VizWorld.com

Daden Limited has a new creation online in Second Life, a virtual interactive model of the Library of Birmingham.  Using architects images and plans, Daden constructed the library on Centenary Square in second life, and included a warehouse of furniture, objects, and special features to make the environment interactive and interesting.  In addition, they trained the Library team to modify and update the space themselves.

“We felt it was important to allow the team to own the building and to be able to make the changes to the floor space and experiment with the internal fit-out rather than be reliant on Daden – and it’s worked well,” says Daden’s Managing Director David Burden. ”Every time we visit the library we notice they have made changes or added more detail.”

In addition to working as a PR piece, visitor’s time in the virtual structure is carefully recorded to be used as reference data in future modifications to the design.

Daden have also built-in sensors providing useful data to the Library team as to the routes people take and where visitors decide to explore within the Virtual Library of Birmingham. By creating a virtual model and letting users explore it we can start to get answers to the very practical questions of how a building will be used, which appear to be missed by more current techniques.

Get the full details in the Press Release after the break.

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The University of Washington’s Continuing Education program is now offering a certificate in Virtual Worlds, offered via all in-world education.

Learn to use immersive virtual environments to enhance business, social and educational interactions within all types of organizations. Examine methods for creating increasingly sophisticated virtual worlds that incorporate game theory, 3D environments and information science. Explore an emerging movement to create green workplaces by using virtual location alternatives to reduce the need for commuting and business travel. Learn exclusively in a virtual world environment through a hands-on and practical educational approach.

The 9-month course begins in October, and costs $2,625 to enroll. Looks like a broad class open to everyone from educators to programmers, marketers to graphic designers.

Kinda funny tho, that they’re using standard in-class clipart to advertise it tho.

via Certificate in Virtual Worlds | UW Professional & Continuing Education.

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The U.S. Military was one of the big consumers of the Second Life Enterprise Beta project, the “Virtual World On A Blade” project from Linden Labs that allowed people to run their own Virtual Worlds within their own networks.  It was particularly attractive to the Military because they could then lock it down to their own DoD security restrictions, unlike other “public” virtual worlds.  With it existing no more, the U.S. Army has released a parallel project named ‘MOSES’ (Military Open Simulator Enterprise Strategy) for all the orphaned developers.

Priority will be given to technology and / or military testing. “It doesn’t have to be a military project,” explains Maxwell. “If you’re developing or evolving some cool new kind of technology, like bots, for example, that would be clearly relevant to the MOSES mission.”

So far, Maxwell has assigned 18 sims for Air Force use and 4 sims for Navy use. Another 4 sims have gone to private research firms and several to individual qualified researchers. “I will keep assigning MOSES resources until they run out,” says Maxwell.

via U.S. Army Offers MOSES 3D Web System for Non-Army Researchers « Sitearm.

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Daden has thrown another interesting tool into the virtual world space with their “World Finder” application.  A nice web-app that allows you to select a combination of aspects you find important (security, configurability, public/private access, etc) and then let it recommend some options.

Which brings us to the ratings allocated to each world characteristics. These aren’t scientific. These are our personal view, BUT reflecting over 10 years of virtual world expertise and the delivery of over 100 virtual world projects to paying commercial clients. We’ve deliberately limited the parameters to 12 (we couldn’t manage 10 and could easily have had 50), but have tried to chose those which we think are the most critical in virtual world selection and which force users down one route or another (eg graphic quality varies only by degrees but in-world building is binary). More than happy to debate if we’ve chosen the right 12 (but only if you say which you’d drop), but we WON’T enter into debate about the ratings, they are just our view.

via World Finder – Daden Limited.

Science daden, virtual worlds

FCVW11 is over and they have a nice writeup of it over at the Feeding Edge.  Of course one major part of the event was the IEEE Virtual Worlds standards group that is slowing forming, but more interesting is the many uses of virtual worlds and real-world cases.  I particularly like this creative use of virtual worlds in education:

Dr Dede talked (and showed) some kids education environments that were around explore an eco system at a lake. On the surface it was a lake, trees and some overlays, but there were some innovative ideas that he helpfully referred to as “magic”. This magic is where you move from a straight simulation and help with pointers or tools that would not otherwise exist. The first was a submarine that scales you down to microscopic levels to explore the environment. The other was the ability to virtually geotag a single atom and then a HUD that tells you were it is over time as it is absorbed or moved around the environment. The “magic” layers can conflict with the “real” layers but are essential in the balance of immersive environment use. Otherwise there is little extra that the place give you.

via My takeaway from FCVW2011 « Life at the Feeding Edge.

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The Air Force has long been looking at Second Life for training and education, and a new article over on the Defense.Gov website chronicles some of the more successful efforts and what they hope to gain.

“What really drew us out to [the virtual world] was this wonderful opportunity to interact and connect with people on a global scale and with high levels of creativity,” Andrew Stricker of the Air Force’s Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base’s Gunter Annex in Montgomery, Ala., told American Forces Press Service.

“We thought Second Life was perfect for doing innovation work in the Department of Defense,” said Stricker, whose team is part of Air University’s innovations and integration division

via Defense.gov News Article: Air Force Eyes New Learning Systems in ‘Second Life’.

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The Department of Defense has been investigating virtual worlds like Second Life for several years for a wide variety of uses ranging from battlefield simulation to system monitoring.  Over at GlobalSecurity they have a short interview with clinical psychologist Greg Reger who is using virtual world to treat PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) in war veterans.  The process is something like this:

When avatars come into the virtual space, Reger said, they land at a welcome center that offers information about different deployment-related difficulties and a map of activities available in the T2 virtual experience.

“The cornerstone of the experience is when they leave that area and go into an area that teaches about the causes of post-traumatic stress disorder,” Reger said. “They enter a space where they get into a Humvee and are taken through a computer-generated simulation that includes [intense fighting on an Afghan street and] an explosion.

“As this occurs,” he continued, “they receive audio instruction about what we think causes post-traumatic stress disorder, and this sets the stage for the rest of the experience.”

Users then take a simulated flight home, during which they watch a video about post-traumatic stress. They land at a shopping mall, where each store offers an activity that illustrates a symptom and how it may affect daily life.

They don’t provide any information or statistics about the effectiveness of the tool, but they do comment that many PTSD sufferers have difficulty getting out and socializing with other people in groups, so an online tool is perfect for reaching those individuals that would never visit a psychologist for treatment.

via ‘Virtual World’ Helps With Post-traumatic Stress.

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Now here’s an interesting announcement right before Christmas.  Linden Labs, the company behind Second Life, has just announced a new CEO, and the selection might surprise you:  Format EA executive and man behind the scenes of EverQuest and The Sims Rod Humble.

“Rod is a great new leader for Linden Lab,” said Philip Rosedale, Founder of Second Life. “Second Life has become a consistently large and profitable business with a thriving virtual economy built together with its passionate Resident community. This has always been a big, long-term vision, it is still early and there is enormous opportunity for growth. With Rod’s fresh insights and deep experience in creating and leading the development of fun, intuitive, immersive entertainment experiences that have attracted massive audiences of loyal users, he’s the right leader to understand what makes us special and bring the next level of growth to Second Life.”

“Joining Linden Lab is a very exciting opportunity,” said Humble. “I have a long standing interest in the how the boundaries of society and economics change as communications evolve in new ways. Second Life is unique: it sits at the intersection of virtual worlds, avatars, and human contact. The Residents and developers of Second Life have built something very special, I am honored to join the talented team at Linden Lab to help expand this new frontier.”

While I’m glad to see someone with some experience come to the job, I’m a bit nervous that Second Life may turn into a type of open-area Arcade.  All in all, I suppose that wouldn’t be all bad but I hope they don’t begin to sacrifice features for the sake of ‘gameplay’.

via Second Life’s New Leader: Rod Humble Becomes CEO of Linden Lab | Linden Lab.

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Daden Limited is no stranger to virtual worlds, having already created several products and won a few awards for their work in existing systems.  In a new whitepaper entitled “The Future of Virtual Worlds” they look 20 to 30 years out and what they think is coming, and I have to admit it’s an impressive bit of work.  In particular, I like the graph above showing how the space has exploding into little submarkets that they believe will re-coalesce into something useful in the near future.

Over the next two decades the boundaries between these will become blurred, and related systems such as messaging, entertainment, on-line games and even the web and desktop will be drawn into the maelstrom. The eventual model may be one where the “systems” will largely coalesce around a new 2 x 2 matrix defined by private and public access, and information and experience spaces – not by technology or even applications – although the Information axis is likely to be dominated by “web” like systems, and the Experience axis by virtual world like systems.

I also love that they very clearly and early make the definitive statement that Virtual Worlds ARE NOT the 3D Web.

One thing that we are quite clear on is that Virtual Worlds ARE NOT the 3D Web, and the future of the Web is not Virtual Worlds. A web page full of text and graphical imagery is an incredibly information rich environment. The Web will remain, for the short to medium, and maybe all but very long term, the most efficient way to view, assess and interact with most transactional information and services. Virtual worlds are about immersion and community. The two are quite fundamentally different. Virtual Worlds convey experience, the Web conveys information.

The entire paper is only 19 pages long, but it’s a good piece.  They cover the background of the technology, and how the movement into “serious games” and “Games as simulations” are the first steps toward Virtual Worlds.  They also cover some of the current problems like file formats, geometry formats, and some of the infrastructure that will have to be built to make this a reality.

You can go download it (fill out the form at the top of the page) here.

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ISGTW has an article about the rise in popularity of various virtual world platforms like Second Life to replace current virtual classrooms that typically consist of little more than powerpoint slides and web forums.  The ‘virtual reality’ environments of Second Life and World of Warcraft offer significantly improved interactivity and realism, which greatly improve the student’s reactions.

“Extensive research shows that visual imagery can play a powerful role in accelerating learning. Evidence suggests that use of visual media can enhance problem-solving, motivation, understanding and the expression of ideas,” said Roger Murphy of the Visual Learning Lab at the University of Nottingham, UK.

Part of the “Immersive Education” initiative and the “Media Grid” standards group, they’re working to create a standard infrastructure to combine media delivery, storage, and networking into a unified environment for both educators and students.

via Feature – Teaching gets a Second Life.

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