Graham Sabre – Page 3

Ubrowser

September 4, 2007 by Graham Sabre Leave a Comment

The uBrowser website states that uBrowseruBrowser “is an open source test mule that renders interactive web pages onto geometry using OpenGL® and an embedded instance of Gecko, the Mozilla® rendering engine. Its primary purpose is to help me integrate Gecko into my company’s software – a 3D virtual world called Second Life.”

The developer behind this browser experience is Callum Prentice. Callum is part of the Linden Lab team and he goes into great detail at the uBrowser website on how he sees this software integrating with the content and developments going on in SL. His aim is to have “residents … put interactive content anywhere they like – the much rumored “Web-On-A-Prim”. As well as allowing for the display of regular Web pages”.

If this is the case and uBrowser achieves the goals that Callum is setting. it would bring about a synergy between the realtime interactions in SL and the semi-static text, audio, video and graphics that make up the bulk of websites.

Put your hand up if you’d like web on a prim?

Filed Under: Open Source, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: browsers, callumprentice

Victoria University joins the class

August 29, 2007 by Graham Sabre 2 Comments

Recently, Victoria University established a large holding in SL.

It is pretty obvious that Victoria University is taking a ‘from the ground up’ approach to their SL presence. There is none of the polish or professional builds we have seen with other Australian or other Universities. In fact, there could be said that this presence is akin to that of the MIT area that was set up some time ago. A lecturer and student led development aimed at learning by doing.

Visitors may at first blush be dissapointed at what they see. Objects and items such as sheep and chickens, helicopters, vehicles and bits n’ pieces floating either in water, in the air or strewn about the land. Buildings that look like they have been grown one atop the other or blocks of grey granite style cubes pushed together in a very haphazard fashion.

How refreshing! It is heartening to see SL being used for this kind of activity in an age where education institutions are expected to perhaps display polished and “marketable” product. Victoria University is displaying education in the raw. Experimentation, trial and error and cooperative learning enterprises. It should prove worthwhile watching how this initial offering in the Sl world evolves.

Check it out in-world

SLURL:

Filed Under: Australian News, Education, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: education, universities, victoria

Kaneva – tried it?

August 27, 2007 by Graham Sabre Leave a Comment

Whilst SL is arguably the premier virtual world community, there are more and more alternatives appearing. Kaneva is a contender that has been on the scene for a little while. It has boosted its “citizen” numbers to more than 550 000 people and like SL, it appears to be modeled upon the interaction between citizens in a 3 dimensional world where the kind of building and social interactions that go on in SL can be emulated.

At SLOz we would be interested in any comments from people that are using SL and Kaneva on a regular basis for either business or pleasure. Are there gigantic differences and how have you found the two in comparison?

Filed Under: Alternatives, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: alternatives, kaneva

Virtual Africa

August 22, 2007 by Graham Sabre 2 Comments

Many years ago a group of musicians got together and in the name of social justice, put on a world-wide concert called Live Aid. It was aimed at alleviating famine in Ethiopia.

Sadly, little has changed on the continent of Africa when it comes to the tribulations that befall it. There’s a very real attempt to create an SL presence that has as one of its primary goals, the linking between a South African based social justice organsiation and the virtual world.

Uthango Social Investments has created an offshoot blog site called Africa’s 2nd Life, our Virtual Reality, which is the information and news centre for Virtual Africa.

A look at the Uthango website shows this endeavour is aimed at developing projects that “are dynamic and innovative and focus on bridging the digital divide, micro-enterprise development, intercultural dialogue, crime prevention, community mental health and most importantly, infrastructure development.”

The SL Africa is a work in progress and it will be revealing to see how it can be used to help develop solutions to the problems and challenges being faced by the many countries that make up that continent.

Filed Under: General News, Landmarks of note, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: africa, landmark, nonprofit

Teachers Buzz

August 19, 2007 by Graham Sabre Leave a Comment

Teachers world-wide will be conducting another Teachers Buzz this coming Monday 20th August 6pm SLT/PDT. The meeting is being held on the LivingintheUniverse island.

An added benefit to these SL educational happenings is now the use of date and time services at Time and Date.com. Educators here in Australia and around the world now have a quick and easy reference for local times to that of the SL happenings and times.

The Teachers Buzz on Monday is being presented by Cosmo Priestman, Ourania Fizgig and ScubaChris Wollongong, with the planned program being a look at ‘The History of Earth & Life on Earth Exhibit’. This is a scale model installation work on the timeline of Earth, 4.6 billion years ago to the present.

The History of Earth & Life on Earth Exhibit can be found here.

Filed Under: Education Tagged With: education, teachers

Wrap-up of AIMIA NSW Intimates: The Future of Virtual Worlds

May 24, 2007 by Graham Sabre 7 Comments

On Tuesday evening the AIMIA “Future of Virtual Worlds” (Part 2) was held at the The Shelbourne Hotel in Sydney. Over 60 people attended from a variety of business, government and technology groups – either the first time or to find out more about SL.

The wide variety of community representation meant the panellists; Chris Collins (Business Analyst and Developer, Linden Lab), Abigail Thomas (Head Strategic Development, ABC Innovation) and Nick Abrahams (Partner, Deacons’ Technology, Media & Telecommunications Group) had an attentive and questioning audience during the panel discussion that followed their respective presentations.

The technological development’s indicated by Chris in regard to the “look” of SL through new sky rendering along with “Spatial Voice” heralds some important changes to the way poeple interact in SL. The “Spatial Voice” innovation alone should see some changes to both demographic use and the interactions of SL residents provided bandwidth issues can be resolved. to this end Chris indicated that Australia can expect a hosted server “real soon now”.

Abigail Thomas’ presentation on the success and development of ABC island was likewise well received. The island itself ranks as one of the top Australian visitation sites across SL. Abigail explained that the development of content by SL residents in the ABC Sandbox area was the most popular of the areas curently being used, moreso than the other areas that have been set up to reflect various ABC popular shows such as JTV.

(L to R: Nick Abrahams, Chris Collins and Abigail Thomas)

A highlight of the night was Nick Abrahams. An exploration into the legal ramifications of ownership, activity, authority and jurisdiction, his entertaining look at SL and the law was indicative of how virtual world technology is both a pioneering area in technology, opportunity and behaviour. He covered the recent sex and child protection issues as well as gambling and money laundering and it seems fairly apparent that the concept of SL as a game is well and truly over. With the impending regulation from world-wide authorities to curtail illegal activities, the problems of jurisdiction and legal liability is one that this technology has now pushed to the fore of policy discussions for governments.

Nick Abrahams was positive in his view of the direction that this would take and indicated to the audience that perhaps the nature of SL and its technological development in concert with regulatory authorities, would mean that those wanting to take part in illegal activities may find this difficult due to the nature of the community that SL is inspiring and the globalisation of communication.

Tuesday’s event was moderated by SLOz’ very own Lowell Cremorne. AIMIA’s first venture into conducting this kind of information gathering over a series of presentations and panel discussions was a positive for both SL and the many people that attended. Whilst there may have been some present not too sure what it actually is all about, there is a definite interest in wanting to be part of SL.

Filed Under: Australian News, Business, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: AIMIA, chris collins, nick abrahams, seminar

Australia? There is at least one in SL.

May 20, 2007 by Graham Sabre 3 Comments

Australia is an island continent, so it’s not surprising that someone would have an SL island of the same name. Tucked away and un-named in an SL search result is an interesting commercial venture that is simply called “Australia“. Whilst the island is not in the shape of Australia yet, its developer, Richard Tripp, has plans to terraform to the Australian shape in the near future.

Covering a handful of the best-known destinations for visitors this build has some important variations to other SL offerings of Australian icons.

Fancy a walk across the Sydney Harbour Bridge or a stroll around Uluru? Though the Harbour Bridge isn’t in the same league as the Telstra BigPond offering, there is an undoubted attempt to offer an alternative experience to visitors.

If the Harbour Bridge is less than expected the inside of the Sydney Opera House is certainly a different proposition. This build is a marriage of SL construction and RL photography to display 360º views from inside this icon of tourist destinations. It has a different aspect to that of the BigPond structure and gives visitors a closer understanding of the actual building’s impressive architectural attainments.

The commercial nature of this venture can be seen in the Australia Harbour Centre. Opened only in the last 2 days it is a three level mall awaiting businesses to set up shop. The build skirts closely to the look of the RL Darling Harbour.

Without doubt the developers of this island are still in the construction stage. Their project’s shopping area and Australia-flavoured destinations certainly highlights the efforts people are making to fly the Aussie flag. It will be interesting to watch their progress over the coming year.

Filed Under: Australian News, Landmarks of note, Virtual Worlds Tagged With: Australia sim, business, landmark

Kathy’s Kaffeeklatsch

May 15, 2007 by Graham Sabre 2 Comments

Australian teachers may be familiar with Kathy Schrock.

This USA educator has had an internet presence for just over a decade now and her website “Kathy Schrock’s Guide for Educators” is a popular resource which has certainly developed and changed since the early days.

Of course it stands to reason that Kathy is now exploring the options that SL has to offer educators and with that in mind she has established Kathy’s Kaffeeklatsch.

Downstairs there is a great coffee lounge adjoining a poster display of resources. The posters are, mainly, Web 1.0 links to various resources and events such as NECC 2007.

Upstairs Kathy has a more formally configured SL classroom in which to conduct Web 2.0 professional development and group gatherings.

The “To Put your Hand Up – press the fly up (PAGE UP) key. To Put your Hand Down – press the fly down (PAGE DOWN) key” when sitting in the classroom area is a reminder that in some ways school never changes, regardless of technology!

Filed Under: Education Tagged With: education, kathy schrock

SL Best Practices in Education Conference

May 5, 2007 by Graham Sabre 1 Comment

With recent media attention on performance pay for Australian teachers, it is fitting that SL has an event coming up on May 25th where “the educators in SL are gathering for the first 24-hour best practices conference in Second Life.”

The event is billed as having “REAL colleges and universities, and this is a REAL conference including keynotes, breakout sessions, and vendors.”

A 24-hour conference for education community members is indeed a first. This is but one example that highlights cutting edge approaches many educators, and a small number of Australian universities, are taking to integrate the technology of SL into teaching and learning.

A unique approach to this conference will be the use of multiple venues to cater for prim counts and avatar attendees. However the main venue is Hyperstring’s “Huge Conference Center” with a number of other venues used for breakout/overflow areas, poster sessions and vendors. Expect to teleport to various places as the conference progresses.

In-world you can contact Desideria Stockton for more information on this first for education or visit the Second Life International Best Practices in Education Conference website.

Filed Under: Education

Second Nature, or The Jean-Claude Bradley Center for Open Notebook Science!

April 24, 2007 by Graham Sabre 2 Comments

On the island Second Nature there is a science build called the Jean-Claude Bradley Center for Open Notebook Science, which is linked with Drexel University.

Dr Jean-Claude Bradley is a chemistry professor and coordinator of e-learning for the College of Arts and Sciences at Drexel University. Along with his highly skilled team (check out the credits sign next to the main door for a full listing), they have built a main island with two smaller bridge-linked ones and a gazebo over water that aims to provide visitors with information bays on chemistry, microbiology, the human genome and a number of other scientific areas.

The displays are interactive and 3D model based. Along with poster board displays, links to websites and notecard grabs covering exhibit models and processes, visitors can engage with the content of the displays in a way not often experienced in a classroom. My favourite in this regard was the Eukaryotic cell, created by SL resident Max Chatnoir, a teacher of genetics at a small private university in Texas.

Visitors can enter this cell and be treated to a feast of Mitochondria, Centrioles, Endoplasmic Reticulum and Lysosomes that surround and float past you. As Max said, “I love that cell. It’s sort of restful just to stand in there with the ATP…”

To find out what ATP actually is, like me you will have to visit and enter the cell.