3D Arlington - Leading the Way

A recent article in the Washington Post highlights efforts by Arlington County government to bring the region into the flourishing world of interactive 3d. Resident John Feather is volunteering his time to get these advanced technology initiatives off the ground and making sure they get the attention they deserve.

Much of the article is devoted to area presences in Second Life. Feather (avatar name: Theatre Magic) leads reporters and other interested parties on guided tours of some of these spaces, making sure to show the power and flexibility of the environment:

One recent evening, Theatre was shepherding a reporter toward the county's online office space for a tour when he sent a text message suggesting a detour. "Want to go swimming?" he wrote. He then teleported to a lake surrounded by Japanese maples and did a summersault from a cliff with an animated Buddha nearby. It was a long way from the Arlington office, but what better place to ponder the future of government?

We need more people like John! It's great to see people in previously untapped areas of life getting the interest and enthusiasm for interactive 3d that us pros have been shouting about for years. I found the following note most interesting:

In November, he started working on a 3D map of Arlington's major buildings. Touching images on the map calls up Web pages about them, and he and his colleagues want to add real-time rent data and detailed visuals from architects and developers so that "when you click on that building, you go in the door."

This sounds like a great idea that even non-techies can see the benefit of. Incorporating spatial data (buildings and locations) with other info (rent data, etc.) will allow people to explore data in a new and relevant way while helping them to answer important questions (where should I live?).

Keep it up John! We applaud your enthusiasm and hope that it inspires others. Let us know if there is anything we can do to help!

Review: ExitReality

I recently came across another newcomer to the web-based virtual worlds market: ExitReality.

At face value, ExitReality functions similarly to all of the others out there (SL, Vivaty, Lively, IMVU, etc.). You register (free), login, and get a customizable avatar dropped into a social 'lounge' area where other users also congregate. When I first tried the Beta environment out, there were about 10 other users. Pretty small, but they seem to be fairly new and still growing.

The unique thing about ExitReality is that it is based around the idea of navigating an actual 3d web. It's a concept that has been tried many times before, but never really caught on. In the 'ExitReality Plaza' the commercial aspects of this are pretty in your face. Each major building or structure in the environment is associated with some sort of business interest. There's a Carl's Jr, Wall Street Journal, and ESPN buildings, a Match.com ice cream truck (?) and many others. And as far as I can tell, these commercial interests are all just facades. I would expect to be able to go into the buildings and find related content, but the only further action is to click on their signs and be taken to their regular 2d site.

It's an interesting idea, but I still don't see it gaining mass market appeal. So far, it seems to just be a 3d chat with a whole lot of advertisements. There's just not a whole lot to do. The one advantage this site has over others is load time. It was definitely quicker than the others I've reviewed, but other important aspects - navigation, visual quality, content - all seemed to be lacking. If they mature in at least one of these areas, I'd consider them a contender due to their novelty but right now, they have a ways to go.

The other interesting aspect of this site is their claim to 'View any website in 3d'. I tried our site and got a pretty sad result. The algorithm they are using seems to just grab the graphics from your screen and paste them on various objects in an environment. They also seem to incorporate the site color scheme into the overall asthetic. The '3d' nformationdesign.com turned out to be one big wall with a screen shot of the homepage and then a 'field' of linked graphics that looked like flags on poles. It was pretty disappointing. I think this 'view any page in 3d' concept is probably their best selling point, but the algorithm needs some major improvements. Maybe some simple image processing to guess at what some of the pictures are, so they can be turned into actual 3d representations? How about doors or passages to take you to other rooms (pages) of the site instead of these link 'flags'? There are a lot of options here.

I'm glad to see more businesses take a stab at this sort of thing, but I think the market is getting to the point where the application needs to be a little more mature to catch on.


Did I miss something? Let me know.

ReViving Virtual Worlds

I recently received a beta-testing invitation from 'Vivaty,' a new player in the SecondLife dominated (and dragging) virtual worlds game. I'm not too familiar with the company, but based on a quick Googling, it seems to be well funded and has solid leadership. The most interesting buy-in for me at this point is their Facebook integration. If its solid, that could be a great boost for them and a neat add-in for us Facebookers.

The current roadblock to any real Vivaty appraisal by yours truly is the Internet Explorer 7.0 requirement. No Firefox or Mac support yet! I haven't had the desire to update my long neglected IE yet, but I will be sure to try out Vivaty when I do. Stay tuned for updates!

The Life or Death of Second Life

A lot of people have been tearing Second Life to pieces lately! From the interview and articles with David M. Ewalt at Forbes (whose site is getting a bit ad-heavy, seriously) to the article in Wired about how horrible it is to advertise there, people seem to have it out for the blossoming metaverse. But I don't think they understand Second Life's core elements: creativity, communication, and education.

Here's the jist of their arguments: Second Life (SL) is a place where (like the rest of the Internet) there is a lot of pornography and gambling, upon which the economy there is built. Well, now there is no more gambling, because Linden Labs just banned it for fears that they would get penalized by regulators (I think that's a pretty good reason.). But David Ewalt seems to think that it's the death of SL's Economy. While this may have some truth (one of the Second Life Banks collapsed shortly after the ban), I believe that only part of the economy is dying. I really think that this is a part of SL that Linden Labs must be happy to see go; now other parts can grow into the space where they once stood. The economic struggles are just a phase. But the change is thoroughly worth it. Could SL really be a place for free, open, and honest collaboration and learning, if it had gambling?

The other topic that is under debate is SL's marketing potential. A recent scathing article in Wired magazine, "How Madison Avenue Is Wasting Millions on a Deserted Second Life" puts the heat on marketing in SL. Big companies are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to create SL presences. Most often, they go to The Electric Sheep Company and fork-out 500,000 shells to build and maintain an island. Well, I must agree with Wired that this is not a good way for these companies to spend their money. The only way someone could throw away that much money on an isolated island is if they have no comprehension of the idea of service ecologies.Why would I want to go to Coca Cola Island? Sure, everyone needs a website (a stable presence), but I think if marketers want to meet an audience in Second Life, they are going to have to find ways of advertising that are more distributed and mixed than that. Perhaps something akin to Google ads. But this still leaves the question of why people would want to go there at all.

I think the key to Second Life's appeal is the life part. The dynamic, creative, and collaborative aspects are the real life of Second Life. If Linden Labs wants to save Second Life they need to pursue educational and creative institutions, mixed use, distributed marketing models, search, and social networking. I'm much more concerned about these things than Windlight.

And I really would like to see Second Life live and evolve.