eWeek - March 10, 2008

eras, meanwhile, gather continuous nities for interaction, information about the auto, offering but they also can allow Visions of the future ^effective ^protection ^against ^theft. ^{organizations} ^to ^view Virtual worlds are just one manifestation of the metaverse And Nike and Apple have partnered and manipulate infor- that will evolve during the next 10 years. to create Lifelog sneakers that record mation from a vari-running statistics. ety of applications. ^Augmentation

The Crown Plaza, for

^Real ^problems, ^example, ^lets ^indi-_virtual _solutionsviduals reserve virtual _conference _rooms _in _Augmentedvirtual worlds have gained the ^realitySecond Life. Within widest adoption (though still rela- these rooms, applicatively low) among the 3-D Web tech- tions such as stream-nologies because they address so ing audio, video and, many of the problems facing today’s say, a PowerPoint deck organizations. could be shown on the ^Mirror

Lifelogging

External

Intimate

With employees increasingly walls. ^{Virtual worlds}distributed, the incidental interac- Virtual worlds are ^worldstions that are so important in build- also appealing when ing team experiences are often lost. the gro wing cost of ^Simulation

It’s what Dave Elchoness, former travel—and looming _Augmented _reality _An _enhancement _of _the _physicaloutsourcing executive from Qwest economic woes—are world for the individual ^and ^current ^chairman ^of ^the ^{Asso- f a c t o r e d} ^{i n .} ^{T h e} Lifelogging The recording and reporting of the states ciation of Virtual Worlds, calls the N a t i o n a l B u s i n e s s and life histories of objects and people

“global hallway.” Travel Association Virtual worlds An augmentation of the economic and

“We know that real work doesn’t expects that the costs ^social ^life ^of ^physical ^communitiesget done in 3-hour meetings or con- of car rentals and hotel Mirror worlds Reflections of the physical world ferences,” Elchoness said. “Instead, rates will increase by 5 Source: Metaverse Road Map a chance meeting in the hallway or to 7 percent this year, a ‘drive-by’ into your office is what while airfares will grow by 6 to 10 which means that organizations really gets ideas shared and work percent. need to find new ways to provide accomplished.” The NBTA also reports that more for training and education—both

Virtual worlds can help orga- travel managers are projecting travel of which are strong areas for virtual nizations create these opportu- spending to remain flat in 2008, worlds.

Unisfair builds virtual events in Second Life so companies can avoid the time and costs associated with traveling to trade shows. Edusim, meanwhile, is an interactive whiteboard that uses the Croquet virtual-world platform for training. The University of Minnesota Croquet Project uses the same technology to train students in foreign languages.

Training that would be high-risk in the real world is particularly well-suited to virtual worlds. For example, the Idaho Bioterrorism Awareness and Preparedness Program and the Institute of Rural Health at Idaho State University are