Second Life has taken a bit of beating lately, but don’t be fooled. Virtual Worlds are alot more than trying to sell products or mass market to avatars. Get beyond the ‘blingtardian” factor and you will find some amazing uses. For example a project I worked on, TheWallSL, was commissioned by someone who wanted to remain anonymous. I was stunned at the response, people crying over VOIP, or the fact the virtual memorial was more accurate (sans reflection.) than the real one.

Many companies are on the charge because they realize the many advantages to virtual work spaces go beyond selling trinkets or bumping up average tickets of dirt-world goods.

Let me name a few: reduced costs, enhanced presence and team building of disparate units, fast prototyping, pleasurable, exciting and novel changes to work…the list goes on.

John Chambers, CEO of Cisco is jumping right in and I am a little biased being from his homeland. I have a lot of respect for Chambers and some regional nationalism. He grew up about 30 minutes from my my city in Huntington, WV and has dyslexia- plus he liked to fish. Despite the dyslexia he pilots a true powerhouse. With a disorder like dyslexia it is obvious why someone like Chambers would embrace virtual worlds. 

As I mentioned earlier a colleague had tested their telepresence technology and they were impressed. I hope to have more details for you.

Learn more at CISCO’s blog http://blogs.cisco.com/virtualworlds/

SECOND LIFE

Second Life is a virtual world with millions of square meters of virtual lands (server space), more than 13 million “residents,” (although how many are active is up for debate) and a real economy based on Lindens. Large numbers of colleges and universities—or, in some cases, individual departments or faculty—are active in Second Life, not only for academic purposes but also for campus visits, recruiting activities for prospective students, and fundraising. We even took many on tours to the Vietnam Memorial we created- one many had never seen because of cost, disability or lack of opportunity to name a few reasons. When you heard the reading of the names of those who lost their lives you got an idea how powerful even “virtual worlds and reality can be.”

Let us also not forget recreation. Hang gliding, surfing, horseback riding, fencing, and other things I have no inkling about. Does it replace the real world?

No.

But it can kindle that spark or that interest in new things.

SUNNY IN SECOND LIFE

Sun Microsystems, which makes computer servers and software, operates seven islands in Second Life, two of which are open to the public. The rest are used for training sessions and meetings. During its biggest event, a twelve-hour corporate meeting held in April, 14 of Santa Clara-based Sun’s top executives mixed with hundreds of employees- weird. Skiing, car racing, live jazz and a sandbox were also part of the event. …you start to get the idea. People’s race, religion, sex, etc all fall away and people interact as people. Human beings…and hey not all are dressed as humans. These things really aren’t important- being human is important.

Sun decided to hold the event after it acquired software company MySQL, which tracks its employees by the 110 airports they live near, rather than their actual locations. Sun was looking for a way to introduce the MySQL employees to their Sun colleagues, and Second Life seemed the best solution.

In our far flung world this is a big deal. Having worked with research teams in Bangalore India, Foster City, CA and Huntington, West Virginia I have no doubt that virtual interaction, be it in Second Life or another platform, would have been an important bonding experience and would have saved time and increased esprit de corp.

CIGNA HEALTHCARE

Hoping to make healthcare education hip and hot, Cigna Healthcare announced it has created a virtual environment in the Second Life virtual world to educate people on how to improve their health. I think success will be predicated on how much “fun” they let people have, but this is a good step. Imagination is a good thing. Nothing everything needs to be measured in immediate direct marketing ROI.

SECOND LIFE HAS FLAWS

No it is not perfect- far from it. It has trouble scaling and takes a certain level of indoctrination to learn the ropes…but this is just an early example of what the world we know will produce. It is going to get even more exciting and you can literally fly to the future. Yes it has flaws, but so do humans and that is one of the reasons being human is so great.

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