Virtual world industry leaders forecast 2008

VWN is offering a report that details the response of 45 virtual world managers and leaders to a five-question questionnaire that asked:

1. What are your top 3 trend predictions for 2008?
2. What business goals have you set for 2008?
3. What challenges do you expect 2008 to bring for the virtual worlds industry?
4. A number of new platforms are launching in 2008. What are the biggest impacts this will have on the industry?
5. How will the above changes affect your specific segment of the industry in 2008?

To order the Virtual Worlds Management Industry Forecast 2008, simply send an e-mail to to address listed at the former link and you'll receive a PDF copy of the report in your e-mail.

I found this a fascinating read and I'll have to read it again to compare the disagreeing statements. A number of the respondents were at the recent Virtual World Conference in San Jose and I appreciate the chance to read what they had to say. As you might expect, some had very different opinions regarding the upcoming months. I also noted that education seemed to figure prominently in a number of forecasts as did the expected strong growth in virtual worlds for children.

My only druthers for this report would have been to have the company name repeated after the name in each response since I don't know all of the responders by name and I couldn't follow their association with the industry from question to question.

Newbie ponders what "there" is of IBM's and Cisco's Second Lives

Computerworld writer Gary Anthes was tasked to do a piece on Second Life, which, after spending nearly a week of his time within the simulation, he titled Second Life: Is There Any There There?

Within this piece, he is somewhat critical of the corporate presence within Second Life, having had a rather empty and underwhelming experience at the islands built by IBM and Cisco.

"Knowing my editor would ask me about practical IT applications, I sought out a virtual island owned by IBM. To get an idea of how exciting this place is, imagine a 1950s-era IBMer in a starched white shirt and tie with a "THINK" sign hanging on his wall."

Part of his frustration was his failure to find any company representatives to talk to about goods and services, or to just answer questions.

"I returned to IBM's main island determined to find an IBMer who could answer some questions. I didn't find such a person, but I had a long chat with a well-dressed wolf who said he was from FurNation. He said he was only there to use the public "sandbox," which is provided by IBM, to build things."

And failing that, finding any person was a welcome respite and at least a chance to ask some questions.

"I told him I was trying to find out if companies in SL made any money. Virtual companies make real money, he said, 'selling furry avatars, sexual bits, weapons and the like,' while real companies like IBM only advertise and recruit. The wolf was not applying for a job at IBM, it seemed, but he thanked IBM for providing the sandbox."

And of course, all of this begged the question of what function did all this corporate presence provide?

"Still fretting about bandwidth, I traveled next to the Cisco Virtual Campus and walked into the Cisco Training Center. A sign indicated that it was for use only by Cisco partners and employees, which raises the question of why it's on the public Internet and not on a Cisco intranet.

In any case, I found neither partners nor employees in any of the training rooms, and no books, computers or training materials of any kind. Never had it seemed so reasonable to ask if there really was a there there."

Though he did have a relatively better experience at Sears, the author I take it was not impressed with corporate presence within Second Life, or that much with Second Life itself for that matter. Some of his advice:

"Each major company location in SL should be staffed with a real person, at least during business hours. If some friendly and attractive avatar at the Cisco center had approached me and said, "Yes, sir, how may I help you?" and then had given me useful answers to my typed in questions about training, employment opportunities or products, I would have fallen out of my chair with amazement and delight."

So what do I make of this? I'm not sure where the subjective "attractive need play into this. Well-groomed would do for me. Otherwise, I think it's a good piece. And it's original. As far as negative criticism goes, it's not some regurgitated bit of anti-hype backlash. Nor is it a piece written to reclaim credibility damaged by over-reaching optimism by riding the pendulum swing going the other way. I wouldn't even argue that it's all that negative. I don't think this writer had any axes to grind. I think he came to the assignment with a fairly neutral standpoint. What Anthes is describing here is a very typical regrettable newbie experience. (And it probably didn't help his experience that some web links were broken).

If you read the full piece, you see that he spends at least two days of his assignment just trying to learn his way through the interface and figure out how to find places. Out of desperation, and having wasted time through misunderstanding and bad advice from another confused newbie, he buys a book. Now, if he had me to help him out, I could have handed him a Notecard with some landmarks to visit later, maybe even checking out a couple places with him. I could have taken him to New Dove and New Citizens Incorporated (NCI) to get him started on his own look and get him hooked up with help resources, even classes if he was interested.

But Anthes didn't have me there to help him, did he. He, like most newbies, was left stranded in an empty virtual landscape having to rely on people just as new, confused, and ultimately as bored and frustrated as he came to be. Experiences like his are one of the reasons that though Second Life can claim millions of registrations, they can only muster an active user population of 30,000 - 55,000 on most days. People try it, go "huh?" and leave, never to come back.

In fact, I was one of those. When I first went to a meeting showcasing Second Life for uses at work, I dutifully created an account; I logged in; I then had my "Huh?" moment. I forced myself go through orientation and get onto the mainland. But my experience only degraded the more time I was there. Totally underwhelmed by the perceived function , the lag and abysmal graphic quality, I thought, "Are people serious? Someone has got to be kidding me, right? This is lame. This is a total waste of time." And I left, never to come back, or so I thought. Had it not been for an overdue promise to visit a co-worker's build in Second Life, I would never have given it another look. And the virtual light bulb above my head would have never gone on.


Truths out of the mouths of newbies

Yes, having a real person staffed in Second Life is a big overhead for a company. Server space (aka "land") is not cheap, let's face it. Tack on some employee cost tasked against really no revenue for most Second Life corporate uses, and how does one justify that on the books?

Well, I would ask, how much is your company image worth? Do you want to build a presence, which I presume has some underlying marketing potential, and then leave it to a a visiting anthropomorphic wolf or rabbit with no company affiliation to explain your presence for you? Even if you have staff in simulation, not being able to find them is just as bad. In a large build, teleport signs can be your friend, and the friend to visitors.

I wouldn't expect my local GAP store, even if they could lock down the goods, to just leave their store abandoned, hoping that I'll come in to admire the goods but not having anyone to talk to, and expect me to still walk away with my questions answered, a good feeling about GAP, or likely to buy something. The GAP doesn't have a virtual store that I know of, but if they did, I would ask: why treat a virtual space any differently? Insofar as how a person (and the force driving that avatar, at least for now, is a real human being) is going to react to your company, a virtual space can have the same impact, good or bad, as a real building. That's why companies staff people to help greet and guide visitors in real world lobbies.

If you have goods or services to sell, jobs to offer, information to give out, have someone there to do it for you that speaks for you and has your interest in mind. If you have a virtual space that you are using for a corporate function, do what you would for a real building when not in use - lock the doors (or in Second Life parlance, just restrict access). In the former, you're going to improve experience and maybe actually drive some use and results; in the latter, the lock will probably give the impression the space is important and actually sees use. In most corporate builds, I suspect that the space probably isn't and doesn't but they don't have to know that. Perception is everything.

Doppelganger cleverly controls perception by use of space in vSide, making it appear larger then it really is. In fact, restricting the overall space has the positive benefit of channeling people into the same area, giving the perception of popularity and a crowd, even with a small number of users. Let's face it, we're social animals and many people feel more comfortable in a crowd, even a virtual one. People imply popularity, that you're in the "right" place, and that there's something engaging to do there. Effective virtual builds, like real world buildings, are probably going to need to adopt architectural solutions for crowd management, but at least for Second Life, factoring in the ability to fly.

Nothing is more lonely or gives a sense of a places unpopularity in Second Life like coming into it and seeing that there's only one green dot on your mini-map - and it's you. Now maybe you are visitor number 2,001 that day and you just happened to come at a time when no one else was there. But you don't know that. Unlike web pages, we can see who's visiting at the same time we are. And it doesn't matter how many people were already there or who will come back later. If you're a newbie, you probably got the impression that the space is unpopular, and that feeling maybe carries over to the brand behind it, like there's something wrong with it maybe?

When Electric Sheep opened the Virtual CSI:NY presence in Second Life, I first peeked in after the show just to see what's what and to try out the OnRez viewer to see how different it was. Well, it was crowded, with a bunch of lost newbies who were tripping over their own interfaces. There was a clever use of audio media and a HUD to explain the CSI game. But the game wasn't the problem. It was Second Life. Even more sad was a veteran SL user who popped in to see and who was valiently trying to explain the interface. She didn't realize that all these newbies were using a different world viewer, the OnRez viewer provided by Electric Sheep, where buttons and functions could be in different places than the Second Life viewer provided by Linden Lab. I could just see the thought bubbles going up all around me: "Huh?" <-- brought back memories; "I don't get it"; "I'm so confused"; "How do I get my clothes back on?"; "This is silly." I tried to do my part and both help guide the newbies by giving them links to helpful places like NCI and New Dove, as well as help flag the veteran Second Lifer that there was a new viewer, hence the mismatch between what she was trying to explain and the reality in place. Well, after such a fiasco, you'd expect to come back to Virtual CSI:NY and expect to see few or fewer dots. But such is not the case when I've peeked back in. Why? I can't be certain but one of the things that I noticed was that there was a staffer, I presume from Electric Sheep (maybe CBS) to greet, answer questions, and help new users get started in the entry zone. Wander farther into the simulation, what does one find but more helpers. And those little green dots on the mini-map? There seem to be quite a few of them, all congregated in various spots. Just in case this was an aberration, I checked back a couple more time and the dots at a glance, seemed about the same. I don't know how profitable Virtual CSI:NY is given all that manpower investment, but I'd have to say in Second Life terms, it's popular. Green dots it seems have a way of attracting more green dots.


I know the avatar I'm talking to isn't real. But is she real?

Presence can be costly. It's a lot of overhead to consider. And one has to figure that the virtual world never sleeps. Logging into Second Life at different times, it takes on a European, Australian, or Asian tone. Companies have to figure that a visitor might pop in at any time.

Which is why AI avatar "bots" are being developed that can take on that overhead instead of having a real person. They work quite cheap - free in fact beyond their build cost and they don't take breaks. The initial ones are likely going to be fairly simple responders but there are rumblings of some very savvy ones (see Artificial Intelligence Applications in 3d Virtual Worlds) that can do a credible job of mimicking the responses of a real person.

This of course undercuts one of the basic presumptions of virtual worlds, that an avatar represents a real person. One of the interesting aspects of virtual worlds and MMOs is that people tend to treat an avatar at face value, as if they were what they appeared to be. If that avatar appears to be a human man or woman, you, as a virtual world user, would probably respond accordingly. This probably belongs in its own post, but imagine a virtual world where someone can seed avatars to make a space seem more popular as if other people really found it engaging, making you think twice about stopping to take a look around at the offers. Or that person chatting you up and that seems so interested in your latest real world shopping adventure could be a bot mining you for buying trends. Or your new "friend,", taking advantage of how viral marketing works, just swears by Eau'dee'doh perfume or MuskOxen deodorant.

Let's forget about the ethics of AI bots for the moment. Until such bots are available to help "staff" virtual builds, companies who are going to spend a lot of money and time investing in virtual worlds need to consider the whole experience if they want to make it a success, imho. That means considering staffing such builds as if they were real locations, at least to the point of offering someone to help answer questions and take down contacts. I pity the poor person stuck in an empty Second Life island all day but hopefully such exposure will help that person suggest ways to bring traffic and make the spot a purposeful destination point with the intention of conducting business or inquiry of some sort.

Otherwise, just hope that the visiting furry using your sandbox is polite and friendly (I have to say, they often are) while she tries to answer people's questions. I'll conclude with the rest of Anthes' advice:

"Yes, I know that would cost serious bucks. One or more real people would have to be paid real dollars to do that. But if a company can't make its virtual experience substantially better -- and I mean really head-and-shoulders better -- than its existing Web capabilities, it might as well not bother.

Because my wolf friend isn't going to buy an IBM computer because he spotted it through the window while playing in the IBM sandbox. The IBM island must be a destination deliberately sought out by people with an interest in IBM, with the knowledge that they will have a really cool virtual experience there while being treated like a real human by a real human."

Enchanting Dryad

Stanford Virtual Worlds Group has a nice little package for us under the Yule tree this year. It's a free tree creation utility for 3d applications and worlds called Dryad. Dryad works on most Windows XP & Vista systems, as well as Mac OS X. There is a promise that a Linux version is being compiled, but will possibly be some time in coming.

Dryad did not function correctly on my XP work T60p (I could use it fine. I just couldn't see any effect in my black preview pane that only blinked now and then to show part of that area). I have had numerous problems with the T60p in regards to virtual world use so I won't fault Dryad too much just yet.

"We are aware of a small number of incompatibilities with existing systems which manifest themselves in the form of graphical corruption. We are currently working to resolve these problems. In the meantime, we suggest you run Dryad on another system."

So until I can get home and pop Dryad onto the Vista game rig and Mac workstation, I'll have to take some of the claims on faith. If you have any updates or comments, please do share.

Since I could see some of the interface, I could explore a bit. The right-hand pane, as you can see in this borrowed screen capture, is a contextual options selection. It changes view according to the editing mode. In this initial view, one chooses the basic tree form. Since I could see the occasional glimpse of the interface, I knew where to click to access options. In one case, I accessed numerous slider bars that would change my tree's form and appearance. Finally, clicking the center checkbox allowed me to save my work in the generic and widely supported OBJ format. Since I don't have any 3d applications on my work machine, I was not able to open my edited file to view any of my work.

Trees are very complex objects to render and have them look any good. I remember I was all excited when Bryce first added tree models and very disappointed in how some of them looked upon render in that older version. WorldBuilder was one of the better approachable applications in terms of getting off the ground quickly but look at the price. Let's not even talk about Lightwave or Maya. Looking at some of the gallery images, Dryad appears to do a mighty fine job for current virtual world use; it's intuitive to use; it's free.

Whats more, there is a collaborative aspect that VWN reported on in their coverage, albeit one that I was unable to witness. If as reported, there's a great potential for growth, communication and building upon the work of others as the Dryad application is stated to improve and grow the more it is utilized by the community - sort of a shared object database I'm guessing. I also took advantage of Dryad's prompt to join the Stanford Virtual Worlds Group mailing list, the form conveniently found on the first page of the Dryad site.

Other than for some bugs which I have faith will be worked out, my only objections regarding Dryad is that is is free, easy to use, encourages creativity and collaboration, and outputs in a generic file format understood by most 3d applications (ah, if only most virtual worlds allowed for direct utilization of OBJ). I mean, where's the elitist factor in that? Give people powerful tools for free or modest cost and soon everyone will be creating these wonderful scenes and objects to use and share. Creativity will become the focus instead of tool use and access.

What is the virtual world coming to? Bah humbug! ;-)

Eyes inside virtual worlds

There's been some good buzz here and there recently about the iWear VR920 virtual reality goggles from Vuzix. Given the mostly positive vibes I'd been reading, I had been expecting a lot more coverage by now in my fav blogs. Haven't seen a word dropped therein. So I'm going to kick this out there. Hopefully someone with some more spare cash than I've got can give them a look-see and get back with some more feedback for the rest of us. I'm especially keen to read about their use in Second Life.

Just like you read it, these are virtual reality goggles. They simulate a projected 62 inch (157 cm) screen via two small LCDs parked in front of your eye-balls. Now, I'm not in favor of strapping another source of EMF radiation directly onto our heads, but I can't say I haven't been dying to give these a spin nevertheless. And though the current drivers are mostly for games, as you would expect, I think there is a huge potential for use in virtual worlds.

The difference is perspective. One of the strengths of virtual worlds, and why they are so attractive in their varied forms, is the projection of a formed self, aka avatar, interacting with other counterparts. But you, as a user, are still mostly removed from the setting, peering at your avatar from above, or even in mouselook, through a window that is your computer screen. In other words, there's still a bit of distance between you and the medium and between you and other users. What these goggles do is to put you into the setting, removing the boundaries. They react to your movements by changing the perspective and reaction of your view as if you were really there. It's a not so subtle distinction and I think the experience could be a great driver for interest and use of virtual worlds as it makes them a bit more natural, at least to our eyes. They are also a step, I think in the right direction, of removing some of the construct of the interface for virtual world use, and let us function more directly in the medium. In this case, it's merely a visual perspective but that's a lot and the difference I imagine (until I find a spare $400 that's all I can do) is profound and if popular, could lead to other inputs such as hand and facial gestures recognition. And though not really enabled as yet (these work, but only with older graphic cards - sometimes), there is a potential for stereoscopic 3d and the creation of depth perception as well.

Getting back to the here-and-now, the linked review and a commentary I read about a user finally getting to use these in Blizzard's World of Warcraft underscores the wow!-factor. Unlike some predecessors, the price-point for these goggles is not unapproachable for the masses, though still far too high for mainstream use. And they are said to be finicky to calibrate and set up and require learning a slower head-turning response. But, this is a point that was underscored in the reviews, they actually deliver as promised. In fact, I'm hearing there is a bit of a backlog in getting one of these so perhaps they are catching on after all.

These goggles currently work with Second Life and a select list of games. But there's no reason that drivers for more virtual worlds and games can't be created given interest and time. Like virtual worlds in general, game use can provide the adoption bridge that brings these into more common use and the non-game virtual world spill-over I think could really help bring new users into that medium. I can imagine these goggles would make Forterra's already excellent training simulations all the more engaging and, after Second Life, I would just love to strap these on and visit an ultra-high DX10 session of LOTRO or Entropia Universe's promised DX10 makeover.

Just want to make a final note that despite what the reviewer erroneously states for supported systems, my understanding is that these work as well on Apple's OS X, not just Windows. So we Mac'sters are apparently covered.

Is an island bigger than a planet?

Not so fast with your answer now. We're talking about virtual worlds here, where all things are relative.

VWN is reporting that Entropia Universe intends on potentially giving away whole planets to businesses, as long as those businesses can "add value to the universe as a whole" (in other words, bring in traffic and use I expect). So planet is something of a misnomer here. What MindArk deems a planet I believe is more like an asteroid in current Entropia practical parlance. We're not talking Mars, or even Ceres here, for real estate. However, there's nothing to say that given the mutable laws of virtual physics, that such asteroids can't grow themselves over time (or just open up heretofore inaccessible terrain) given the need and traffic.

That gulf of spacial separation will allow for different laws and function - I would expect - perhaps even different techo-themes, bringing to Entropia, customization ala Second Life's island sims. - I was wondering how Entropia was going to offer different environments given that their core design is built around a science fiction theme with an embedded gaming function, sort of. I would say this points the way.

So even if (insert company name)'s New Mars turns out to be someday as big or bigger in pixel depth as the real Mars would be in virtual terms - which will really be bigger, an Entropia planet or an island sim in Second Life, has yet to be determined. I'd say, for this moment, the island is bigger given that it has more use and with more potential to drive traffic (or at least media buzz), but that can certainly change. It's really up to you and I and everyone else to ultimately decide.

On other Entropia topics, I got an e-mail from the Entropia folks telling me to go in and spruce up my avatar, in anticipation of the Crytek-enabled graphic revamp. I haven't gotten around to it as yet and the sample pics didn't entice me much. However, I am very much looking forward to the rest of the makeover. This much hyped revamp has promised to make Entropia Universe one of the most graphically pleasing virtual worlds - simulating the experience of top-end games that use the same CryEngine2 game engine: such as Crysis. We'll have to wait and see. The entry-point for a game like Crysis might be fine when catering to a market of afficionados with top-end rigs. But when trying to pose a product for a world, much of whom insofar as game-like applications are concerned have less than stellar systems, could create an entry barrier. Not fulfilling that promise can undercut the pre-generated hype and anticipation buzz. I suspect they'll have a way to degrade gracefully, like most games do. But I'll be curious to get a sense of the experience range when they finally do launch the changes. And if the use proves practical, I don't suppose that Crytek has given exclusive license to Entropia but we'll see. I know at least one other MMO has licensed the engine and with this cash-and-carry potential, there's nothing to say that an Entropia rival with deep pockets can't just mimic and ultimately steal Entropia's graphic-enabled thunder.

I've always termed Entropia Universe a hybrid virtual world: part social world, part game. I think the folks at MindArk understand that one of the failings of Second Life is that it often lacks for activity function beyond the purely social (even more so with the closure of gambling) and would like to tap into the success of mainstream MMOs (everyone of course thinks of World of Warcraft, but even LOTRO, or City of Heroes, or EVE Online). But trying to be both things at once, I'm just not sure it works. I think it better to have distinction between the spaces but the ability to interlink and travel between them as the needs and fancy suits the particular user. And some users might exclusively prefer one over the other but can still function in the overall space. Otherwise, people can be put off, say, by the violence and conflict or trading function that governs the game activity or find the social function superfluous. I think Sony intends for their Home to be such a bridging construct and I suspect Microsoft has been considering similar uses.

This opening up of "planets" could be just the thing to help move Entropia Universe away from the science fiction gaming anchor and allow it the versatility to function in multiple activity zones. If more business or media "planets" open up, they could provide the social, possibly even educational and commercial, perspectives leaving the main original Entropia planet to explore its function shifting more exclusively to games without feeling it has left the social users abandoned or put upon by their more combative brethren.

Virtual Worlds Connect(ed)

Join more groups!

I must have woken up with that mantra in my head. It's the only reason that can excuse signing up to yet another site for virtual worlds: Virtual Worlds Connect. If so, I'll state that it was obviously divinely inspired and therefore fate.

What the heck: it's free; it's run by the folks behind one of my fav blogs: VWN (and those affiliated functions like the recently attended Virtual Worlds Conference); and ya never know, it pays to be connected (so they tell me).

Anyway, if you feel like it, come join me in the crush. I even started a group (who's subject seemed to be sadly lacking imho or I'd not have bothered).

Virtual Worlds Conf. - San Jose, 2007: Content Portability

Day 1, Session 4 - Technical Perspective: Designing for Cross-Platform Delivery and Long-Term Content Portability

Panelist: Aaron Delwiche (Metaversatility)

Given the ever-changing scope of virtual worlds, with new offers appearing every month, almost weekly at times, one is never certain which might ultimately come to the fore. And with the risk imposed by the current lack of standards to build by, if your project or product is too intertwined with a given world, and that world ultimately does not prove to be successful, how do you prevent all your hard work and your clientele from being left stranded in a marginalized virtual environment?

The best solution is to have a - suitcase mentality, - ready to pack it up and move elsewhere when required. But that's easier said than done. What are the practical considerations when envisioning such a virtual gypsy existence?

The panelist for this session is a professor on academic sabbatical, due to return soon to his work at Trinity University, Austin. Delwiche proved a good speaker and I found myself engaged and entertained throughout this session. Nonetheless, given how new virtual worlds are, and like many other panels I attended, there wasn't a lot of concrete example or proven methods attached to the topic discussion. The content was mostly supposed and common sense and despite being a very full session, can be summarized in just a few points:

Plan for portability from the onset.

Preserve copies of your asset files in multiple formats. Use generic, aka the most mutable formats, when possible (eg. OBJ, COLLADA, etc).

Preserve layers, when applicable.

When working with a 3rd-party vendor or sub-contractor, always try to secure the highest quality source files in addition to whatever use files you receive. Note: Most vendors will offer such but often at a much higher cost than just getting either "flattened" or down-sampled use files. After all, they can make more money if you have to come back to them later. Just be sure to account for any such in both your negotiations and budget if using outside talent.

Focus on accessibility. If you do so, portability is likely to follow.

I have to say this is great advice and the most ethical tactic. Too often, disabled users are considered only as an afterthought as to how to service their needs. And accessible solutions too often address the minimum adherence to laws governing requirements rather than effective use and enablement. I've personally found that if you plan and try to future-proof for the effective use of both accessibility and internationalization using a modular solution that can adapt, such will realize long term benefits. Modularity means that you can adapt specific components, realizing faster solutions and not being stuck reinventing everything from scratch, or being caught in a legal bind. And in this case, modularity means a greater likelihood you will be able to pack up at least parts of your kit and take it with you, ala the previous mentioned suitcase analogy.

Regrettably, virtual worlds seem to have taken the somewhat typical approach of not addressing accessibility from the onset. But Devlin, from IBM Ireland's contingent at the IBM booth, was able to offer a great example of virtual world accessibility. He and his team have worked on scripting proximity detection via sound within Activeworlds, in order to help enable virtual world navigation for the visually impaired. It is encouraging to note that some companies are working on accessibility even at this early stage, rather than as an afterthought.

Design your presence around core principals of virtual community. Since technology changes, standards shift, it is sometimes impossible to preserve the functional technology of a space.

So if nothing else, understand that community is the most important thing to preserve when migrating.

That last sentence is particularly key. It was suggested that in order to preserve community in a new space, worlds vendors and managers really need to be already involved, in tune, and understand the core concerns of users/consumers/clients engaged in the original space. "Be kind, be interested, pay attention."

Some panelists in other sessions I attended discounted any value in the interaction of virtual space with the Social Web experience of blogs, forums, wikis, etc. Here though, it was suggested that such spaces are very useful when preserving "community memory" since they are independent of the technology used for the virtual space itself. Certainly it provides a compelling argument to at least consider interlinking functions of the Social Web within or adjunct to virtual offerings.

It was suggested for further study on the topic to understand that value of preservation of The Virtual Community, to read the works of Howard Rheingold, the man who is credited with having invented that phrase through his seminal works.

During the Q&A session, there was some discussion about how to preserve files from Second Life by possibly taking them out of that setting. There was mention of applications, some that would allow for the export and theoretical preservation of native Second Life constructs into XML (LIB SL was mentioned & OpenSim was possibly inferred), or re-importation into other forms via other applications, but which violate Linden Lab's terms of service.

CopyBot, for example, probably built with the best of intentions to help develop Second Life, has been used for outright theft of intellectual property within that simulation. So for the time being, there is no way to legally store for safeguarding or migration anything built or purchased in Second Life outside of that setting. But, with the opening up of the source code, it is possible on a limited basis to import some sculpted prims created in other applications, preserving some aspect of those constructs outside of Second Life. And hopefully more opening up of that simulation will occur, as has been promised.