Really

A poem

Can be a virtual world,

Where we see new vistas,

Meet old friends, and

in whose beauty we

Immerse ourselves.

But not this one.

I went to visit the Collaborative Environments group at Sun Labs in Burlington to learn more about the MPK20 project. Nicole Yankelovich and her team gave us a nice demo and told us about their motivations and future plans. If I heard correctly, more than 50% of SUN’s workforce is ‘remote’, and one of the major complaints is the quality of remote collaboration tools.

MPK20 is an attempt to improve remote interactions, both to improve efficiency, but also to bring back some of the social aspects of working in the same location that remote workers currently miss. Built-in from the start is voice support and application sharing, and though the project is still at an early stage, the development team thinks they are very close to being able to use it in day-to-day meetings.

I tried downloading and running MPK20, which was remarkably easy - as long as you have ant and a recent jdk, you can check out the source yourself, build and run the system in 2 steps. The system downloads the environment from Sun’s servers, which didn’t work through our firewall, but on my home machine everything came up smoothly.

The virtual world you get by default is limited to one building (MPK20 refers to building 20 at the Sun’s Menlo Park campus. There are 19 physical buildings, and building 20 is the virtual one). When you enter the environment, you’re in the big hall shown above. There are a number of “non-player characters” standing around having conversations or doing demos. Unfortunately, the voice-bridge is not yet available for download, but what happens is that as you move closer to different groups of people, you start hearing their conversations (similar to Second Life’s voice support).

There is currently nothing indicating who is speaking, and though the NPCs in the environment are gesturing, there does not seem to be any way to animate your own avatar. The avatars themselves (and the whole building) are rather primitive looking, though I’m pretty sure that it’s because the development team is focusing on features rather than graphics (since everything is built on Java3D, better graphics should be possible).

This image shows my avatar (live avatars are labeled with their names, NPCs are not), in the “team room”. This area has information all along the walls, and the intent is to have automatic updates of various artifacts, and perhaps even have whiteboards that can be updated in both the real and the virtual world. All around the team area are smaller rooms, that could be specific to individuals, for example. As in a physical office, a closed or open door can be used to indicate whether it’s ok to disturb the occupant.

There certainly is a lot of demand for a business oriented virtual world platform. Second Life and other available platforms have many problems, either in terms of security or in cost of content creation. MPk20 is open source (the voice bridge will be released soon) , Java based, includes application sharing and claims to be scalable because of the underlying Project Darkstar architecture. It will be interesting to see the future development of this project, especially if an open-source development community forms around it. So, if you’re a Java hacker looking for something to do, helping out the MPK20 team could be an option. If you want to make me happy, start working on some of the below:

• Easy content creation. Right now you have to use Blender or something similar to create 3D objects. The ability to import from Sketchup is supposedly being developed, and in-world building tools are also being considered.
• Better avatars. Better looking, more customizable, and more controllable avatars are needed before it becomes possible to feel comfortable with interacting with others using this environment.
• Better camera controls. There are currently only a few camera angles possible. If I’m looking at an application window in-world, I’m going to need better ability to zoom-in and to quickly look at other information being displayed around the room.
• Windows Application sharing. Currently being able to display and interact with desktop apps in the environment is only possible if the applications are X11 based.

Perhaps we should start a list of the minimal feature-set needed for virtual worlds?

One of the wonders of Second Life is the new variety of ways businesses and individuals can spam you. Apart from posting billboards all over the mainland, spammers can offer you objects,notecards, and textures, as well as send you IMs and group invitations. The latest releases of the SL client have included some features to try and limit “object-spam”: muting an individual or an object lets you ignore any offers of items, not just chats and IMs. Spamming also seems to be against the Terms of Service, though in an article in the official Linden news letter Torley Linden implies that it is only repetitive spam that is a virtual world faux-pas.

In any case, abuse-reporting and muting spammers doesn’t prevent the spam from reaching you in the first place. I’m starting to get a fair amount of group invitations and IMs from people asking me to try their latest products, which is doubly annoying, since these messages get forwarded to my email. The only option available at this point is to turn off email forwarding, which is too blunt of an approach. Some more fine-grained tools would be helpful. For example,

• Only forward IMs from people on my “friends” list
• Allow IM forwarding on an individual basis
• Automatically reject group offers

Anybody have other ideas? I looked in the Second Life Issue Tracker, and could not find any request related to IM spam, so maybe there’s a possibility to fill the gap and influence the development.

The real problem is that Linden Lab has created a communication mechanism without considering the spam issue at all. Given the history of USENET, email, wiki vandalism, blog comment spam, as well as other examples (I’m even getting spam on Twitter), it seems that building in a filtering mechanism from the start of any new communication medium is an essential feature.

I finally re-read Neal Stephenson’s book The Diamond Age, something I’d been meaning to do since the Spring Virtual Worlds 07 conference. At the “Virtual Worlds Roadmap - Where is it all going” panel an audience member asked the panelists to expound on the future of the Metaverse, taking it beyond the vision laid out by Stephenson in Snow Crash, towards the world depicted in Diamond Age. Unfortunately, I don’t think the panel had read the book, so the answers tended be along the lines of “more virtual worlds blended with augmented reality” (as I recall).

Diamond Age is a lot less focused on virtual worlds than Snow Crash was, however. The book describes a future where nano-tech has been completely mastered, enabling the cheap and quick (or slow, if the story demands it…) manufacturing of goods, food, and new materials. Information is distributed via “smart paper”, which is interactive, connected, and embedded with sufficient compute power to allow for at least a limited form of AI. Those of us interested in the future of documents can definitely take some inspiration from descriptions of smart-paper workflows like:

“Cover sheet,” Hackworth said to the piece of paper, and then it had pictures and writing on it, and the pictures moved–a schematic of a machine-phase system cycling.

[…]

“Letter fold,” he said to the piece of paper, and it creased itself neatly into thirds.

Virtual worlds do appear in the form of “ractives”; interactive movies which seem to be the main form of entertainment, but are not used to socialize or do business. Ractives are one aspect of what to me is the major technological theme of the book (apart from the nano-tech): using humans as compute engines. Humans are used either for creating believable interactions, not achievable by AI, or as compute-engines linked together into a massively parallel supercomputer (Stephenson seems to believe that the human brain is not a Turing machine).

Using humans as compute engines is pretty standard today (see Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, or projects like Galaxy Zoo) , and in Second Life avatars are (mostly) backed by a human brain. Interestingly, there’s been a large number of employment services that have moved into SL recently: KellyServices, Manpower Inc. , Semper International, and Randstad (all claiming to be “first”). Will we see a future where “actors” will take on different roles depending on what currently is in demand (furry male bartender at night, female ninja for a machinima shoot during the day)?

On the nano-tech side of things, we’re seemingly much further away from a reality where we can construct products, buildings, and tools effortlessly (just a small matter of programming). Of course, in the virtual world we have that ability, so now is the time to experiment with and invent the new tools and devices that we want to be able to create as soon as the technology in the physical world catches up.

Tateru Nino has written an article on why virtual worlds are not the future on the web (and summarized it quite concisely on twitter). Tateru argues that the web and virtual environments have different purposes, and may continue to evolve together, perhaps enhancing each other, but still remaining largely separate. The web is for efficiently finding and understanding connected sets of information, whereas virtual environments like Second Life are best used for visualizations and immersing yourself in an environment to experience data: “A virtual environment is a representation of data through digital synesthesia into forms the user will find meaningful or familiar.”

If I understand the argument correctly, it comes down to the notion that some tasks are simply more effectively done in a 2D environment like a web browser; search results, or amazon product listings are best viewed in a list on your web browser, where you can quickly click on them to achieve what you want to do. So, in the future, we’ll still have our web browsers for getting information, and we’ll pop into the virtual world when we want an experience, or want to hang out with other people.

My issue with this argument (and apologies to Tateru if I mis-stated it) is that I’m not sure that the 2D desktop is the best way to interact with and create data. I think this is the problem (I mean, the opportunity - since this is a corporate blog…) that we’re only starting to address. We are so used to dealing with lists and windows and linear pieces of text that it is easy to believe that these are the best ways of doing things on computers. But there is nothing particularly natural about those techniques, and often they seem to be results of physical constraints of our devices. The interface for browsing your files on today’s computers is not significantly different from using the DIR command in MS-DOS. Apple’s use of Cover Flow to browse files in the upcoming Leopard release, is still essentially a one dimensional list, but (as I may have mentioned before) perhaps an initial step on exploring how a 3D space can be used. Other examples are The Ivory Tower of Primitives and the Particle Laboratory in Second Life, showing how a 3D environment can be a more effective mechanism to convey a tutorial than a document or a wiki. As experimenting with 3D virtual environments becomes easier, and the results of those experiments can be used on affordable consumer hardware, people will discover new interface techniques that will displace the standard browser and desktop metaphors.

Email was said to be the original “killer-app” of the Internet, and while email client apps are probably not going away any time soon, web-based email continues to grow. I don’t think it is unreasonable to believe that in the same way that people figured out how to use the new affordances of the web to enhance email, we will start to discover how virtual worlds will make our current web-browsing tasks more effective (though 3D Mailbox’s tool representing your emails as people at a virtual pool party may not be the best approach, there is something to be said for feeding spam to the sharks in the pool….)

It’s been a while since I posted anything — partially because I just spent some time in Montana with no access to the Internet. However, since I was surrounded by gorgeous landscapes, Casinos everywhere, and furry animals popping up when least expected, it was similar enough to Second Life to lessen any withdrawal symptoms.

One piece of news that came out while I was away was Linden Lab’s announcement of the impending arrival of the “Hetereogeneous Grid”. Apparently, the latest upgrades have set up the underlying architecture of Second Life to allow different versions of the server software to be running on the grid simultaneously. This will allow the Lindens to run Beta versions of the server on the main grid, or gradually roll out the latest version of the server to a small set of regions, only affecting those residents who chose to visit them. Viewer upgrades are also optional, so users can run older versions of the client without crashing or being forced to upgrade.

Enabling the heterogeneous grid will hopefully lead to a more stable Second Life, where new features can be tested more thoroughly and shutting down the entire world on “upgrade-Wednesday ” is no longer necessary.

What else is possible? Linden Lab could offer different versions of the server software to sim owners, perhaps a “premium server” with additional features (for a moderate fee, of course). If they were in a more benign mood, they could allow users to develop and run their own versions of the server (once the server code is open sourced). Land-owners could then try to lure residents and businesses by offering more features than the competition. One could even try to lock-in residents by providing features that also require a custom version of the client. The result will be a truly heterogeneous grid, with different clients and servers, only unified by a common protocol, similar to the World Wide Web.

So, Steve Jobs didn’t announce a surprise Apple-branded Metaverse platform yesterday at the WWDC’07 keynote address. But, what was interesting were some of the new features in the OS. CoverFlow, the 3D browsing mechanism for iTunes, has been promoted as the way to browse through all content on the computer:

(Image Courtesy of Apple)

When describing this feature, Jobs reportedly said: “…it turns out to be INCREDIBLY useful.” One of the arguments I hear often is that, “some tasks are always going to be better in 2D”. Maybe so, but I think once designers start trying to use 3D interfaces, they are likely to stumble upon new ways of doing old tasks (and let’s face it, browsing through a list of files has not really changed a whole lot since the days of DIR C:), that are INCREDIBLY useful.

The “stacks” features, shown on the right side of the screen, is another move towards a more three dimensional way to organize objects (Wired gives some more details and history on this feature). Also, the fact that the dock icons are shown sitting on a shiny floor really starts to hammer home the notion that not only are the buttons, windows, and icons three dimensional, but they are living in a three-dimensional space.

Along with the new iChat features (like video backgrounds), calling virtual desktops spaces, and the fact that major gaming companies are supporting the Mac platform, these new features clearly indicate that Apple is pushing their desktop into the virtual world arena. At the next WWDC, the Mac will be a fully immersive environment, where you control your avatar via the built-in camera, seamlessly moving within Mac “spaces” and to spaces on other Macs, iPhones, and iPods (and even PCs - but they will not look as nice).

One more thing - Ok, maybe there won’t be a Mac Metaverse, but Apple will continue to innovate in their interfaces, in ways that can be adapted to improve interactions in virtual worlds.

The new sky and cloud system being previewed in the SL First Look Viewer, adds yet more detail (if not realism) to the Second Life landscape. By playing around with the available controls, you can get a range of effects, from partly overcast sunny days to gorgeous sunrises and sunsets (click on thumbnails for larger picture):

What the images don’t show, is that with the default settings, the clouds move and change at rather extreme speeds (Torley Linden posted some videos that show you) . I think cloud speed is a parameter you can set, but of course, if you set it to a more realistic level, you won’t actually notice the clouds changing… A couple of rash clicks and drags can also get you to:

You can even pre-program the light changes for the day. Right now, the effect is controlled by the client, but the plan is to allow estate owners to control the lighting and weather effects so it will be the same for all visitors. I predict the rise of a new profession: Weather Manager. Is this yet another step on the path towards higher quality content at the expense of simple controls?

In Clive Jackson’s white paper on The Metaverse 2.0 he mentions cites “no barriers to entry” as the first criterion for successful adoption of the metaverse. We saw an example of this principle when Linden Lab remove the credit card requirement for creating new Second Life accounts, paving the way for the exponential growth in registrations.

Another way that Second Life lowers the barrier is the ease of content creation. The in-world tools for building and scripting brought 3D modeling and animation within reach for many people, who no longer needed to buy and learn potentially complex applications like Maya. The success of Second Life must be at least partially attributed to the fact that large numbers of people, many of who might never have thought of themselves as modelers or programmers, were able to have great ideas, and then implement them. Because everybody is using the same tools, applications are differentiated mostly by their creator’s imagination, rather than proficiency in some tool or programming language. There are exceptions, of course: texture and animation creation is more difficult than regular building, and is thus more costly (and, perhaps, we see less innovation in those areas?).

Several recent developments seem to be moving us towards raising the barriers for creating. There’s the proposed certification system for builders and scripters, the push towards mono for scripting (ultimately allowing the use of programming languages like C# instead of LSL), and most recently, the introduction of sculpted prims. All of these initiatives are intended to enable richer, better, and more quality content. Since there’s no plans to remove the current building tools and features, it may not prevent people from creating content, but it may lead to a split in the creator community. Those who bother to go through the certification, know how to program in C#, and are able to use 3D modeling packages to create sculpted prims, will be more sought after, and will be able to create much better applications than those developers only using LSL and standard prims (whether the certification program will actually have any effect, remains to be seen, but the intent is to differentiate between professionals and hobbyists).

That better applications can be built is good of course. However, if the consequence is a decrease in the number of people who try to develop their own ideas, because ultimately they won’t be able to compete, might that not lead to less innovation? Gwyneth Llewelyn covers the sculpted prim aspect of this discussion, but I think it’s worth seeing that as just one piece of what she terms the growing rift between the “talented amateur” and the professional artists, and perhaps another slight dent in the ideal expressed by “Your world, your imagination” .

On April 17th, we had a big product launch event at Fenway park in Boston, in conjunction with AIIM/OnDemand. There was a large Second Life component to the event, with the Boston audience being shown a virtual product showroom on Xerox Innovation Island. Sophie Vandebroek posted a short summary (including a transcript (warning - MS Word document!) of the in-world panel discussion), and there was some news coverage and blog entries here and there. We had also planned to stream video from Fenway Park into Second Life, so that the SL audience could see and here what was going on. Unfortunately, as we all know, Real Life is not entirely stable and we always take a risk when we try to stage events in the physical world, so the video link never materialized.

However, there are now some videos of the event available, so everyone can see what they missed! The first video shows what was going on in both worlds, and gives you a bit of peak of the pavilion at Xerox Innovation Island:

The second video is an edited version of a machinima shown at the event, used to introduce the audience to Second Life. Follow along as a journalist meets an avatar named “Sophie”, and learns how businesses are mixing digital and real worlds:

Unfortunately, this edit omits my favorite line in the film. As Sophie and the journalist sit down to chat, Sophie, of course, chooses “Belgian hot chocolate” to drink, but the narrator declines, stating “I had my big eye on a little tea”! Get it? Well, I liked it.

As you may have noticed, both videos include parts from the machinima we did in January - Reuse and recycle is what we do!