Enzo Silva Blog » 3D

Project Wonderland’s Future

enzofsilva — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 21:43:17 +0000

The Project Wonderland development team just found out that development resources will no longer be applied to the project, Sun/Oracle resources that is.

However, the avid team plans to keep up the great work they have done so far counting on the open source community. The team wiill soon release Project Wonderland v0.5 Preview Release 3 this week.

Nicole Yanchelovich (project lead) reminds us of the countless university projects and corporations utilizing Project Wonderland as a virtual world platform and several companies offering Wonderland-based services. Also noted in her post on January 30, 2010, is the power of the community that keeps the project alive and she calls for participation:

“Any concrete help you can give us would, of course, be welcome, but what we are asking for now is your moral support and your continued participation in our thriving community. Let’s stand together in our determination to keep this project moving forward. If you would like to contact me privately, please feel free to do so at nicoley @ dev.java.net.”

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Second Life’s Decline? – Whatever Happened to Second Life?

enzofsilva — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 16:42:11 +0000

This post by Barry Collins for PCPro highlights the author’s adventures in Second Life and the decline of his interest in the virtual world. As many of us when we first get into something new and cool, he a peak of interest which then started to turn into boredom as he experienced and saw more of the same every time he walked into the world of Second Life.

The last points he raises such as goals and rewards would probably make users stay in Second Life longer. Besides the social interaction and some interactive attractions in Second Life, there is not much to it if designers/developers don’t put much effort in creating new experiences rather then only replicating what we already see in real life.

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Article by Avatar Languages – 3D Virtual Worlds for Language Learning

enzofsilva — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 14:53:53 +0000

3D Virtual Worlds for Language Learning

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Google Lively – 3D Chat/Virtual World

enzofsilva — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:39:56 +0000

As if Google wasn’t already trying to be the know-it-all and the have-it-all of the Web, now they also try to compete with 3D chat rooms and virtual worlds in this new release in beta phase:

Lively – “Chat and interact with your friends in rooms you design.”

“Customize your avatar and stream personal photos and video.”

“Invite your friends to chat and help decorate.”

The look an feel resembles virtual worlds such as CyWorld, for instance. Many others are compared on this chart by TechCrunch. The Blue Book published by the Association of Virtual Worlds contains and enormous list of Virtual Worlds…

It might be worth giving it a try. I am just not sure whether we need yet another virtual world combined with a chat room capability… mmmm… All in all, It might be just another move for Google to place their ads all over the Web , this time on the 3D Web…

By the way, no Mac version as of now…

Also, take a look at Karl Kapp’s list of Alternative to Second Life.

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Handipoints – Virtual World that Helps Kids Do Chores in Real World

enzofsilva — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:14:31 +0000

Speaking of persuasion power, Handipoints is a clever idea of getting kids’ interest in video games and virtual worlds to get them to do something productive in real life through an “incentive program”.

I will not go on an on about how interesting this idea is since Michael Arrington from Techcrunch already wrote a nice post about it here.

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Immersive Education – Education Grid Initiative

enzofsilva — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 14:25:00 +0000

An interview with Aaron Walsh, professor of virtual environments and games for learning at Boston University:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8eK0jfbYRA&hl=en]

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