this, and perhaps there is another explanation, but for all the World it looks like they've not renewed their maintenance and the island has been reclaimed. A shame, given the effort that had gone into building it in the first place.

If you know of new corporate sites - or indeed anything non-residential and worth the trip - then do let me know. Alternatively, if you know what's happened to the Logica CMG sim, then I'd love to hear.

VS2008/.NET 3.5 SP1

Don't run away... I know the title of the post looks a bit... well... tekkie. But hopefully, with luck, we can steer a safe course through to the end of this without any palpitations, hot sweats or brains turning to mush. So what's this all about? Why the weird sim name: VS2008/.NET 3.5 SP1? It seems this code is Microsoft's way of communicating with microsofties and microserfs around the globe, who will immediately recognise this as meaning: Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1. If you are non-the-wiser (and why should you be?), suffice it to say that this is all about developing solutions for Microsoft platforms. And that's pretty much as far as I go with the technobabble, I hope.

This sim is far from complete, but already there is one corner where people who actually understand anything about the above can go and start picking up information. There's a video by Scott Guthrie, author of the blog linked above, giving an introduction to the use of dynamic data in ASP.NET, and a number of presentations (see pictures below) on other such gubbins - with a bunch of links to pertinent pages, such as the thrilling ADO.NET Entity Framework Overview. (hehe... more technobabble... sorry!)

You will also find a link to Project Manhattan. No... not that one... this one. This is "a community based effort to explore the OpenSim virtual world software. OpenSim is free software that can be downloaded and used by anyone to create their own simulators and grids. This effort is supported by Microsoft... " News of the project is distributed via Twitter. If you hanker for more on the whole OpenSim thang then you should take a deep breath and dive into Tish Shute's Ugotrade blog.

Anyway - this island will presumably grow and develop. But for now, here's some snaps to look at:


Now it's getting technical...

Braving The Arctic in Inouk

Another sim that's been open a few months, but I've only just stumbled upon is: Inouk. The word has a distinctly Arctic ring to it, and the sim itself is indeed decked out in sub-zero fashion, with igloos, ice floes, snowballs and all the trimmings. The mystery of the sim's name is soon resolved - if I told you it belonged to a well-known tour company, would you be any the wiser? Howzabout if I suggested you reverse the name?

Kuoni has been providing holidays to the discerning for over 100 years now. Although headquartered in the UK, the founder of the company, Alfred Kuoni, was actually Swiss - which is suitably apt, since this sim is, in fact, owned by Kuoni Switzerland. Kuoni's first package trips, in May 1906, were journeys by mountain railway up the Uetliberg on Zurich's western side and the Dolder on itd eastern side. A year later he was offering package tours of Egypt! Since then the company he created has gone on to offer high-end holidays around the globe.

The sim itself is quite good fun, and not overly pushy about Kuoni holiday offerings. You can pick up a "Travel Book" - a heads up display that will compare and contrast RL and SL locations, offering you brochure page links for the former and teleports for the latter - and there are other freebies, like an animal rug (choose the fur you want). The most complex element of the build is the Ice Labyrinth. Enter and find the six keys (while in theory absorbing messages about holiday locations), locate the treasure and win some money! I got 20L$ - which is more than I had when I went in. You are also invited to complete a questionnaire and get another 40L$. For those wanting free money, it beats camping.

The sim is mainly aimed at "doing stuff" - like the Labyrinth - or the Snowball Battlefield: pick up a pile of snowballs, and over the course of a week, see how many people you can hit - within the designated battle zone. A rather elegant and sinuous bridge leads you across the freezing inlet that nearly splits the sim in two. On the far side is a large globe, with map pins suggesting the location of Kuoni holidays; a bar and ice piano (nice touch, that); a dance floor; a video area and an explanation of the Travel Book.

In construction and ambience, it reminded me of a refrigerated version of the TUI tour company site in Second Life - you can read my post about that here. I didn't see much sign of events - which is regrettable. However, if you wanted, you could perhaps fix that since you can rent one of the large igloos for your own shop. I don't know if the Planning Regs allow events and parties - but it would be one way of livening up the place.

And here's what it looks like:

Late News From The Newseum

While I occasionally manage to time my site visits just right - or even, just a little 'ahead of right' - one of the recurring motifs of my virtual travels is the frequency with which I make a spectacularly late arrival. Tonight's sim fall isn't this category: Newseum. I reckon I'm about 4 months late for this one... And it's not like I didn't know of its existence. In fact, I've seen it many times on the Second Life map over the last God-knows-how-long, but whenever I tried to teleport it was always shut. So often had this been the case that I gave up trying maybe 6 months ago (maybe longer than that) and it was only on a whim that I tried it this evening, while I was visiting a neighbouring sim. I have to confess, I was rather surprised to find myself teleported in. But enough of this tedious tale... what am I actually waffling on about?

To save you wading through my prose, I can point you to this post, which gives you all the news that's fit to print about Newseum and the Newseum sim. But if you want to persist with my prose, here goes:

It seems that the Newseum opened its prestigous new building on Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC in April this year - with its Second Life equivalent opening at pretty much the same time. The version in the atomic world describes itself as "the World's most interactive museum" - a claim I have no means of (or for that matter, any interest in) verifying. And this spirit of interactivity is carried across into the Second Life build - where you will find a lot to see and do.

The build consists principally of the museum itself - the surrounding landscape being a little perfunctory, in my view. There is a rather sketchy Washington Monument, but the main effort has been poured into the museum. And unlike the surroundings, the museum is a great success. It is a copy/homage/interpretation of the atomic world building - and to my untrained eye it seems to carry it off very well.

The textures and shading are well executed, conveying a strong 3D feel, and this is heightened by the thoughtful detailing in the furniture and other fixtures and fittings. The virtual museum also houses a lot of stuff - including a number of intriguing integrations with the outside world. For example, in the atrium there is a running tickertape-style headline display that seems to be current, while in another part of the museum you can read today's front pages from a number of US newspapers.

The Pullitzer Prize room is thought-provoking, providing background on some of the most iconic photos of the last half century or more. In another room, you can listen to brief histories of some the many journalists killed in the line of duty. Continuing the sombre theme, there is the 9/11 Gallery, which is also to be found in the atomic world museum, comprising cover stories about that fateful day from papers across the USA, and indeed much further afield.

Or if that is too gloomy for you, perhaps you'd like a run-through of the top Stories of the Century - or take part in a news quiz. For the more cost-conscious museum-goer there are free T-shirts to be had in the Gift Shop. And to round things off, there's also an auditorium, a studio and a couple of staged scenes (I assume so you can get a photo of yourself or your companion as 'intrepid reporter').

The build has been done by Bethany Heart and Echo Seigo, who together make up EB Creations. While they may be relatively new to this scale of building, I think they've done a fine job, and look forward to seeing what they do next. One note of concern, though - despite the interactive nature of the build, there isn't much sign of a continuing engagement with visitors, for example, I didn't see any indication of a schedule of events. With the avowed aim of the Newseum “to provide a forum where the media and the public can gain a better understanding of each other", I would expect more in the way of discussions, debates and other activities.

Anyway - here's my piccies of the build:

Scoping Out Princeton East

I have written several times about Princeton's sites in Second Life as it continues to expand its presence and, more interestingly, continues to commission work from some of the most thoughtful builders and artists in the virtual world. Last night, I popped along (again) to the Princeton cluster of sims after noticing an unusual-looking construction on Princeton East on the Second Life map. From the aerial view it seems to resemble a rocket in flight, or perhaps a ship travelling at speed, and leaving a wake behind it:



The sim turns out to be another fascinating build from Scope Cleaver, though as you will see from my photos, it is not quite complete. The only mention I've found on the web so far about this construction was on arcspace.com, which commented almost a year ago: "Princeton East, a void sim is currently open space, but a folly/ tower/ observation point designed by Scope Cleaver is planned for future development." Now, nearly 12 months later, this folly / tower / observation point/ whatever-the-heck-it-is is approaching completion. Indeed, Persis Trilling, the custodian and curator of the Princeton sims, has indicated that it will open officially in just a couple of weeks - and reading between the lines, I understand we can expect a few surprises when it does open.

Until then, I will leave you with this taster. In most of these piccies I opted for a moody, mysterious "foggy" setting:

Archidemo and Nippaku100

Last Sunday I got an email from Hidenori Watanave, Associate Professor of Tokyo Metropolitan University, letting me know that he and a student team from the University have developed a 3D image database in Second Life dedicated to Oscar Niemeyer and his work. The database is an "official art project" as part of the centenary of the first exchange between Japan and Brazil. Niemeyer, who reached his own personal centenary last year, is best known as the inspired architect behind muich of the construction of Brasilia.

According to the Archidemo blog, the current construction is just a first build, with much more to come. Nevertheless, I recommend you pop along to the Nippaku100 sim and have a look. Click on the cubes as they float past, and click on the pictures too - to bring up weblinks. It's a clever and imaginative piece of work - as hopefully my pictures below will show:




If you want more on Archidemo, take a look at my post from January this year.

Back on the Blue Pills

I first wrote about Belgian virtual world build company bluepill GROUP last October. Now, following one of those odd pieces of synchronicity, I am writing about them and their sim again. Synchronicity? Well... I re-discovered this sim some 4 or 5 days ago, while looking for somewhere to write about. I had a brief look around, but to be honest, couldn't see that I could do a quick post on something I found a tad baffling. So I consigned it to my "Maybe Later" pile, in the almost certain knowledge that I would never get around to it. And there it would have remained if it wasn't for an IM from one Paco Zagato, who suggested: "you might be interested to check out an Intercultural Learning Space. Curious to hear your opinion." Said space being on the Bluepill sim. Incidentall, a quick search told me that Paco is the owner (or co-owner) of 4 bluepill GROUP groups in Second Life, and would thus qualify, perhaps, for the title: "Mr bluepill."

So what's this Intercultural Learning Space all about then? To explain I will need to copy and paste liberally from the many informative notecards available at the site. The SIETAR Intercultural Learning Space is brought to you by the bluepill GROUP in collaboration with DIVERSOPHY.COM for SIETAR - The Society for Intercultural Education, Training and Research.

The most immediate feature of the Space - apart from the fact that it sits inside a giant, transparent sphere on which are displayed the faces of young people from around the globe - is the set of 19 quizzes., that are there to help you "explore different cultures and learn how you can deal with the challenges of living and working with people different from yourself in ever more diverse and multicultural places." I took the British test, and while I am pleased that (at the time of writing) I lead the table, I am also a little disappointed at scraping only 80%, given this should be my specialty! I could not get the American one to ask me anything - but I have captured a couple of snaps of the tests anyway. The Space is actually intended to tie in with the SIETAR Global Congress 2008, to be held in the rather wonderful setting of Granada in Spain from 22nd - 25th October. As well as being interesting and entertaining, participation in the quiz qualifies you to win a pass to the Congress, or other (as yet unspecified) prizes.

In the St Gery Contemporary Art Museum on the sim you will find a related photographic exhibition, The Face of Tomorrow, by Istanbul based photographer Mike Mike.

Asking the question "What does a New Yorker, a Londoner, a Parisian look like?" he has photographed 100 people at random, and generated a set of composite images for a range of cities. As the photographer put it, as a result of the merging process: "You end up with a new person. Someone who didn't exist before. Someone who doesn't exist now. But someone who is nonetheless quite real."

And now for my take on the site. Well, as I intimated in my opening paragraph, I initially found the Space rather busy and confusing. While the giant, transparent globe looks striking in the publicity shots, I found it made the background too fussy for my tastes. I'm not usually one for minimalism, but with so much happening in the foreground I think a quieter background would have been good. The quizzes are fun and - for all I know - illuminating, though the English is a little quirky at times; I don't normally refer to people from the USA as "Usians" for example. As well as the quiz area, you will find a wealth of information about SIETAR and a small auditorium. The Face of Tomorrow expo is fascinating.

Here's my photoset - I have covered most of the sim, in fact!


Incidentally, I am also reminded that the bluepill GROUP logo is curiously similar to my blood pressure tablets.

BMW are leaving Second Life

I was unfortunately unable to make the inworld announcement today by Munich Express, the Second Life avatar of Achim Muellers, the Head of Brand Relations for BMW. However, he kindly IM'ed me the gist of the announcement:

BMW have decided they will be leaving Second Life in the near future.

This may not be a great surprise, but I have to say I am disappointed. I hope to find out more from Munich/Achim when I can, and will bring you more when I find out more.



On a personal note, I hope this does not mean the permanent disappearance of Herr Express from Second Life, as I have had many enjoyable debates and discussions with him in the past, and would welcome further such debates in the future.

UPDATE 31-07-2008:
I thought you might be interested to see some previous articles I posted on BMW. Perhaps the most illuminating is a chat with Munich/Achim from over a year ago. While This, this and this give you a bit more historical background.

Versailles Architecture

When I saw the name on the Second Life map, I would have sworn I'd been to this sim in the past. I know I've pottered around at least a fraction of a virtual Palace of Versailles. But on a whim - or may be that should be a hunch - I decided to take a look in any case. After all - it might have evolved since the rough and ready version I visited (but did not write about) last year. What I found was... well... a surprise.

I am not sure I can bring this sim to you in all its strange glory - but hopefully I can give you enough of a flavour that you will seek it out for yourself. First things first, though... the sim, Versailles Architecture, belongs to the Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Versailles, or énsa-v. The website informs us that: "the énsa-v is one of twenty public schools that provides higher education in architecture. The pedagogical aim of the Architecture School of Versailles is to favor an intense experience in the architectural project while developing the questions of architecture in the fields of building, city and regional planning. The school prepares the students in methods of diverse professional exercises...Situated in the heart of Versailles, opposite the Palace, it is very close to the capital and its high cultural circles, but also close to the peripheral urban fabric, just between urbanization and the rural world." It has a little over 1000 students.

Second Life - with its strong emphasis on user generated content and object creation, free of many of the restrictions imposed by real world physics and materials - is a great place for budding (and practising) architects to explore their craft. They can unleash their creativity in ways which are currently not possible in the atomic world. I would cite, for example, Keystone Bouchard's wonderful experiments in 'Reflexive Architecture', which I discussed last year, or the Archidemo work by Hidenori Watanave, Associate professor at Tokyo Metropolitan University. Now énsa-v have discovered, and are exploiting, the creative environment offered by Second Life.

So what about the sim itself? As with many of these "architects at play" sites, it is very difficult to know where to begin, or indeed make any sense of what one has seen. At ground level the land is roughly divided into 9 parcels in a 3x3 grid. And all bar one of these parcels is... ummm... how do I put this? "Very busy". One parcel, for example, consists of a large "URL farm" - though at first sight you would be hard pushed to recognise it as such. Others parcels provide you with all manner of experiments using particles and scripted prims, including a Museum of sorts. The central parcel contains just a large shiny sphere. Touch this sphere and it will set you on a path that explores the rest of the build, which is constructed high above the ground. Again, links abound, and you will find student areas, dance areas, more information zones and links to other universities and colleges. And don't forget to take the rocket ride at the end of the exploration.

Actually, a large part of this sim is given over to information sharing - with various ideas being explored to bring new ways of accessing data and giving students links to web-based resources. In this respect, it differs from some of the other architecture builds, which are more focused on just exploring the medium.

I have no idea whether this description does the site any justice. I think it doesn't, since simply listing the features does not really impart the ambience of the place. But I also think you should go along and decide for yourself. Personally, I love its quirkiness, flair and imagination - though it is hard to translate all of that into a few short, stumbling paragraphs. Perhaps these photos make the case more strongly:

Innovatie Eiland

Even my tenuous grasp of other European languages is good enough to spot Dutch when I see it, and that is indeed the case with tonight's sim: Innovatie Eiland. Furthermore, I will push the boat out with a bold attempt at translation. I could be wrong, but I'm plumping for Innovation Island. It seems like an age since I last posted a piece about Dutch sims. In early 2007 it seemed hard to move without stumbling on a new Dutch build, but latterly I cannot claim to have seen many. I do realise that this sim itself may go back a long way - it's just that I have only just stumbled on it. However, I have some reason to believe it is not that old - as you will see - but if I am wrong, then this sends a worrying message about the state of non-residential, RL business use of Second Life.

It's a bit difficult to figure this place out - so bear with me. As far as I can tell, it belongs to Syntens, though the website is about as much use as a chocolate teapot to a non-Dutch speaker. Fortunately another site has all the info I need - and it's in English. Here are the salient points: "Syntens focuses on helping medium and small sized enterprises to innovate quicker, better and sooner, by being a full partner to the management and R&D directors... Syntens is a not-for-profit organisation, which operates in and with companies that want to innovate. Syntens’ advice stretches to the first crucial phases of innovation: finding the challenge and the best path for its solution."

It seems quite natural that a company with strong innovation credentials should gravitate to an innovative innovation environment like Second Life. *Phew* That's a lot the 'i' word!

Their presence in Second Life has been constructed by DNBmedia (cool website by the way), a digital media and virtual worlds build and consulting company, like Syntens based in Amsterdam.

As for the island itself, it is a clever construction, built in 2 layers. The lower layer seems to be a rural scene in present day Holland, with a farmstead set amid fields, with old churches, traditional towns and a modern wind farm on the horizon. Clever use of shadowed textures and photo-quality road tesxtures give a wonderful sense of being there. All of this is enclosed in a megaprim hemisphere, who inner surface provides the sky view, and serves to block out some the "machinery" of the sim.

The second layer is a couple of hundred metres above sea level, and comprises the same rural scene, but this time at some unspecified time in the future - presumably after all this innovation stuff has been done. The farm, roadways and canals are pimped in a sci-fiwards direction.

Use the teleport in the barn (also acting as a seminar room) to teleport between the 2.

But where's the innovation? hmmm... not sure. One thing I failed to point out is the group of open-sided spheres, floating over this pastoral landscape. The are labelled with various business areas, such as Logistics or Health. But only a few of them have any contents - hence my earlier observation about the state of RL business in SL. If this sim has been here for a long time, then it is remarkably underutilised - a worrying sign. On the other hand, if relatively new, then it is providing room for growth. Maybe someone will tell me which is true!

In any event, the spheres that are occupied seem only to carry links to traditional websites. While this is fine, it is hardly at the cutting edge of innovation. Nevertheless, the build itself is rather good, and the split "now/future" concept is very neat indeed. Here's my snaps, which I hope give you a fair view of the place:

WIKTI

I found tonight's diversion while exploring the Southern Marches of Second Life, where you will find an archipelago of French islands. It is the sim belonging to the WIKTI Project - short for the Water International Knowledge Transfer Initiative. The sim and its associated web page seem to be at an odd point in their development. At first sight, they look complete - but on closer inspection both seem to be a little way off being ready.

So what is this WIKTI thing then? Well it appears to be a project or initiative of SUEZ, whose website informs me: "SUEZ, an international industrial and services Group, designs sustainable and innovative solutions for the management of public utilities as a partner of public authorities, businesses and individuals. The Group aims to answer essential needs in electricity, natural gas, energy services, water and waste management."

In the Commercial section of the website, we are told: "WIKTI, the Water International Knowledge Transfer Initiative, was developed by SUEZ Environment to standardise and implement knowledge transfer. This method, which is ISO 9001 certified, relies on the establishment of a matrix-based organisation: vertical operational tasks are cross-referenced against horizontal functional tasks, defined according to the WIKTI maps for the 36 task processes. For each process, a Business Area Expert is given the task of identifying the level of expertise and instigating the transfer with the help of a ‘business kit’ consisting of appropriate learning tools."

As part of the KT process they are building the WIKTI University sim in Second Life. This has a fairly basic structure, resembling a quincunx. The corners are occupied by the Orientation, Learning, Conference and Information Centres. The centre of the island is labelled "Discover Wikti" and has a large number of graphics panels, depicting various aspects of water management. I assume these will eventually hook into pages on a web site, but at the moment they are mute. The build appears to be the work of French virtual world construction company Stonfield Inworld (go here for the more complete French site), who have already done work for Credit Agricole. Completion cannot be far off for this sim and its associated website - but I don't think it's quite there yet.

Here's a few snaps for you - they should give you the idea:



It's not an Earth-shattering build, but that should not prevent it from doing what it is setting out to achieve - namely vLearning; providing an always-on resource centre, teaching facility and meeting space.

What's in a Job Title?

I have recently been pondering the question: "What's in a job title?"

I've been prompted into this line of pondering by the role of Chris Collins. I am not referring to the well-known virtual worlds educationalist, whose avatar name reminds me of Nip/Tuck. I am actually thinking of the one who works for Linden Lab.

If you do some choice Googling you will most likely encounter Chris being described as "the Technical Assistant to the CEO at Linden Lab". While this may conjure up images of a geek whose role in life is to switch on the CEO's PC and make sure he knows when Outlook has a message for him, I suspect the role may be larger than that. For example, most techie button-pushers are unlikely to be interviewed by Tech Crunch. The article, dating from November last year, gives us more insight: "recently he took up the Technical Assistant to the CEO role, an interesting position in that it’s essentially an executive in training position. Collins shadows Linden Lab CEO Phillip Rosedale at all meetings and functions, and is also directly responsible for Lindex Exchange, the Linden Dollar to US Dollar currency service for Second Life. At the end of the position (6-9mths) he will then take up an executive role with Linden Lab."

In more recent articles (such as this from Reuters) it is clear that he has now taken up that executive role, as Director of Enterprise Business Systems. To residents of Second Life who have no interest whatsoever in the enterprise use of the environment, this job title might sound as vacuous as Homer Simpson's classic 'Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence'. However, for me, given that the thrust of this blog - and indeed much of what I do in Second Life - is directed to the business use of virtual worlds, this job role resonates strongly.

I would therefore be very interested to know what the heck this role entails. I can see that there is a recurring piece of blurb that appears in recent articles: "For more information about the Second Life Grid visit www.secondlifegrid.net/, or contact Chris Collins, Director of Enterprise Business Systems at business@lindenlab.com." But frankly, that tells me sweet F.A.

Is this job title as meaningless and confusing as his earlier "Technical Assistant" role? Or does it mean that Linden Lab are really going to provide some proper focus on enterprises wanting to use the environment. While some residents whinge and moan about the arrival of enterprises, there is no reason to believe that this needs to be to their detriment. Indeed, the size and strength of enterprises should be better at applying pressure to obtain the necessary improvements in grid performance, stability and capacity.

Right now I am not getting a strong sense of "Enterprise Business Systems" forming part of the Second Life ecosystem. I would therefore be interested to know how the new CEO (with or without someone to switch on his PC) and the Director of Enterprise Business Systems are going to address the shortcomings of their company's engagement with the business world.

Sigma Aldrich

Occasionally I like to see what new islands are appearing at the very edges of the great Second Life grid. These far-flung islands will, soon enough, be gobbled up as the region starts to fill - but for now they lie out in the deep blue ocean as vanguards of the advancing grid. Today I happened upon a small group of 4 such sims belonging to Sigma Aldrich, and thought I would take the opportunity to give them a post.

Sigma Aldrich is a global company, headquartered in the US, who specialise in research chemistry and the supply of "fine chemicals", together with the manufacturer of products for use by research chemists. Their website has some engagingly whimsical pages, such as the Scientific Origamists Gallery and their Design A Lab Coat competition - while the more seriously minded might want to wander into the Stable Isotopes Centre (just one of many product pages) to checkout what's available in the world of NMR solvents (I have no idea what they might be, I hasten to add).

The four Second Life sims are glued to form a single land mass. Two of the sims are at a reasonably advanced state of construction, while the other two are at a very early stage in the build process. In part, the rapid build may be due to the employment of various Clever Zebra prefabs, all the work of Lordfly Digeridoo. However, since a lot of additional items, such as lampposts and fountains, are also the work of Lordfly, it is possible that he is providing rather more hands-on assistance to the build. I am tempted to touch on his recent departure from CZ, but instead I will point you in the direction of Prokofy for the full story. It is an interesting tale*.

As regards the Sigma Aldrich sims, there is little to say, to be honest. The "corporate buildings" look suitably corporate, and the overall build seems to be progressing well. But it is really too early to tell what the site will eventually offer. In the meantime, a few pictures, methinks:


* Thinks: Dunno why I'm driving footfall to Prok's blog, as Prok seems to think I'm a total d*ckhead. Oh well.

Does Lively Look Lively?

Yesterday Google joined the virtual world party with the launch of Lively. There have been dark mutterings and rumours for a long time that Google would shortly turn their gaze on this part of the Future Web and hose it down with a mega-product of their own. Well this prediction remains in force, since Lively does not - at least on first acquaintance - fit the bill.

I have to say that my stance is somewhat jaundiced owing to the number of issues I have had trying to get the damned thing running on my PC. It still doesn't work properly, despite several re-installs, careful checking of my security settings and even an unnecessary re-install of Adobe Flash. Did I mention it is Flash-based? It is.

To access Lively you will need to run a client-side installer and create yourself a Google account (if you don't have one already). Once you have done this you are ready to visit the virtual rooms. In Lively, the "world" is reduced to a number of 'rooms' - tiny handkerchief-sized pieces of virtual real estate. Some are pre-built, but you can create your own. In creating a room you can select from one of a variety of templates. I rather like the classic "tropical island".

I've explored a few rooms as best I could - and noted that it does integrate smoothly with, say, YouTube - allowing the owner to stream videos into the room. There is a small but growing catalog of avatars, clothing, furniture and fixtures for users to grab and employ. It is also very easy to embed links to your room(s) in web pages, including (I understand) MySpace and other social sites.

And that is basically where my experience with Lively runs out. When I run the software I should see a toolbar on the screen that would allow me to select and configure an avatar, add friends, view my inventory and so forth. Or at least, that is what I have read. On my machine there's no toolbar - so no avatar, no inventory, nothing. I also lack the "chat" feature. Instead I simply see the display "Joining room..." My Lively is not so lively, then. I've checked the related discussion forum and can confirm that I am not alone in experiencing this - but also, at the time of writing, as far as I can tell, no-one from Google has actually posted any replies to the many, many queries that are building up there.

So my views are somewhat soured by these frustrations. That said, Lively is far from being Google's virtual world "killer app" and I am mystified why the computerworld blog thinks this inflexible, buggy, room-based world represents a great leap forward for teleworking. Perhaps, as Chris Carella puts it on Twitter, Google's involvement provides validation (or even, benediction) of virtual worlds, and therefore stuff we've been discussing for years now becomes mainstream "news". But this is not really a virtual world in the style of, say, Second Life, Entropia or Active Worlds. Rather it is positioned to be used alongside existing social networking to add... well... what exactly? An increased sense of connectedness maybe? You tell me.

To sum up, Lively may prove popular because (a) it is coming out of Google and (b) it can be embedded in just about any web page to "extend" the page's reach and capability. But it isn't the virtual world we still suspect lurks somewhere behind Google's closed doors.

Asahi Broadcasting Corporation

This blog is largely given over to looking at non-residential builds in Second Life - they could be corporate, education, not-for-profit or whatever. But how do I find them? Well, in truth, I find as the number of islands grows, the more time-consuming and tedious the job of finding suitable sims becomes. Now, even regular readers may be forgiven for forgetting one of the tricks of the Ambling Rambler's trade: if you see initials on the Map, then check out the sim. So many organisations use acronyms and initialisms that it is worth investigating if you see them. And so it proved with today's site. In fact, it is a cluster of 4 sims - but the one that caught my eye was the enticingly entitled: ABC.

The list of possibilites was extensive, even after noting the neighbouring sim is called TV. In fact, the 4 sims belong to Asahi Broadcasting Corporation. This was easily ascertained, since it is plastered on the underside of the blimp that circles the TV sim. Originally founded as a radio station in Osaka, Japan, in 1951, ABC now broadcasts both radio and TV to around 20 million people. And that about taps out my knowledge of the company.

The 2 principal sims (ABC and TV) are rather splendid - at least to someone who likes both rich immersive textures and well-made Japanese sims. To be fair, not a great deal happens on the sims, given the amount of real estate available. ABC features a nicely made office block (though there is limited access to the interior) and a set of teleports to locations around the block where you can acquire a variety of free branded vehicles. Though the ads have the number "100" emblazoned on them, I did not seem to be charged for the pleasure. I can recommed the wheeled vehicle, but I found the aeroplane a nightmare! Most striking about this sim though, is the near photo quality of the textures.

The TV sim is rather more exotic. A large ... what?... (hmmm... words... what words to describe it?...) blue, fluroescent sci-fi ziggurat dominates the sim. Within this, somewhere, is a splendidly realised theatre. You reach this via a nifty teleport, which bears a small amount of explanation. To use it - simply walk on to the square plate of the device. You will be instantly boxed in by blue walls. Now use Right-Click and select "Sit" to operate the teleport. All this is explained in Japanese, with pictures, but there's no harm in explaining it. Also around the sim are 3 blue "studios" - I won't explain these, mainly because I can't - plus it might spoil your own discovery. Finally there's a sandbox and freebie station, where you can acquire a cartoony avatar. At least, I think that's what it is - I've not unpacked it yet.

The other 2 sims are still basically empty, so I won't bother describing them yet. Using my yardstick that the more pictures I take, the more I like a place, I can safely assert that I like this place (14 pictures). Oh, I'm not saying it's cutting edge - or that it engages with the virtual world community - or that it does a great job for ABC. But I really like the build. Kind of reminds me of Electric Sheep builds of yore. Oh, and if you can tell me about the builders responsible, then I'd like to hear that. In the meantime why not have a look?

The Triptych at Princeton North

I have a largely visual treat for you today, courtesy of Poid Mahovlich, who has produced yet another interesting piece of work on one of the growing cluster of Princeton sims. I've talked about Poid's stuff on these sims before, but I think this takes things to a new level.

Poid commenced work on Triptych around 6 months ago, and launched it at the end of June (or thereabouts). As the name would suggest, this is an immersive installation in 3 parts, accessed through a common portal. The parts are labelled 1) Gossip Death of an Avatar, 2) Binary and 3) elit-sim. At first I had a problem picking up the thread connecting them, and to be totally honest I'm not sure that there is one. But more of this anon. Let's consider each of the parts first. If you've not yet visited the sim, do be aware that it is not a mirthtastic, laugh-a-minute, rollicking roller-coaster of rumbustious fun. I do suggest you follow the advice to set your daylight settings to "midnight".

Gossip is dedicated to a friend of Poid's who was hounded out of Second Life by gossip, lies and insinuation, and whose live (both atomic and digital) was made a misery. A steady drizzle of gossip (the word actually pours down and through you) forms the backdrop to a couple of remarkable constructions. One resembles an orrery, and seems quite benign; the other is a disconcerting circle of whispers, some consuming you with incandescent fire, and all the while you are poked and probbed (and even impaled) by rods emanating from the centre of the circle.

Elit-sim is a commentary on elitism. As the accompanying notecard puts it: "Elitism - The belief that certain persons or members of certain classes or groups deserve favored treatment by virtue of their perceived superiority, as in intellect, social status, or financial resources. There is NO room for elitism in art in any world." Both this and Gossip I suppose represent aspects of the dark side of existence, and in particular the oddly enhanced and speeded up existence to be found in virtual worlds like Second Life.

This not-so-neatly segues us into Binary, the final part of the Triptych. This is inspired by Snow Crash, which is often referenced as a key influence on the development of Second Life, and particularly "Chapter 8 - Black Sun Passport - Stepping Through the Stargate." A black room ripples and dances with noughts and ones. Aside from acting as a metaphor (and nod in the direction of The Matrix) that everything you see in virtual worlds is digital, I am not clear what this is about. But Poid does say that (if pushed at any rate) this does provide a common thread linking the other parts.

It's a great build. Sombre, certainly, but also full of texture and detail. It should be on anyone's "must see" list - though perhaps not on Day 1 of their new Second Life. Give it a few days, eh?

It is also worth mentioning 2 other people: Talia Tokugawa, who provided additional scripting for the build and Persis Trilling, responsible for Princeton's Second Life and more importantly, curator and mentor to the group of artists who have produced such fascinating works on these sims. Here's my pictures - which I hope whet your appetite: