Here’s that list from 03/19/08 from Mike Rhodin  of IBM Lotus that references 5 trends to embrace in the virtual workplace.

The press release is here: http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release.do?id=834515&sourceType=1 

Here’s my own description of them:

1) “The Virtual Workplace will become the rule.”
Laptops and mobile devices will allow us to move beyond the “desk - typewriter - phone” model of the workplace. For many people of course this is already a way of life.  Social networking aspects of the virtual world will give the feeling of community.  The need for business travel will be reduced as virtual worlds and telepresence tools get better.

2) Real-time collaboration will become the norm. 
Email is too slow, and should be used (as it is in Second Life) as merely a cache of stored messages which arrived for you while you were asleep.  Again, already many young workers consider email too slow, having grown up on texting on phones.

3) “Beyond Phone Calls”. 
If you value productivity and time, the telephone is one of the least effective ways to communicate. Here IBM again mentions IM as being a tool for replacing many phone communications.  Now, of course the telephone is not going away, that’s not the point.  But there are huge benefits available in shifting select communications from phone to IM.

4) Interoperability desired.
IBM focuses on interoperability and open standards as inevitable as the space matures.  A lot of this just hasn’t been figured out yet and may not be, since platforms are generally competing business entities with different competencies. They are not necessarily interested in interoperability, whereas business just requires a coherent set of tools that does a few basic things flawlessly. That might not be found in any 1 platform, hence the cry for openness. They also mention increased ease of finding resources which could refer to ease of finding things in virtual worlds or better access to the correct individuals.

5) “Meetings” replaced with new models.
Fewer meetings - Woo-hoo!  It’s a conceptual leap - “gaming technologies will significantly influence online corporate meeting experiences”.  As I said at Virtual Worlds Fall 2007 in San Jose “gamers are using it now” and in fact, “collaborating ” much more effectively and with less cost.

-Bob Ketner

There were big announcements over the last couple of days that IBM and Forterra are teaming up to create collaboration tools for intelligence agencies. Both companies (IBM on 01/22/07 and Forterra on 06/25/07) have presented at the Virtual World SIG over the past year.

The article on applications for intelligence agencies are here:
http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/marketwire/0377901.htm

and here: http://www.forbes.com/technology/2008/03/20/

That article references another release in which Mike Rhodin of IBM Lotus describes 5 future trends in this direction of “Unified Communications”. That release is linked here: Marketwire IBM press release.

And more discussion about the IBM view of virtual worlds here:
http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/marketwire/0377261.htm

This type of news could be an early glimpse of the slope of enlightenment, which would be welcome, as there are indications that this could be a trough of disillusionment period. It’s good to see these virtual world concepts that have been talked about for so long put into some concrete plans. Now let’s just hope that today’s version of the ARPANET is online and their version of “the grid” is up when the red phone rings at 3 am!

-Bob Ketner

Here it is, what we have discussed at the SIG before, a mixing of RL and SL and representation of both on screen of some kind. These folks at Georgia Institute of Technology (http://arsecondlife.gvu.gatech.edu/index.html) show how avatars and humans, both seated within a designated AR stage area mix in a video. They also discuss MMO’s in general. Looks slightly odd and hard to tell what’s going on but this is right on the edge of the augmented reality direction for sure.  You can even teleport to their location:

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Augmented%20Reality/41/74/38

They also have a longer video at: http://arsecondlife.gvu.gatech.edu/defensearmmoref.mov.

Ouch, watch the mic in the first minutes of this video. The birds and crickets also have a really good time in the background.

Hello Virtual Worlders…

Read all the blog coverage on the Virtual Worlds FALL 2007 conference:

http://www.djcline.com/?p=3107 

http://www.djcline.com/?p=3059 

http://www.djcline.com/?p=3097

There is so much blogging on this event I don’t know where to begin, but also check out:

http://metaversed.com/15-oct-2007/future-content-watching-detectives

http://metaversed.com/12-oct-2007/business-age-avatar

http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2007/10/post-conference.html

 The conference organizers: Chris Sherman, Tonda Bunge , and Tim Williams were excellent hosts and put on an event like no other…thank you!!

 Now, for those who would like to keep the conversation going: 

On Oct. 22 we will be featuring a panel review of the year ahead in virtual wolds.
Scheduled guest panelists will include technology providers IBM, Forterra Systems, eFrontier, Multiverse, and Linden Lab and more.

Following up on some of the insights from the Virtual Worlds Fall 2007 conference, please bring your points of discussion and questions to this   interactive forum.

Find out how to best implement virtual worlds for business, networking, and entertainment, on the eve of several major promotions that will surely propel virtual worlds into the mainstream like never before.

We will organize the key points using scenario planning methods and reconnect with many of the speakers from the conference.  Not to be missed!

Media and teleport links:
http://www.virtualworldsig.com

SDForum link:
http://sdforum.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Calendar.eventDetail&eventID=12941

Location
Pillsbury Winthrop Office Silicon Valley
2475 Hanover Street
Palo Alto, CA 94304-1114

Agenda
6:30 PM Registration and Networking
7:00 PM -8:40 PM Presentations

Price
$15 at the door for non-SDForum members
No charge for SDForum members
No registration required
See you there,
Bob Ketner

Hello Virtual Worlders,

It’s an exciting month coming up for those interested in virtual worlds.

SDForum’s CEO Susan Lucas-Conwell will moderate the panel:
Investing in Virtual Worlds   Wednesday Oct.10, 4:00pm - 5:00pm
http://virtualworlds2007.com/schedule/strategy.html

SDForum’s booth will be located at space 417:
http://www.virtualworlds2007.com/exhibits/index.html

Also speaking at the show, Virtual World SIG Co-chairs

Bob Ketner on the Enterprise track: http://www.virtualworlds2007.com/schedule/enterprise.html

and Corey Bridges on the Business Strategy and Investment track:  http://www.virtualworlds2007.com/schedule/strategy.html

Upcoming SIG Oct. 22 will be a participatory event that you will not want to miss:

Virtual Worlds SIG: Virtual Worlds - Future Scenarios
http://sdforum.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Calendar.eventDetail&eventID=12941

In this session we will draw on presentations from the Virtual Worlds 2007 conference to look at emerging factors in the virtual world space.  We will use scenario planning methods to gain insight on the upcoming year and factors to consider in launching or using virtual worlds.  Select presenters from the conference and previous SIGs will be invited to attend and contribute in this participatory event.
6:30 PM - 9:00 PM October 22, 2007

Lot’s of exciting opportunities to engage with the virtual world phenomenon.  Looking forward to seeing you there!

Bob Ketner

IBM’s main site is now featuring employee avatars with a great graphic. The report they link to was written in partnership with another Virtual World SIG presenter Seriosity.

Thanks for the great turnout for the Seriosity event.  What a fascinating evening.  We had  a lot of viewers on Ustream.tv which  worked well.

Oct. 22 we will have a panel discussion with a set of topics tba.  To be on the panel or to participate please contact me at orange[at]studiosfo.net

WIRED’s blog asks us to “forget Second Life” and turn the real world virtual. That’s just the idea!

They post this interesting goggle-based augmented reality device with 6 modes of psychedellic visual effects (made even more so by the sound effects in this video).

The artists are named as Alexei Shulgin and Arstarkh Chernyshev and the system is called “SUPER-I” which is called “A real virtuality system”. In the mode of earlier Virtual Reality systems it features a publicly viewable screen for the un-goggled. Very cool and if it can “turn the reality around us into ASCII” then it could convert other artists’ views or digital effects as well.

One can imagine cartridges that process different artist realities enhancing the product. As always, send me any more information / links you may have about it!

Business week has an interesting article “The End Of Work As You Know It -
Increasing connectivity will change how and where we labor—even the very notion of an employer”

The article mentions upcoming Virtual World SIG presenter Seriosity and also touches on augmented reality, Mechanical Turk, telepresence, and distributed workforces. We have discussed it in virtual world circles before but it’s the first big publication mention I have seen of how work processes could be deconstructed, distributed, and completed by contractors working around the world.

I’ve also tossed around the idea that work processes themselves could be deconstructed. For example: the task of identifying a tumor on an x-ray could be represented as a map or other image and then “acted upon” or spotted by a player (contractor) for a digital currency reward. Couldn’t other data manipulation tasks be abstracted as well? I can imagine a future of monotonous data entry or auditing being accomplished by a workforce that only viewed the data as “a game” or as elements in a virtual world. The source data would be even be somewhat encrypted by virtue of this “virtualization”. Great things to consider as we continue to redefine “virtual worlds” as they emerge.

Let’s continue the discussion at the upcoming SIG and I’ll also be speaking on the topic at the Virtual Worlds 2007 conference enterprise track where SDForum will have a presence with a booth and a VC forum.

Book discussed in the article:

The Future of Work

Just announced from SDForum: 

SDForum members get 10% off on the current registration rate, ($60 off the $595 price or after August 24, 2007, $80 off the $795 price), for the Virtual Worlds Fall Conference. October 10-11, 2007, San Jose
The Virtual Worlds Fall Conference

Virtual Worlds Fall is dedicated to helping businesses harness the power of virtual worlds to engage with their customers, partners and employees. The event follows the highly successful Virtual Worlds Spring Conference which took place in New York in March.

The conference has five primary tracks: Entertainment and Marketing; Virtual Worlds for the Enterprise; Business Strategy and Investment; Community and Customer Service; and Design and Development. Leading companies will be showcasing the latest technologies and services at the Virtual Worlds Expo.

Please email Bridget DiMambro to get the discount code for the 10% off on the current registration rate,.

REGISTER NOW at http://www.virtualworlds2007.com/,

San Jose Convention Center, San Jose, CA

Registration/More Information