MindBlizzard blog

Prepare for the Worst - Christian Aid week Machinima

2008-05-09T15:41:00.004+02:00

Last year I've written a number of blogentries on NGO's getting into Second Life, such as the Red Cross, Disabled Sports, Flying Doctors, the MacArthur Foundation , Dance 4 Life and a few others. It's fundraising 2.0 time again, as I noticed a nice machinima produced by an organisation called Christian Aid.

At their blog the machinima is introduced:

This year’s Christian Aid Week advert highlights the work we do in helping people prepare for the worst. You can’t stop a hurricane, but you can help save lives by funding stronger buildings and installing early warning alarms. It’s just one of the ways Christian Aid makes a real difference to the lives of millions of vulnerable people across the world. Help us continue our work by supporting us this Christian Aid Week: please donate what you can.

I'm not sure in which virtual world this machinima is shot, but I like the way they've used a virtual world to show the impact of a hurricane, although right now one would probably use shots from Birma / Myanmar suffering from last week's disaster.

To find out more, visit the Christian Aid website / blog.

Dutch Banker goes Supermodel

2008-05-09T11:48:00.002+02:00

Dutch Triple A rated bank Rabobank has been fiddling around with gadgets, widgets and virtual worlds a lot in the past years. Their first metaversal experience came from Why Robbie Rocks and in april 2008 the bank hit the typical avatar-based 'girlworld' goSupermodel targeted at a 12 to 17 year old audience, loosely styled like Habbo Hotel.

goSupermodel has about 250.000 unique visitors a month, which log in about 200 times a month and spend 22 minutes each session. Rabobank has launched a chatbot, called Yvette. Through the chatbot Yvette you can ask questions about finance. This financial coach is also reachable through SMS, MSN, Hyves and Live-spaces.

Actual numbers from the first week of operation are promising:

5.881 mails to Yvette
25.901 chatsessions with the girls
44.305 visits to the Rabobank office

Civilisation IV - Beyond the Sword

2008-05-09T10:41:00.004+02:00

Not feeling in the mood to explore the Metaverse, I've spend some time playing the latest Civilisation game, one of my old time favorites.

The first Civilisation game (which came in a 3 floppy disk edition) was an instant classic when it hit the market in 1991. I remember playing the game untill way past bedtime during college. This first edition was of course pretty basic in graphics and gameplay. You had a world, a number of civilisations you could play and so on. After a little while Civilisation II hit the market, and Sid Meier started exploring new Civilisations. This 2nd edition centered in the near east, primarily adding the Carthagens to the game. I really missed out on the big world map so I was happy when Civ III was released and we were back to normal gameplay again.

Civilisation IV (by Firaxis Games) is the 2005 release of the game and has been severely upgraded, not only in graphics, but also in a number of other areas:

The concept of religion is new to Civilization IV, where in previous games players built generic temples and cathedrals to contribute to happiness and culture. There are now seven distinct religions in the game: Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism and Taoism. Each religion is associated with a specific technology on the tech tree; the first civilization that gains the technology founds the religion. The four later religions (Christianity, Confucianism, Islam, and Taoism) begin with a free Missionary unit for reasons of game balance; missionaries can later be trained at a city that has constructed an associated monastery. Other than this, there are no special traits or bonuses associated with any particular religion
in order to avoid controversy.
Religion factors into a number of existing game mechanics. Civilizations that share a common state religion will find themselves more agreeable in their diplomatic dealings; conversely, civilizations with differing state religions will not be as close diplomatically. The religion's founder may also receive an economic benefit: if that civilization expends a Great Prophet at their religion's holy (founding) city, they will construct that religion's most sacred building, and it will generate 1 gold per turn for every
other city that hosts said religion. Once a religion has spread to a city, there is no way to remove it from said city. Finally, if a civilization has a state religion and owns that religion's holy city, they will receive 'line-of-sight' in every other city hosting that religion.
The new civics model of government also has a strong effect on religion. Players can found a state religion, declare religious freedom, restrict non-state religious adoption, or take other actions that have profound impacts on the religious lives of their subjects. These civics can provide a great incentive to spread a state religion throughout one's empire, as the best bonuses will only be applied to cities in which the religion is present." (Wikipedia)

Another new feature of the game is that you've got more civilisations to chose from, and a number of civilisations have more than one leader to choose from, each with their special traits and special units.

The main concept of the game is to build your nation: explore, found new cities and build them into little paradises for your population. In Civ - IV there are a ton of new buildings to build, like groceries, forges, drydocks etcetera.

An important gamefeature is the ability to build World Wonders. These wonders bring extra happiness, culture, productivity or other benefits to your nation. In Civ IV the number of world wonders has been expanded drastically as well. There are new additions such as the Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel Tower, and a whole range of religious and Asiatic world wonders.

When you work your way through history, it's unavoifable to run into a war at times. In this case I got dragged into a war two times because vassal nations decided to hammer eachother, drawing me in as well. Fortunately, World wonders such as the United Nations, or the Apostolic Palace give you tools to declare worldwide peace soon enough.

In the early Civilisation editions the world was cramped. You had to expand fast to secure your place in history. To speed up your development it's vital to share knowledge with your neigbours before trying to reinvent the wheel everytime yourself. In the old games, you had to have a little luck there, it largely depended on which continent you landed on. Sometimes, the civs on the other content had a faster development rate and you fell behind. In Civ IV every civilisation starts on the same continent, and there's a second continent (If you play world-like map) called "The New World" which has to be discovered and colonised as well.

Not being a big fan of "Shoot 'em up" games, I prefer to win by technological dominance, rather than destroying my opponents. This time I was way ahead of the competition and started building my spaceship when the neighbouring countries were researching how to build Railroads. On earlier occasions, the spacerace was a closely contested project and needed numerous sabotage efforts to stop the competition for achieving this victory before me.

And victory is there... We've gone where no man has gone before and started a colony. Here ends the 'Normal' Civilisation game, now let's have a look at the "Beyond the Sword" expansion pack.

This release of Civilisation comes with a number of expansion packs, such as "Warlords" and "Beyond the Sword" which bring a number of new features to the game as well as a range of scenario's to play.

Me the Media - about me as well

2008-05-09T00:20:00.003+02:00

Mid april the Sogeti Vint Institute released its latest book, called "Me the Media. Past, Present and Future of the Third Media Revolution".

VINT is Sogeti Group's New Technology Research Institute, founded as the Verkennings Instituut Nieuwe Technologie in the Netherlands in 1994. Currently VINT has offices in Amsterdam, Paris, Stockholm and Washington.

"Me the Media " investigates the exciting development of web media. It envisages a future of hyper-individualization, of ICTainment on top of ICTechnology, and of meaningful web conversations between organizations, customers and employees. Somewhere in the book you run into a picture of yours truly, both avatar and Real Life and referral to the MindBlizzard blog. On the Me The Media website you'll find a short outline of the book in English as well.

To get more info on the novel, sign up for the book presentation at the Vint Quarterly Technology Update in 't Spant in Bussum on May 13th.

SEAT Auto Emoción

2008-05-08T23:53:00.004+02:00

VeeJay's time has been taken up with more pressing matters, and as a result he was not able to get to this sim yet - so he has asked me to cross-post this article from my Ambling in Second Life blog...

I almost forgot about this one, but a piece of tumbleweed blowing through my otherwise vacant mind dislodged a memory that I had forgotten about. Around a week or so ago I got an email from Barrabas Zabaleta of virtual worlds builders, Mosi Mosi (who produced the entertainingly fun Prados Azules sim). The mail contained an offer of a pre-launch walkabout of a new sim. I had meant to take up the offer, got sidetracked and ended up forgetting about it... until today. Why today? Well today was when the sim actually opened, and this (or the tumbleweed) triggered my memory. I was a little surprised when I checked the map, though. The sim was empty. Had I got the dates muddled up? Had I missed it? Was I too early? The answers are (in order): 'No'; 'Dunno' and 'Dunno'.

But before further ponderings on this, it would be a good idea to tell you about SEAT. The company name is an acronym for Sociedad Española de Automóviles de Turismo; in English, Spanish Saloon Car Company. Founded in 1950, it used to make re-badged Fiat cars for the Spanish domestic market. It has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Volkswagen since 1990, producing a popular range of cars for both the domestic and international marketplace. As for the 'auto emoción' strapline, I can't find a really good reference for this, but I take it to mean that the SEAT design philosophy is to produce exciting vehicles that are enjoyable, even thrilling, to drive. Perhaps The Guardian had it right in 2006, when reviewing the Leon:

"SEAT is not the world's most popular brand, but it is trying. Its recent products have been supported by splashy advertising campaigns, pressing home the slogan "auto emocion", which, it would appear, is to be said where possible in a smoky, post-coital whisper. By this means the company hopes to persuade us that it is an A-grade manufacturer of pulse-quickening automobiles, rather than a
low-maintenance corporate outcrop of the VW group and a budget car builder from Spain - Spain being about as famous for car production as Italy is for golfing holidays."

The car got a good review, by the way... but now let's move on to the sim.

The first thing that struck me was just how much Mosi Mosi have been able to fit into the sim, yet without it feeling cramped. I honestly had to check the Map a couple of times, to reassure myself that it was just the one sim! There's a lot to see and do, as you might expect. One nice idea is a series of computer screens showing some "html-on-a-prim" webpages you should explore. By way of an example, in the attached photoset, I've included Torley's YouTube page. If you are new to SL, there's a number of orientation displays and there's also a HUD you can pick up, giving you information on cool sites to visit in SL.

The cars are displayed in an elegant showroom, all sweeping curves and open space. Here you can pick up a range of freebies, ranging from drivers' helmets to scuba diving gear. While the latter seems bizarre - as if shoe-horned into the sim - there does seem to be some logic, since you are able to use your newly-gained equipment at the Beach Club. Here, you can also indulge in dancing and generally carousing. The biggest freebie is a car - but you have to win this by completing a series of challenges, at the end of which you receive your license and vehicle. Being totally rubbish at driving in SL, I did not give it a go. Finally there's a sandbox - which is nice to see.

Here's a few photos to give you the flavour:

How this sim will fare with those who are professional marketing folk, I do not know. However, I liked the sim. It had handy hints for newcomers, lots of freebies, a sandbox (not that common these days) and some interesting, interactive challenges. It is also well constructed, coherent and adheres well to SEAT's branding.

My only note of concern is about the promotion of the sim. I had expected some indications of a launch party, and perhaps a series of events to get the sim off to a good start. Promotion through SEAT's existing websites too - if it's there, I've not spotted it. So it appears to be something of a soft launch. If so, then all well and good. But for the company to extract more from the site, it will need a bigger, louder launch at some point - and a schedule of events and competitions might be an idea, too. To be honest, in promotional terms, I'm not sure how much good these actually do - but they're better than comatose sims.

Taking it Slow - Living the Life

2008-05-01T10:55:00.005+02:00

Taking it Slow

It's been about a month since I last posted here at the MindBlizzard blog. Some havhave thought it for audacious reasons, like 'banning Second Life' because of the new Trademark Regulations, and I wish it were true.

Prime reason for my absense is that Real Life needed a lot of attention. My mother has been diagnosed cancer and has been on and off into the hospital. It puts a little strain on my family as well as we have to go over regularly and help out. Since winter has been long, and we're all dying to get some warmer, sunny weather, my own health has been failing a little as well, being floored by the flu twice in a month.

Live the Life

What spare time I had, I spent outside the Metaverse -in private gaming. One of these adventures I'd like to share with you. In the early 90's I played a lot of Sid Meier games, like Civilisation (1991) and Railroad Tycoon (1990), which would fit onto 3 floppy disks at the time. I've been playing Civilisation a lot over the years, upgrading every version as soon as it came out. There was one more game which I played for a little while, which was "Pirates! Gold" (1993)

Last year I already tried out the new Railroads version, but aside from improved graphics, I think the gameplay didn't match the original. Some two months ago I ran into the new Pirates version, titled "Live the Life" (Official Site)

"Sid Meier's Pirates! is a 2004 strategy/action/adventure computer game developed by Firaxis Games and published by Atari.[1] The game is based on Sid Meier's earlier 1987 game, also named Sid Meier's Pirates!. Overall, the gameplay remains similar to the original game, though it features a 3D game engine (NDL's Gamebryo). Some elements such as sun sighting have been removed, but other features have been added, such as a ballroom dancing mini-game and an improved turn-based land combat system." (Wikipedia)

As with "Side Meier's Railroads" (2006), this new Pirates! version isn't much more than a brush up of the graphics, but its been fun to play for old times sake. A couple of screenshots:

Most importantly, as a pirate, you sail the caribbean seas, chasing Spanish galleons laden with treasure, troops or spices. Visit the various Governors regularly to get promotions, and be sure to marry a Governor's daughter, as this is where the real money is. Once you're married, she'll give you clues to Lost Cities of the Aztec, Incan and Olmec empires which will yield great treasures.

Here's a screener of the retirement page. Final rankings, Pirates defeated, treasures found etc.

IBM and Linden Lab create 'enterprise-safe' grid

2008-04-03T12:59:00.005+02:00

Though the potential of Virtual Worlds for businesses has been established, the concerns of safety and security of (sensitive) corporate data has been a major issue and caused much reluctance for corporations to create their Virtual Office. Today Reuters announced IBM and Linden Labs have been working on a solution and are ready to go public with their 'Grid behind the Firewall'.

Using the server and client software of Linden Research Inc.'s Second Life, and the interoperability program created by IBM they managed to create a separate place which would allow any of the (well over) 5,000 employees of IBM to enter the private grid, but keep the rest of the Second Life users out of their corporate servers.

IBM has more than 5,000 employees using Second Life for purposes such as sales training or collaborating across different geographic regions. The company will also allow the employees to explore Second Life. And whey will be able to cross into IBM’s secure firewalled corporate network, much like users do with a virtual private network, which creates a secure connection from the Internet into a corporation so that users can log into enterprise applications from their homes.

The firewall will also prohibit regular users of Second Life from gaining access to portions of Second Life that are available only to IBM employees. Spohrer said that the companies have to work out exactly what to move behind the firewall to guarantee security.

Source: The Standard

Playboy gets Dressed

2008-04-02T21:35:00.003+02:00

This weeks top story features Playboy getting dressed for the occasion. Playboy getting dressed isn't your typical April Fool's Day prank but a very smart move by the popular magazine, as reported by James Wagner Au at the NWN blog:

Smart Bunny: Playboy Sells Fashion Created And Co-Branded By Second Life Designers
With regular events and a staff of gregarious, frequently dancing Bunnies, Playboy's official Second Life presence, a tropical island club developed by Boston's Green Grotto Studios, is one of the few real world company sites boasting steady visitor traffic. (Direct SLURL teleport at this link.) And unless I missed a previous announcement, it can now claim another title: the first major company to link its brand with Second Life-only brands. In this case, Playboy-branded fashion sold on the official island, but created and promoted by SL designers who are an integral part of the label; among them, KO Designs, Alpha Male, Sharkture, and Simply Spoiled.

Playboy started out in the Metaverse with the opening of the Playboy Island in Second Life in June 2007 (read blogpost here), which surprisingly (for many) didn't become the house of sin in the sex-filled world of Second Life. No actually, there was nothing sexy about Playboy's presence.

This time, everybody is getting fluffy with the bunny as Playboy is now in cohoots with a quality selection of Second Life fashion designers. Reactions from the more marketing oriented blogs are pretty happy about Playboy's move;

Nic Mitham says:

"The company is selling Playboy-branded items on the island created by residents inside Second Life - they are tapping into the expertise incumbent in-world."

And Digodo writes:

"It’s an interesting move because apparently Playboy thinks they can fill a gap the Metabrands have - a recognizable, A-brand that separates the quality from the B products for people who haven’t spend months in Second Life. On the other hand, the metabrands bring ‘good will’ of the existing community to the table, a recognised and appriciated brand amongst people who have spend some time in Second Life and are well rooted into the community.

What the most important thing is, in my humble opinion is that Playboy seem to understand how communities work and that is even more important than getting your product out in the virtual world. I have been very disappointed with the things (the majority of) real world companies have done in Second Life sofar. It's been a marketing trip mostly, and the community just isn't interested. It's time companies skip the promo-attitude blabla and start taking their business into Virtual Worlds.

This would have been easy for Playboy, to bring their business to a Virtual World which is sex-infested according to many. Doing the opposite; getting dressed gets them my respect and it shows they understand the way the Second Life community works. Whereas most brands come in and invite people to 'leave their natural habitat' to come to their island, Playboy is bringing the brand to the community.

CSI (8): The Conclusion

2008-04-02T17:51:00.004+02:00

In a day or two the VW Conference in New York starts. Last october, in the San Jose edition, we had CSI creator Anthony Zuiker as one of the Keynote speakers on the CSI:NY & Second Life mashup. Although we had high anticipations, the actual numbers flocking to Second Life after the show aired were largely disappointing.

Well, the VW Conference is back, and so is CSI. Nic Mitham from KZero puts it nicely:

Well, it’s back with the second part of the story and being aired tonight on CBS. On a related note, it is me or does the timing here seem a little spooky? First episode - just after VW Fall, second episode the night before day one of the NY show. Maybe someone should investigate that.

During the VW Conference in October Zuiker said the plan was to air the second episode in February, but somehow that was delayed. Some even speculated it was cancelled, but yesterday I read this at one of the Electric Sheep blogs;

Tomorrow, at 10, CBS will air the long awaited conclusion to Down the Rabbit Hole and wrap up the story of everybody’s favorite cyberceleb turned killer, Venus.
If you saw last week’s teaser for tomorrow’s episode, then aside from hearing an interesting cover of “Back in the New York Groove” you saw a few machinima shots in the trailer (including the one above.) But, while we can’t really give away any plot points, we can say – there’s more than you saw in the promo.
What’s different about this time though, is that we have some awesome behind the scenes pics we’ll be posting and linking to (courtesy of Damien Fate) explaining how we did some of the shots and showing what went into making them.

A little digging brought me to the official press release:

ELECTRIC SHEEP COMPANY’S MACHINIMA ANIMATORS WRAP UP THE “CSI: NY” Virtual World Killer Mystery

Primetime CBS Series Offers A Glimpse Into The Future Of 3D Animation Using Electric Sheep’s Machinima
March 31, 2008 — NEW YORK, NY —
CBS drama CSI:NY and the Electric Sheep Company partner to wrap up the Virtual
World killer plot line in the upcoming episode “DOA for a Day” on CSI:NY,
Wednesday, April 2 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.
The first part of the episode titled, “Down The Rabbit Hole” which originally aired, Wednesday, October 24th will re-air this Wednesday, March 26 (10:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.
In “DOA for a Day” the CSI’s, working with an anonymous tip, travel to an abandoned warehouse and back into the virtual 3D computer world where they hope to find one of the city’s most-wanted criminals.
The Electric Sheep Company, a leading virtual world services company, was hired to supply the animation for both episodes. The machinima was produced by the former ILL Clan, machinima pioneers acquired by the Electric Sheep Company in January 2007 to head their machinima animation division.
“Speed is what distinguishes machinima from all other forms of animation,” says machinima animation director Kerria Seabrooke. “In spite of the extremely tight deadline, we still had time to focus on details such as seamless animations, the richness of color, the flow of fabric, the metallic reflection on a gun, which bring the virtual world into the realm of high-end 3D animation.”
Machinima (machine + cinema) animation differs from traditional 3D animation because it is similar to shooting film or TV. It’s shot in real time without the long rendering times that traditional 3D computer animation requires. The real-time aspect of machinima animation was very important on this project, as there was a two-week turnaround time from script to completed animation.
In addition to the animation, an ongoing cross platform experience was created last fall in the virtual world of Second Life by the Electric Sheep Company in conjunction with CBS and Anthony E. Zuiker (creator of the CSI Franchise). The experience includes a virtual lab where users can recreate the experiments and tests from the show as they solve one crime per month.

Brussels Airlines: Subtle and Smart

2008-03-29T00:39:00.006+01:00

Hundreds of companies are trying to understand the Metaverse and find a use for 3D environments that has meaning to their business. Most of them have failed... for now.

Last year I stumbled upon the website and blog B-Places, which basically is a guide to the toprated places in Second Life. Second Life residents rate the places they've visited and the website shows the sims to visit. An excellent move, even more so if you know that B-Places is powered by Brussels Airlines, a Belgian airliner.

The B-Places formula fits neatly into the corporate communications which uses the B-.... terminology a lot (see inset of b-flex economy) and what do you do when you're an airliner and get down to the Metaverse?

Exactly, an airline's core business is to bring people from place to place. In the virtual world however, you don't need transportation. You can just teleport. Airliners have become obsolete. Yet Brussels Airlines knows that bringing people from place to place is just a means to a goal. It is actually about people going to destinations. So if you can't do the transportation part, focus on the destinations. That's exactly what the B-Places directory does.

Here's a short promovid on YouTube:

Here's a snapshot of the website:

Toprated places in Second Life are the Botanical Gardens, but also Rezzable's Greenies and the Caribbean are among the citizens favorites. To me this is a very succesful and creative way to experiment with virtual worlds. It isn't outright branding, but subtle and smart.

exitSL Avastar Recap

2008-03-29T00:11:00.003+01:00

The new Linden Lab Trademark policies have caused a row amongst bloggers and citizens of Second Life. Allthough the actual legal impact may not be as big as feared at first sight, it still is a fuzz and the manner in which in was announced has certainly caused havoc. The exitSL logo I created to express my 'frustration' made it to this weeks' Avastar (Issue # 67).

More Japanese Intelligence

2008-03-28T09:12:00.003+01:00

Yesterday I checked out a particular sim in the Japanese cluster, called Intelligence. It belongs to yet another Japanese employment company, residing on the Doda website. I can't tell you much about the company, as there was no English page on the website available.

Wikipedia wasn't much help either, as it only writes:

"Doda (Dogri/Hindi: डोडा) is a town and a notified area committee in Doda district in Jammu & Kashmir of India. Or Job change information site in Japan"

As said, the sim is setup in the busy Japanese cluster, next to the marvellous sims of Mirai and Suntory, and is crafted as a futuristic urban sim, which is strengthened by the skyscrapers from some of the other sims surrounding it. There appear to be two main buildings:

A number of smaller buildings and stands can be found across the sim. Some with information and promotional stuff, some with unknown purpose.

As for the jobs... in the two main buildings there are several signs with avatars depicting jobs and japanese advertisements. Inside the main tower, at the center of the sim, is an information room, which I'll call the 'warp core room' as the central information pillar reminds me somewhat of a Star Trek warpcore.

From inside the main Intelligence Tower, the 'warp core room' you can also teleport up into the tower to a room in which you can experience a job, in this instance a Chinese Language Teacher. You have to look hard though, I needed a little help from a Japanese friend to find the teleport. It's located in the 'warp core room', look for a blue door, click it and answer some questions.

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/intelligence/126/72/42

SEAT and Mitsubishi inSL

2008-03-27T23:24:00.003+01:00

Just spotted in Second Life: Car manufacturer SEAT. Not much more to tell as the island is blanked out and inaccesible.

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/SEAT%20auto%20emocion/128/128/0

And another automotive company (and many other things) is rezzing in Second Life as well, Japanese Mitshubishi Corporation is going six isle strong.

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Mitsubishi%20Corporation/128/128/0

Failure to Ping

2008-03-27T21:50:00.002+01:00

There's something fishy going on. I changed my blog layout last week and suddenly it didn't update my technorati ratings anymore. After tweaking a bit with the metadata I did get an update.... but it was a one time only. Now three days have past and no update.

The funny thing is, it does show the blogs that link to the recent articles, but still it doesn't pick up the latests posts. Yet my feedreader picks up new posts without any problem.

Well, it's back to the drawing table. For now, I'll put back the old design.

Eduverse Symposium videos online

2008-03-26T18:42:00.003+01:00

Finally... they're there. The online video's of the Eduverse Symposium.

"After a considerable amount of time transcoding, uploading and and messing with WP plugins, I have managed to get the entire first symposium parsed and online. The videos are viewable on the “Symposia” page"

If you can stand the sight of me, pay attention to the first intro video, titled "VJ's intro" where I try to start up the conversation on Education in Virtual Worlds. I'd advise you to pay close attention to Dr. Jay Bolter on Augmented Reality and Dr. D. Danforth on the Testis Tour.

AWE kicks off Easter Quest 2008

2008-03-26T17:18:00.003+01:00

AWE - Active Worlds Europe, is keen on Quests. Every year they organise several questsd in the 3D worlds of Activeworlds Europe, and every time in completely different surroundings. This time, everyone will be looking for Easter eggs in different worlds, and gain points that may entitle you to prizes.

The AWE Easter Quest 2008:
Start: Saturday, March 29, 19:00 hours (Dutch time)
End: Saturday, April 5, 24:00 hours (Dutch time)
Prize ceremony: Sunday, April 6, 19:00 hours (Dutch time)
This Quest has something special in addition to the other worlds… There are 12 mazes you can only get through if you are good at maths! Every room contains Easter eggs with points, but you can only visit the next room if you got an A for the exercise in the previous room! It could be a good exercise to test your maths knowledge. (and Dutch, as all exercises are in Dutch).

Many of us know only the online demo world of Active Worlds that's been sitting around for ages. You can register here for a tourist account and walk around for a few minutes. Citizenship comes at a price, but as Activeworlds Europe celebrates its 5th birthday this year you get a free membership (2 weeks). You can extend this citizenship by converting the points you've earned during the Quest. If you're good, you can earn yourself a free year of citizenship or even a dedicated private 3D world.

What's the difference between a citizen and a tourist in Active Worlds?

Tourism Everybody can enter our Universe for free as a
Tourist. You can chat with other people, play games, win prizes and even build your own home in one of the public worlds. However, your options and choices of Avatars are limited.
Citizenship Our Universe contains many public Web Worlds
that you can explore for free as a tourist, although citizenship gives you more privileges. If you want to explore all these options, become a Citizen of Activeworlds Europe. This gives you a registered name, a large choice of
avatars, permanent builds and features like contact lists, instant messaging and private conversations in most worlds. It also allows you to open your own Web World. Citizenship costs €6.50 per month or €65 per year.

Is this interesting for you English folks? Maybe not. Maybe you're not interested in doing math-quizzes at all. But with a two week free citizenship, it gives you the chance to explore more worlds and options than the online free demo and explore a bit and see what AW is capable of.

inSL Program - exitSL Fun

2008-03-26T08:46:00.004+01:00

Logging into Second Life yesterday, a new ToS (Terms of Service) was pushed. As usual, you hardly read these things and click 'accept', but this one is tricky. Especially for bloggers.

The thing is... they've started being picky about the use of the Second Life(TM) logo. On monday the 24th, Linden Lab opened the all new Brand Center;

"With the Brand Center, we’re also launching the inSL Logo Program, which provides a new community logo for Second Life Residents. Display the inSL logo to show you and your brands are a part of the Second Life community. This logo may be used on your website, business card, promotional materials, product packaging, and in many other places where you may wish to promote your contributions to the Second Life world. When using the logo, be sure to follow the Guidelines for Using the inSL Logo."

Be sure to comply, and change your blog. You've got 90 days;

"If, after reading the Trademark Guidelines, you realize you’re using a Linden Lab trademark incorrectly, please use the next 90 days to change your use to comply with the Guidelines. For more information, see our FAQ. Signing up for the inSL Logo program is fast and simple."

Signing up for the inSL Logo program might be fast and simple, changing years of blogging is not, and, what does it actually mean to you and me? As James Wagner Au describes it at New World Notes:

The Lindens have announced a 90 day amnesty for third party sites and individual users which incorporate the company's eye-in-hand logo or the Second Life/Linden Lab name into its material. Extensive FAQ here. An SL bloggers group has an extended conversation here, and offhand, I tend to agree with Kanomi Pikajuna, who says, "A company as dependent as Linden is on the goodwill and contributions of their community cannot possibly be stupid enough as to harass their fans for failing to put a TM after their company name. My guess is these guidelines are there to give them protection and cause to go after bogus currency exchange web sites and other profiteers."

Unsurprisingly, the new policy has caused some ripples of anxiety, particularly among longtime Residents who've enjoyed five years without this being much of an issue. (Especially as it'll apparently impact sites that have long included variations of "second life" in its URL.) Jennyfur Peregrine, for example, who co-launched the annual Second Life Community Convention with the Lindens' blessing in 2005, says, "I know that we are not alone in our contempt for this new decision."

One resident, Rheta Shan, has gone to extremes though in cynically replacing every mentioning of Second Life in her blog to You-Know-Where.

Another way is to replace the old Second Life(TM) logo with the logo of a Dutch shoe manufacturer, called Teva, which basically is the hand...

What happens if I don't agree with this new stuff? I'm going to get kicked out of Second Life (TM). The thing is. I'm a paying resident. I agreed to the terms of service at the time I registered, and when I renewed my subscription. I'm actively considering to not renew my subscription and follow the EXITSL strategy as Linden Lab isn't doing much to keep the fun alive, nor to improve on business usage of the Grid.

PS - there's absolutely no Trademark or Copyright on the EXITSL logo. Use freely.

Wipro Innovation = Redundancy?

2008-03-25T23:21:00.008+01:00

Today's last expedition led me to te Wipro Innovation Isle (I guess it they'd love to abbreviate it to Wii - but that one's already taken in SL). For people working in the IT Services a well known name as it is one of India's giants when it comes to IT services.

"Wipro Tech is an information technology service company established in India in 1980. It is the global IT services arm of Wipro Limited (in operation since 1945, incorporated 1946). It is headquartered in Bangalore and is the third largest IT services company in India. It has more than 79,832 employees as of December 2007, including its business process outsourcing (BPO) arm which it acquired in 2002. Wipro Technologies has over 300 customers across U.S., Europe and Japan including 50 of the Fortune 500 companies." (Wikipedia)

Near the end of 2007 there were speculations of Wipro Technologies considering to take over Capgemini and thus Sogeti as well, but in the end it was a no show. The corporate website puts focus on 'applied innovation';

"At Wipro we have fine-tuned the science of viewing innovation through the lens of practicality to design unique solutions for end customers. Applied Innovation is the ability to infuse newer ideas and newer ways of doing things into all parts of the organization, and improve business outcomes, often without major disruptive change. It is a 360-degree business approach covering process, delivery, business and technology Innovations that help Wipro to work
collaboratively with clients for cost take-outs, speed to market and new business opportunities."

It is this theme that is the starting point for the Wipro presence in Second Life, which looks to be in the first stage of the experiment. It is a 3 sim cluster, of which only one is fully build, one only holding an expo stand and an empty sim.

Applied Innovation is the ability to infuse newer ideas and newer ways of doing things into all parts of the organization, and I can well imagine this applies to their Second Life expedition as well. I do believe we have to bring Virtual Worlds (newer ways) beyond the average marketing department (i.e. into all parts of the organization). The question remains how to do this.

Let's see if Wipro can bring the answer. The sim is filled with an assorted array of buildings, with two larger builds standing out. The first of these is the 'Learning Center' and is shaped a little like the Sydney Opera (not really, buyt you can see which building I'm referring to).

Please reread the lines on the triple sim: "One build, one half build, one empty." This is pretty much the case with the Learning Center as well. It holds two auditoria, and right outside there's an amphitheater. Also, at the second level it has several empty officerooms.

Further onto the campus we see various buildings, like a 'Client Engagement' building, a library and a datacenter each filled with several workstations / cubicles.

Finally I arrived at the second large building, a four storey square concrete office block which looked a little cramped when I walked into the hall and up the staircase. It made me wonder how much of the build is actually shaped like their real life offices... This building is labelled 'Offshore Development Center' and that is what interests me, what would bring innovation to the virtual workspace.

I was a little disappointed though when there were more rooms with workstations, and more and more. But no show. One of the great benefits I see for Virtual Worlds is what they potentially can do for the offshoring industry, as offshoring projects often require a lot of attention; extra management, extra communication, extra code checking etcetera and in the virtual workspace where you can collaborate while both in offshore and rightshore location would greatly aid this process.

Yet I'm fully aware of the limitations Second Life has in this regard. There's no real integration with development suites or management tools. Then there's always the issue of security. I can't really blame Wipro for not finding the solution for Second Life, but I had hoped for more info, more ideas.

The last redundancy in the sim was when I moved from the cantine inside the ODC to 'the Glacier', a cafe on the campus.

As for the build itself, I find it of average quality. It is a melee of textures (a lot of default SL texturing) and styles. As I said, I'm under the impression that part of it is based upon real life buildings, so maybe they had to work with what they had. Otherwise, I'd say the triple auditorium, the cramped staircases etcetera don't really utilise the 3D-ness of a virtual environment.

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Wipro%20Innovation%20Isle/109/225/23

Eye Gaze Interaction

2008-03-25T09:36:00.002+01:00

For those of us having problems navigating Second Life, there's some new technology about to hit the market.

The video shows eye gaze interaction with Second Life using our "Snap Clutch" software; developed at De Montfort University, UK in collaboration with University of Tampere, Finland. The software allows us to change quickly between
interaction modes to allow for a more real-time gaming experience. This research will be presented at ETRA 2008, US.

For more information on the project please visit: http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~svickers/ and http://www.cogain.org/

When looking at the video, I'm pretty impressed with the technology. However, when you've got both hands left, use them, as this is getting very passive.

Thanks to Pieter Bosch for the Tip.

Pasona Recruitment

2008-03-25T08:35:00.004+01:00

Remaining in the employment branch, but crossing an ocean in Real Life, there's Pasona which first started as Temporary Center Inc. in 1976 and now is one of the leading Employment services in Japan.

Ever since its inception, PASONA GROUP has used job creation to pursue a clear corporate philosophy of building a better society and creating a system of employment infrastructure that provides each individual the opportunity to work and the freedom to find the job of his or her choice.

There isn't much to tell about this build. Like many other Japanese firms they've decided not to build a dedicated island, but take a parcel in the busy Japanese cluster. And seemingly it works in this case. Today is just a regular Tuesday and the agency had a crowd of 25 avatars looking for a job, which is more than I've found in many many corporate sims on any given day except for 'grand openings'

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Shibuya%20West/128/181/22/

The Grand Ducale and Grand Duchy of Luxembourg

2008-03-24T23:28:00.007+01:00

The Grand Ducale

Sticking in the same region as my former blogpost on the Belgian recruitment sim of Vacature Reference there's another one from the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , not surprisingly called "Grand Ducale" which is surrounded by sims called Luxemburg Careers and Luxemburg Business. Unlike the "Grand" part of the official name, Luxemburg itself is a pretty small country, I have no doubt there are ranches in the US and Australia which have larger backyards. A little history:

"The recorded history of Luxembourg begins with the acquisition of Lucilinburhuc (today Luxembourg Castle) by Siegfried, Count of Ardennes in 963. Around this fort, a town gradually developed, which became the centre of a small state of great strategic value. In 1437, the House of Luxembourg suffered a succession crisis, precipitated by the lack of a male heir to assume the throne, that led to the territory being sold to Philip the Good of Burgundy. In the following centuries, Luxembourg's fortress was steadily enlarged and strengthened by its successive occupants, the Bourbons, Habsburgs, Hohenzollerns, and the French, among others. After the defeat of Napoleon in 1815, Luxembourg was disputed between Prussia and the Netherlands. The Congress of Vienna formed Luxembourg as a Grand Duchy in personal union with the Netherlands. Luxembourg also became a member of the German Confederation, with a Confederate fortress manned by Prussian troops." (Wikipedia)

The triple sim setup is not about promoting Luxembourg by displaying it's landmarks, but is a rather cartoonish carnival of recruitment stands. It's lively colored and an original design. I like the small details like the sculpted trees and the overall quality of the build.

To get down to business, most of the time sites like these are rather empty, but it seems they are preparing themselves for large recruitment event, not only aimed at Luxembourg, but

The 3 sims, taken together, provide a large recruitment facility. The first event was actually held at the end of November, 2007, to recruit staff for GAX Technologies. I think this may have been something of a proof of concept, since GAX are (I think) the builders of the site. According to the Working Worlds website, the next fair is on the 28th March, 2008 - though the information on the island itself points towards a fair on 29th May. (Aleister Kronos)

Some familiar names appear (again), like recruitment companies Randstad and Manpower, both active in Second Life as well and a number of dedicated spaces for clients like Dexia (finance)

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Grand%20Ducale/128/128/0

The Grand Duchy

There's also a sim out there called "Grand Duchy" which seems to be the national immersion zone for Luxembourg, but aside from a few shops it's still rather empty and under construction.

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Grand%20Duchy/128/128/0

PS: I'm having a Technorati-frustration at the moment. It hasn't updated my blogposts for a while now. Either I screwed my rpc-ping settings when I changed the template, or Technorati is screwed for the weekend.

Virtual Career City

2008-03-24T22:22:00.003+01:00

The next Belgian sim is Vacature References, a joint effort by Belgian career sites vacatures.com (targeting the Dutch speaking Belgians and the German speaking minority near Eupen, St. Vith and Malmedy in the Ardennes) and references.be (which targets the French speaking Belgians), hence the double name.

Fortunately, this is a proper build. It is well designed, though a little low on texture (actually quite German-White in texturing).

It has several bars and lounges as well as a kind of jobshopping boulevard, a mall where several Job agencies, like Randstad, Accent and Eandis have a small office, but also clients like Logica CMG and Bosch.

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Vacature%20References/128/128/0