Liveblog, hurried and it was hard to hear and muffled so lots of typos and elisions.
Kevin Hanna, Creative Director, Google Lively
About a year ago the first rumors hit about Lively. My favorite was one where some bloggers decided to debunk the rumor, presenting arguments as to why Google would never go into this space. At the end the question is why would Google do this?
So we are here to answer the question of why is Google in this space?
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The Web is moving towards a user-centric experience. Whereas a few years ago, it was all about visiting destination sites, now it is about destination sites spitting out data that comes to you, via RSS. The attraction of things like Twitter or Facebook lies in the ambient information that flows out and about, and in your largely asynchronous, largely placeless, largely shallow updates on what your friends are doing. You come to know them deeply not by engaging deeply with them, but by building up pictures of lots of small actions they take.
Compare, for example, the destination-like IRC versus the ambient Twitter. Hardcore Twitter fans use it almost in realtime. They answer people, with their @fred syntax convention. They have a better history, perhaps, because they can search the stream in a way that IRC doesn’t really support. But more importantly, you follow Twitter by filtering it; it’s one big stream, and you take little bits of it out. It is as if IRC were all one channel, and you happened to build an aggregate channel of just the people talking that you wanted to hear.
Dusan Writer has a take on the panel I was on, casting it as Metaplace vs Linden Lab — though to my mind that leaves out the contributions of Mike Wilson of Makena and Corey Bridges of Multiverse. That’s because Dusan is interested mostly int he clash of philosophies about where virtual worlds are going:
But it leaves a question: are virtual worlds places? Or will the technologies that enable 3D spaces become so ubiquitous that we’ll stop thinking of them as distinct places? Because in Raph’s view, the tools and technologies to create 3D artefacts, the system for managing your avatar and identity should be EXPRESSION-agnostic. In other words, we should have the tools for creating content and then be able to seamlessly publish that content to cell phones, browsers, Flash, separate clients – whatever, it’s not the viewer, it’s in the engine from which content is derived and creating standards and tools for expressing the content from that engine.
FWIW, virtual worlds are definitely “places” in my mind. But to me, clients and devices are merely windows that look onto that place. That doesn’t preclude rich 3d “windows” — I merely happen to think that multihead, flexibly represented VWs is the future. I would swap the word “engine” for “server” perhaps, or “world.”
Liveblog, excuse trhe typos!
Technical Visionaries Discuss and Debate
The Future of Virtual World Technologies
This session will analyze the future course of virtual worlds technologies. Join us for debate between leading industry technology experts on the future of the technology, where it’s headed and what needs to be done to get there. Don’t miss this lively conversation.
– John Swords, Director of Business Development, The Electric Sheep Company (moderator)
– Ian Hughes/epredator Metaverse Evangelist, IBM
– Ben Goertzel, CEO, Novamente LLC
– Mark Wallace, Chief Executive, Wello Horld, Inc.
– Christian Renaud, CEO, Technology Intelligence Group
Mod: When we brainstormed, a common theme was that we might be at a point where it’s time to talk about VW’s 2.0. The last few years could be described as 1.0, what characterizes the changes and what is 2.0?
Ian: The 2.0 thing kind of scares people, geeky. For me, there’s stuff that is probably going to happen that breaks this avatar model. There may actally be better ways for us to interact as humans over this medium, and it may be that while we try to repicate the world and dress up in interesting ways, that there are better ways, whether it is motion tracking or other ways we choose. That may be a leap we need to take, though avatars has brought some acceptance.
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I’m driving up to LA tomorrow morning for the Virtual Worlds Expo. I’ll be on a panel. If you’re there, say hello!
1:00 – 2:00 pm Business Visionaries Panel: Where is the Business Headed Next?
Innovation is coming fast and furious on multiple fronts from multiple vendors. This one-of-a-kind session brings together the business visionaries of major virtual world companies for an interactive discussion on the future of the industry. Join us for a session you won’t want to miss.
– Ginsu Yoon, VP of Business Affairs, Linden Lab
– Corey Bridges, Executive Producer, Multiverse
– Michael Wilson, CEO, Makena Technologies, Inc.
– Raph Koster, President, Areae
– Joey Seiler, Editor, VirtualWorldsNews.com & Virtual Worlds Weekly (moderator)
