One cannot say that he or she has figured out the way that large organizations will be able to use Second Life on a broad basis. Using it as a tool to reach ordinary people or simply do internal activities has yet to develop comprehensively.A few examples such as Sun Microsystems and IBM have been widely cited in the media for having virtual offices or meetings. We sometimes hear that there are companies who recruit on the grid. But all of this is rather experimental. There isn't clear a "virtual world presence" model for everyone. Even for retail businesses, which may not have been fully using the potential of SL.Without being an oracle, I have a bit of a vision on all of this.Let's start with the retailers. I believe that in the long run, 3D worlds have all the potential to be a replacement for traditional Web sites. Today's Web sites have their limitations when you want to shop. Imagine going to your favorite electronics or housewares store's Web site. You do not get the same shopping experience than you get at the RL location.Second Life can be an answer to this. With an island, sculpties and a bit of work, even a luxury shop from 5th Avenue in New York could recreate its unique in-store experience. Even for the curious such as me who don't go to NYC very often! You would go to virtual stores and look at the virtual replica of this LG television, Canon photo camera or GE fridge that you are thinking of buying. You could read about it from a notecard. You would get, on your screen, the environment that you would later see when visiting the RL location. Or order in-world if you want.In such a model, the virtual world doesn't have to replace the real world... just replace the limited potential of the Web site.As for large organizations that want to use virtual worlds, IBM's answer might prove to be right. They want organizations to use SL as they use the Internet. They would have a firewall that allows them to step outside as much as they want while protecting their internal islands. That would be a brilliant step towards a more secure environment.But there's still a major problem, as The Economist points out wisely in its March 19 edition. You can't take something you created in Second Life and take it to another virtual world. The same goes with your avatar. They are wrong about moving information in, which is rather easy. But being unable to move it out easily is an issue. And they rightly point out that more open standards might do to SL just what they did to AOL's gated online services. Once we discover a universal, open virtual world, we may all abandon SL to avoid its limits.Scary for the Lindens, eh? But it could be a long-term reality.Related Link: Break down these walls (The Economist)
0 comments:
Post a Comment