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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
 By Aleks Krotoski
I'm speaking at a couple of games/virtual worlds events in London this week, which may (or may not) be of interest to readers of this blog. The first is Science in Virtual Worlds, happening tomorrow night, organised by the Royal Institute and taking place at the Apple Store on Regent Street:
Online worlds are social spaces too, and that makes them attractive to social scientists. How do we develop meaningful relationships with people we've never seen or heard? How do those with autism or schizophrenia fare? Do gender roles or moral codes alter? How does information travel and how can there be economies, uprisings and fads? What are the ethics of studying the denizens of these worlds -- are they different from real world citizens? Join us at the Apple Store on Regent Street for a free event on how science is expanding into virtual life.
READ IT ALL HERE:
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/games...
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 21 June 2007 )
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Human Interest
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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
The internet-based virtual world Second Life may have a serious impact on people's real life relationships, one of Britain's best-known scientists warned yesterday.
Baroness Susan Greenfield, director of the Royal Institution, said she feared users of the popular simulation could abandon the messy intimacy of "real-life" human relations for two-dimensional liaisons in the virtual world.
Second Life was started in San Francisco in 1999 and now has seven million players who can create their own characters, known as avatars, buy goods, throw parties and build their own homes.
However, Baroness Greenfield says the implications have not been thought through. "People who dismiss it as a game will be in for a rude awakening," she said. "This will have a huge impact on society.
"Offering people the chance to have a permanent soap opera going on, in which they can participate, will be even more pervasive than reality TV such as Big Brother.
"This is the ultimate in that you can be involved, you can interact, but still you are hiding behind an avatar."
READ IT ALL HERE:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...
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Business
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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
By Mitch Wagner
That suggests that current real-world leadership development processes may be misplaced, Malone said. Instead of focusing, as we now do, on leadership training, we should be diverting some resources to creating environments where leaders can emerge.
Disruptive Technology
Virtual worlds, like PCs, are disruptive technology, with unforeseen consequences, Kapor said. They will become mainstream quickly, but -- like PCs in the very early years -- they're now a very marginal phenomenon, Kapor said.
Like PCs, virtual worlds will enable people to do new things, and will create new economies of winners and losers.
But virtual worlds are still in the early adopter stage. The next, larger stage of users -- pragmatists looking for a payoff in uselulness -- has yet to begin.
"Virtual worlds are now at a tipping point," he said. "There is a critical mass of early adoption."
http://news.yahoo.com...
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Business
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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
By China Martens
Although virtual environments are still at an early stage in development and adoption, many companies are already dabbling in one or more virtual worlds or closely observing them prior to getting their feet wet.
Businesses that may have been slow to embrace the Internet are keen this time around to actively engage with the technology before it becomes mainstream.
"'I don't get it, but I know I should get it,'" is what businesses tend to tell Sandra Kearney, global director, emerging 3D Internet at IBM Corp., when she asks them about virtual worlds. "They say, 'I missed the Internet; I don't want to miss this too,' " she said during a panel discussion to debate virtual worlds and their business value at a joint IBM and MIT Media Labs conference held Friday.
READ IT ALL HERE:
http://news.yahoo.com/...
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Business
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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
"This weekend's New York Times Magazine
[0]puts a human face to the 'gold farming' profession. Virtual world
economist Julian Dibbell travels to Nanjing, China, for a look at the
working conditions and first-hand experience of farming gold from virtual
monsters as a way to make a living.
From the article: 'At the end of each
shift, Li reports the night's haul to his supervisor, and at the end of
the week, he, like his nine co-workers, will be paid in full. For every
100 gold coins he gathers, Li makes 10 yuan, or about $1.25, earning an
effective wage of 30 cents an hour, more or less. The boss, in turn,
receives $3 or more when he sells those same coins to an online retailer,
who will sell them to the final customer (an American or European player)
for as much as $20. The small commercial space Li and his colleagues work
in -- two rooms, one for the workers and another for the supervisor --
along with a rudimentary workers' dorm, a half-hour's bus ride away, are
the entire physical plant of this modest $80,000-a-year business.'
READ IT ALL HERE:
http://www.nytimes.com...
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Business
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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
By Xoxo Reader
"Reuters reports that two women at Yale Law
School have [1]filed suit for defamation and infliction of emotional
distress against an administrator and 28 anonymous posters on AutoAdmit
(a.k.a. Xoxohth), a popular law student discussion site. Experts are
watching to see if the suit will unmask the posters, who are
[2]identified in the complaint only by their pseudonyms. Since
AutoAdmit's administrators have previously said that [3]they do not
retain IP logs of posters, identifying the defendants may test the limits
of the legal system and anonymity on the Internet. So far, one method
tried was to [4]post the summons on the message board itself and ask the
defendants to step forward
READ IT ALL HERE:
http://xoxoreader.blogspot.com/...
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Business
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Tuesday, 19 June 2007 |
By Xoxo Reader
"Reuters reports that two women at Yale Law
School have [1]filed suit for defamation and infliction of emotional
distress against an administrator and 28 anonymous posters on AutoAdmit
(a.k.a. Xoxohth), a popular law student discussion site. Experts are
watching to see if the suit will unmask the posters, who are
[2]identified in the complaint only by their pseudonyms. Since
AutoAdmit's administrators have previously said that [3]they do not
retain IP logs of posters, identifying the defendants may test the limits
of the legal system and anonymity on the Internet. So far, one method
tried was to [4]post the summons on the message board itself and ask the
defendants to step forward
READ IT ALL HERE:
http://xoxoreader.blogspot.com/...
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Business
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Monday, 18 June 2007 |
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Sponsored by:  MICROSOFT - Thirty-four geeks and techies gathered recently for a presentation and Q&A by members of the Microsoft Visual Studio team. Chris Millionsofus introduced the speakers who were audio streamed live. Caroll Upshaw (whose real name is Carol Grojean) is Principle Group Program Manager in the Visual Studio group. Neilenns Runo (Neil Enns in real life) is Senior Lead Program Manager in the Visual Studio Group. The theme of this presentation was a change of focus in Microsoft’s Visual Studio development from “Code Complete” to “Feature Complete.” Upshaw and Runo shared development experiences they had with feature crews and quality gates at Microsoft. READ IT ALL HERE:
http://www.slnn.com/....
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 19 June 2007 )
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