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AVWW 2008 – registrations open

November 10, 2008 by Leave a Comment

The Australasian Virtual Worlds Workshop and (AVWW) is back again in 2008 and it’s looking like a fascinating two-day program. It’s being held at Swinburne University in Melbourne on the 28th and 29th November.

Keynote presenters include the New Media Consortium’s Larry Johnson, SLCN‘s Keren Flavell, Linden Lab’s Chris Collins and VastPark CEO Bruce Joy.

We’re proud to be a media partner for the event and will be covering both the real-world and Second Life proceedings. If you’ve got any interest in virtual worlds and education, health and business then think about registering.

Filed Under: Australian News, Education, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: , ,

The Watch – virtual worlds in the news

November 10, 2008 by Leave a Comment

1. The Japan Times (Japan) – Need for reality checks. “The line between real and virtual worlds has become more confused than ever. Two weeks ago, a woman was arrested after “killing” her virtual husband who had divorced her in an online game called “Maple Story.” She was arrested not on charges of murder, but on charges of illegally accessing a computer and manipulating electronic data. She was taken to face real charges in Sapporo, where the real man whose “avatar,” or online persona, was “killed” really lives.”

2. Linux Insider (USA) – Virtual Learning and the Avatar Generation. “Online learning is evolving into much more than discussions via Blackboard. Today’s online learners are spending time engaged in discussions, meeting in virtual classrooms, and combining online and on-the-ground learning, even if they live time zones away from campus. In response, universities are adjusting their curriculum, learning expectations, and changing how instructors approach topics online. One major challenge, creating and maintaining learning communities in virtual space, is testing both existing and emerging online tools. Jeremy Kemp, assistant director of San Jose State University’s Second Life Campus, never meets his students. Instead, he gets to know them through their avatars. The first thing Kemp teaches his library science graduate students is how to do basic things, like how to share information without interrupting each other, how to outfit their avatars and how to deal with technology problems, like when one avatar is in and out of class as their computer crashes and reboots.”

3. London Free Press (Canada) – Gamers, at any cost. “We are stalking the mountainous terrain on our horse in this world of warlocks, druids, hunters and warriors. Thick purple clouds hang in the sky, blanketing the area and casting it into a permanent violet dusk. Lightning strikes fall around us. Here, in this virtual landscape, where relationships are formed through pixilated images on a computer screen and a few dashes of the keyboard send us into a language with its own dictionary, we have reached Level 70 of World of Warcraft – the most popular online role-playing game on the market.”

4. BBC News (UK) – Capturing the scents of warfare. “Video games use realistic graphics and sounds to create virtual worlds. Now researchers in Birmingham are adding smells to the experience to prepare soldiers for war.
I’m walking along an Iraqi street. I can hear the sounds of a crowd somewhere in the distance.
The call to prayer echoes around as I move towards the still-burning wreckage of a bombed bus. The smell of charred rubber fills my nostrils.”

5. Emirates Business 24/7 (UAE) – A virtual victory. “While crowds gathered at public rallies and millions of others glued themselves to cable news, many spent US election night online – and they had plenty of company this time around.
Across the internet, users were discussing, celebrating and bemoaning Democrat Barack Obama’s unfolding election victory inside virtual worlds, on social networking sites and liveblogs and in online games. Others used techno-savvy websites to share their individual voting experiences throughout the day. A motley crew of election voyeurs gathered to watch voting results pour in from across the country on a giant map inside Second Life, the online virtual world developed by San Francisco-based Linden Lab where pixelated avatars fly around and interact with each other. For months, volunteers have been unofficially campaigning inside the behemoth virtual world.”

6. Gamasutra (USA) – The China Angle: China Tries And Buys Social Gaming. “One of the things that people in the game industry say is that the industry is in some way recession-proof because games are viewed as a cheaper alternative entertainment than eating out and going to expensive clubs. Of course, one still has to buy the appropriate console and software, but on a dollar-per-hour measure, it is still cheap.”

7. Forbes.com (USA) – A Realer Virtual World . “For the large majority of Internet users, virtual worlds like Second Life remain a confusing landscape of empty buildings, failed marketing and furry strangers. But Joe Paradiso believes that virtual worlds could be more than an over-hyped gimmick. They just need a dose of reality. Paradiso, a professor in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab, is working to create what he calls X-Reality or Cross Reality, a system designed to bring virtual and real worlds into a practical sort of alignment. With funding from Second Life parent company, Linden Lab, Paradiso aims to use sensors, displays and software to bring real-world data into virtual worlds and to integrate access to virtual worlds with real-world situations.”

8. PC World (USA) – Second Lifers Split on Linden Lab’s Open Spaces ‘Compromise’. “Linden Lab oversees one of the most successful social virtual worlds in existence, but it is still struggling with residents about how Second Life should be governed. Case in point: The debate over the use of “Open Spaces,” a virtual world land type that the company designed for residents to use for, common sense would dictate, open spaces like forests and water. As residents took advantage of the lower-priced land tier and over-developed and over-used the land, Linden Lab took exception at the increased CPU drain on their servers, and raised prices.”

9. The Daily Mail (UK) – Long live The King. “Next Thursday, I will be queuing at midnight in a line of people dressed as Orcs and elves, questioning what I’m doing with my life. I keep telling myself that I’ll be covering a milestone in the history of games – the launch of Wrath Of The Lich King, the long-awaited expansion for the online PC game World Of Warcraft. But in reality, like 11 million other people worldwide, I’ll be doing it because I’m a helpless addict.”

10. Dusan Writer’s Metaverse – Are Virtual Worlds Ready For Business? “When you think business in virtual worlds you think brands. The wave of polished yet mostly empty sims that followed the press infatuation with Anshe Chung’s mythic millions. And how the brands came and then slipped out into the night, the press flaks from Linden Lab and elsewhere calling the whole thing a brilliant experiment from which, heck, we learned a lot, that was the point really, this was never GOING to be the killer app of virtual worlds, keep your hat on folks, and by the way I have a sim for rent with a nice view.”

Filed Under: General News, Virtual Worlds, Virtual worlds in the media Tagged With:

The Magic Circle – is not so helpful, actually.

November 9, 2008 by Leave a Comment

“One of the more fascinating issues that bubble to the surface from time to time are real world legal consequences for things that happen in the virtual world.” Tech Law Prof Blog

“However this wasn’t a theft that happened on a street corner or schoolyard. This was a theft in a virtual world and the goods don’t even exist outside of this virtual world they were a part of.” The Inquisitr

Understanding the concept of digital environments seems to be so tricky for many people – in both quotes above, the authors are having trouble with the idea that things that happen in a “virtual world” can have consequences in the atomic world.

A term that is bandied about when discussing this problem is “magic circle”. In play and game theory, the magic circle is comprised of both physical and conceptual boundaries. These boundaries are intended to demarcate where real life and work lie, as opposed to play and game activity. Often, this term is applied not only to single player games like first person shooters, but also to multiplayer games (MMORPGs) and so-called virtual worlds or digital environments.

There are two major parties who, whether they use the term or not, have trouble with the size of their magic circle, and the application of the principle. Let us call them the Thompson-ites and the Something-Awful-ites.

The Thompson-ites believe that only they can see the magic circle – only they know where the boundaries between real life and virtual lives lies. Whether they think that other people are too naive or too stupid to realise that the magic circle exists depends on the individual. However, a common point seems to be that they expect people to carry rules from their gaming or virtual settings and apply those rules in their real lives – I shot you in a game, therefore it’s ok to shoot you in real life, too.

At the other end of the spectrum are the Something-Awful-ites. The Thompson-ites have a tiny magic circle – the Something-Awful-ites have an enormous magic circle, much larger than most other people. At the extremities of this idea, these folk actually believe that the magic circle encompasses the entire digital world, and that no consequences can or should escape from it into the atomic – see the second quote above. In a sense, they are violating their own principles: in trying to force other people not to take the game so seriously by griefing, they are breaking the magic circle they claim to believe in – they look to create real-world consequences from within the game world.

Unfortunately, the whole concept of the magic circle has been stretched out of all proportion in its application to digital environments which are not solely gaming environments. Dutch historian Johan Huizinga used the term first, in his study entitled Homo Ludens (1938). Huizinga describes play as “a free and meaningful activity, carried out for its own sake, spatially and temporally segregated from the requirements of practical life, and bound by a self-contained system of rules that holds absolutely.” He is thinking here of a game of chess or some other higher order play, rather than a child at play with a doll – in chess, the magic circle is much more clearly delineated. A child at play has a porous and weak magic circle – elements of real life and play may intersect or overlap each other.

Likewise, the magic circle for a virtual world is poorly delineated. As stated by  Edward Castronova, a synthetic world “cannot be sealed completely; people are crossing it all the time in both directions, carrying their behavioural assumptions and attitudes with them.” Elements of real life regularly creep into discussions in digital environments, whether they be social virtual worlds or MMORPGs or the like, and discussions flow the other way, too.

Indeed, the magic circle is almost always a bit leaky – any time you add other people into the equation, the circle becomes fuzzier and can only be reinforced by tightening and strengthening the gamespace rules. Elements of play move away from the imaginary and into the real.

The poor old magic circle was never designed for this kind of work. What kind of conceptual structure would you use to help us understand digital environments better?

Filed Under: Education, Op-ed, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: , ,

Single, engaged, married

November 9, 2008 by Leave a Comment

Three women friends, one in a casual relationship, one engaged to be married and one a long-time wife, met for drinks after work. The conversation eventually drifted towards how best to spice up their sex lives.

After much discussion, they decided to surprise their men by engaging in some S&M role playing. The following week they met up again to compare notes.

Sipping her drink, the single girl leered and said, ‘Last Friday at the end of the work day I went to my boyfriend’s office wearing a leather coat. When all the other people had left, I slipped out of it and all I had on was a leather bodice, black stockings and stiletto heels. He was so aroused that we made mad passionate love on his desk right then and there!’

The engaged woman giggled and said, ‘That’s pretty much my story! When my fiancé got home last Friday, he found me waiting for him in a black mask, leather bodice, black hose and stiletto pumps. He was so turned on that we not only had sex all night, he wants to move up our wedding date!

The married woman put her glass down and said, ‘I did a lot of planning. I made arrangements for the kids to stay over at Grandma’s. I took a long scented-oil bath and then put on my best perfume. I slipped into a tight leather bodice, a black garter belt, black stockings and six-inch stilettos. I finished it off with a black mask. When my husband got home from work, he grabbed a beer and the remote, sat down and yelled,

‘Hey, Batman, what’s for dinner?”

Filed Under: Email Joke Graveyard, Sex

Weekend Whimsy

November 8, 2008 by Leave a Comment

1. Knight Poderous Second Life

2. Digital Eyes Dance Fans

3. Haunted House: Report

Filed Under: User-generated, Virtual Worlds Tagged With:

6 reasons not to mess with children

November 8, 2008 by Leave a Comment

(1)
A  little girl was talking to her teacher about whales. The teacher said it was physically impossible for a whale to swallow a human because  even though it was a very large mammal, its throat was very small.

The little girl stated that Jonah was swallowed by a whale. Irritated, the teacher reiterated that a whale could not swallow a human; it was physically  impossible. The  little girl said, ‘When I get to heaven, I will ask Jonah.’ The teacher asked, ‘What if Jonah went to  hell?’

The little  girl replied, ‘Then you ask him.’

(2)
A  Kindergarten teacher was observing her classroom of children while they were drawing. She would occasionally walk around to see each child’s work. As she got  to one little girl who was working diligently, she asked what the drawing was.

The girl replied, ‘I’m drawing  God.’

The teacher paused and said, ‘But no one  knows what God looks like.’

Without missing a beat, or looking up from her drawing, the girl replied, ‘They will in a minute.’

(3)
A Sunday school teacher was discussing the Ten Commandments with her five and six year olds.
After explaining the  commandment to ‘honor’ thy Father and thy Mother, she asked, ‘Is there a commandment that teaches us how to treat our brothers and sisters?’

Without missing a beat one little boy, the oldest of a family, answered, ‘Thou shall not  kill.’

(4)
The  children had all been photographed, and the teacher was trying to persuade them each to buy a copy of the group picture.

‘Just think how nice it will be to look at it when you are all grown up and say, ‘There’s  Jennifer, she’s a lawyer,’ or ‘That’s Michael, He’s a doctor’.’

A  small voice at the back of the room rang out, ‘And there’s the teacher, she’s dead.’

(5)
A teacher was giving a lesson on the circulation of the blood. Trying to  make the matter clearer, she said, ‘Now, class, if I stood on my head, the blood, as you know, would run into it, and I would turn red in the  face.’

‘Yes,’ the class  said.

‘Then why is it that while I am standing upright in the ordinary position, the blood doesn’t run into my feet?’

A little  fellow shouted, ‘Cause your feet ain’t empty.’

(6)
The children were lined up in the cafeteria of a Catholic elementary school for lunch. At the head of the table was a large pile of apples. The nun made a note, and posted on the apple tray:

‘Take only ONE. God is watching.’

Moving further along the lunch line, at the other end of the table was a large pile of chocolate chip cookies.

A child had written a note, ‘Take all you want. God is watching the apples.’

Filed Under: Email Joke Graveyard, Kids

10 days left to save humanity

November 7, 2008 by Leave a Comment

Superstruct game.

Superstruct runs for only 10 more days.

Due to the nature of the game, it’s still not too late to join in, though some may find the task even more daunting than when the game began. Superstruct is difficult to navigate. Though several superstructs have been put together for this express purpose, there is no single, compact point from which to view the game, no easy and comprehensive way to search the collection. Additionally, there’s either quite a bit of duplication of effort, or people have not been sufficiently able to explain how their superstruct differs from other very similar efforts – this makes researching the results doubly difficult.

6452 players. 488 superstructures. Sounds good, considering the nature of the game.

Score: 8196. Current Survival Horizon: 2051. Ouch. Looks like we haven’t significantly impacted our survival horizon. Still, 10 days to go!

Here’s a random selection of superstructures, intended to give an overview of the types of superstructures that have been created thus far.

The Common Purpose Engine

“Large-scale problems do not require large-scale solutions. They require small-scale solutions within a large-scale framework.”

This superstruct is working to reduce carbon emissions from energy production while still keeping everyone fed and keeping necessary technologies running. An open-source online carbon/energy monitoring system is being combined with national systems of Tradable Energy Quotas (see www.teqs.net).  Energy usage by homes and businesses will be closely monitored to ensure that a minimum of energy is being used to reduce carbon emissions.

Badge Winner! Longbroading
The Rooftop Cultivation Association
“Feeding ourselves, one apartment block at a time.”

This superstructure relies on the concept of using rooftops, balconies and other small areas for gardening, along with the idea of vertical farming, in order to produce food within cities. They are looking for marketing folk to assist with the push to get people interested and active, as there has been quite some interest in the past with little activity.

Badge Winner! Cooperation Radar
EDUCYCLE
“Changing the world one student at a time!”

Educycle is all about giving and getting a free education. Groups are set up online through yahoogroups; then there are local groups, moderated by local volunteers, set up in participating towns. Each person shares what knowledge they have in an accessible way, and has access to the knowledge of the rest of the superstructure.

Badge Winner! Multi-Capitalism
Foundation of Hope
“Every mission needs a foundation.”

This superstructure is primarily about the delivery of hope to other SEHIs and other people across the planet. Additionally, hope is transmitted not only just by being hopeful, but by telling stories of hope, helping by talking to other people one-on-one, and by providing help in other forms – there is a section in which people can ask for help, and in which offers of help can be made.

Badge Winner! Influency
Outposts of One
“Together we are no longer alone.”

This superstructure is all about connecting people, especially those who are geographically or physically unable to connect with others. People are invited both to connect through this superstructure and to contribute ideas as to how to connect people so that no-one is left out.

Badge Winner! Mobbability
Everyday Heroes
“Everyday people saving the world.”

Join Everyday Heroes and become an everyday hero! Take a form of transport that produces fewer carbon emissions, help out a neighbour, give to someone in your area who is in need, tell stories of hope for the future, and have dinners for 12 people (12 is the limit for the number of people meeting in ReDS (Respiratory Distress Syndrome) areas).

Badge Winner! Signal/Noise Management
Assembly12
“Making casual social contact safe again — 12 bodies at a time.”

On the recommendation of the World Health Organisation to reduce the number of people meeting in any given space to 12, this superstructure is focussing its efforts on ways to implement this idea. City planners, health specialists, and people to come up with alternative ways to meet, educate and socialise are asked to join.

“Casual social contact in the time of ReDS is no different than casual sex last century during the initial outbreaks of AIDS”.

Badge Winner! Mobbability

Extended Family

“Straddling the global/local divide.”

The idea here is that people have more interest in and are more invested in people that they care for – and that immediate families and blood-relations need not be the limit of those we care for. We need to connect with people beyond our immediate surroundings and local areas, to interact with and care for people across the globe.

Badge Winner! Longbroading
Portable Energy
“Produce your own Power.”

People are encouraged to find personal ways to produce energy for running their homes, if not to produce energy for the wider grid. Solar cells, wind-farming, and human power efforts are all encouraged.

Badge Winner! Longbroading
Ancient Knowledge
“Preserving the past, connecting the present, and safeguarding the future—by conserving, respecting, and sharing the knowledge of the ancients.”

This superstructure has been put together in the expectation that there will be failures in our energy supply and/or global information systems, and that we will lose access to the knowledge we possess now. We need to prepare for disaster, and keep information, especially that concerning basic survival techniques, alive and available.

Badge Winner! Longbroading
Geocaching: 2019
“I swear! I left it right there!”

The idea behind this superstruct is to take the concept of geocaching, placing caches of goods – emergency supplies, medkits, food, batteries, information and reports – around in a distributed fashion, so that people can have access to necessary supplies without needing to have face-to-face contact. Older technologies can be used for this, so that GPSes need not be used.

The New Modesty
“Changing fashion and customs to prevent the spread of ReDS.”

Loose-flowing clothing covering the body to reduce the incidence of insect bites, face masks to reduce air-based transmission of disease and other changes to dress are promoted here. It is recommended that customs such as handshakes be replaced with the bow. All this is to reduce the spread of ReDS.

Badge Winner! Longbroading
Bright Green
“Bright Green Tech, education, and community meals.”

Bright Green technologies embrace solutions that are environmentally sensitive, but technologically sophisticated. Sustainability, literacy and connectivity are key.

Badge Winner! Cooperation Radar
Superstruct Classifieds
“Who needs what?”

We provide a classifieds system, so anyone with a specific need can easily find help within the superstructure structure.

Badge Winner! Open Authorship

These superstructures are overflowing with wondrous ideas that could – and perhaps should – be implemented now, rather than in 10 years time. However, when that time comes, hopefully exercises like this will have taught us how to cooperate and collaborate far better than we do now.

Filed Under: Education, General News, Virtual Worlds Tagged With:

Virtual worlds are big: market research

November 7, 2008 by 2 Comments

US-based market research firm In-Stat have released a research paper entitled ‘Virtual Worlds and Web 3.0: Examined, Compared, Analyzed‘.

To see the 58-page report in full you’ll need to pay US $2,995 (that’s only $51.64 per page folks!), but the overview is:

  • virtual world businesses earn nearly 90% of their money from sale of virtual items
  • The number of registered virtual world users will have exceeded 1 billion by 2012, with a total revenue of US $3 billion.

    • Ten criteria were used to rate virtual worlds, with the social networking aspect coming out as the strongest hook. On the face of it, none of the findings seem earth-shattering for virtual worlds observers. For more traditional businesses, the revenue projections would certainly draw some interest. Market research on virtual worlds in becoming more and more frequent as business sees the potential opportunities – market research businesses in particular.

    The projections put forward by In-Stat don’t seem that unrealistic given the current revenue and registration numbers – what do you think?

    Filed Under: Business Tagged With: ,

    SLACTIONS 2009: Call for Australian involvement

    November 7, 2008 by Leave a Comment

    Last week I received an email from the organisers of SLACTIONS 09, an academic research conference to be held in Second Life. The focus is wider than Second Life though – OpenSim, Open Croquet, Activeworlds, Open Source Metaverse and Project Wonderland are also on the agenda.

    The real-world aspect of SLACTION involves local chapters – currently those include Brasil, Hong Kong, USA and Europe. The organisers have invited Australian academic institutions or private research institutions from Australia and New Zealand to hold local physical chapters.

    If you’re interested, email the organisers: info AT slactions.org or check out the detail on their website.

    Filed Under: Education Tagged With: ,

    Gatheryn – MMO / casual world hybrid

    November 5, 2008 by Leave a Comment

    A potential new MMO kid on the block for 2009 is Gatheryn, the first title under development by San Francisco based MindFuse Games. They state that genre-wise, Gatheryn is “very steampunk-ish, with a deep story and setting reminiscent of the Victorian period.”

    Although it’s an immersive MMO, MindFuse see Gatheryn’s key difference as its casual gaming focus rather than long-term grinding through levels. There’s some real cross-over with casual worlds – each player receives their own virtual space (apartment) which can be customised along with their avatar. There’s also a number of payment tiers – from casual play options right through to “extended community building and exploration”. There’s also the usual MMO features like a marketplace for trading goods and skill mastery challenges.

    Graphically, it’s certainly competitive:

    We’ll follow Gatheryn’s development over coming months. You can register for news updates and future beta invites here.

    Filed Under: Alternatives, General News, Virtual Worlds Tagged With:

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