New World Notes

Noirran Marx Blogs Second Life Housewares Beautifully

SL House and Decorating Addict, as the name suggests, is a blog devoted to Second Life interior decoration, and as photographed by Noirran Marx, it's sumptuous, besotted fun for home decor lovers (real and virtual.) One could wish there were a few more avatars in the pics, but look at this tribute to mid-century modern, with what looks like Betty Page in the kitchen.

In Second Life Meeting Space, Real World Veterans Need Virtual Walls to Feel Safe

Second Life has shown a lot of promise as a platform for recovering military veterans, who seem to enjoy the feeling of anonymity in an immersive, safe environment to share their horrific wartime experiences with others. But what's the best virtual architecture for them to meet in? This challenge was recently given to real life/Second Life architect Jon Brouchoud (Keystone Bouchard in SL), who recounts on his blog Arch Virtual the design process for creating a new Second Life space for civilian-veteran dialog:

[M]any veterans prefer to sit with their backs to the wall so they can more easily survey their environment... it has long been known that people really do experience a strong connection, or sense of ‘embodiment’ in their avatar to a certain extent... if a virtual object is thrown at your avatar, many people will physically flinch in the real world – even though the virtual object could obviously do them no harm.

To account for this, Keystone tweaked his original construction (as seen above):

We revised and modified the design to make it feel more secure by enclosing some spaces, first by raising concrete walls around the outer circle but we soon realized that we had actually gone too far and had created an environment that was too confining and enclosed – to the extent that it could actually make the civilians participating in the dialogue uncomfortable.

Fascinating stuff -- read it all here.

Ophelia's Gaze: Iris' Favorite Second Life Shopping Experiences

Iris Ophelia's ongoing review of virtual world and MMO fashion

For many designers, a store is a utilitarian necessity; shelves of products and information are set out in a spartan way so customers can find what they need and leave. However, some see their store as an opportunity to build an entire experience to engage visitors, and it's these stores that really give me something to gush about!

Take Lula [SLurl], for example. At its heart is a breathtaking build that certainly doesn't scream "mall", even though it houses Lamb, Tres Blah, and Mon Tissu's main shops. I find myself coming back to this place again and again, even when I don't need to buy anything, just to soak in the atmosphere. This sim reminds me so much of the romantic little towns in the south of France, between the lush vegetation, rolling hills, and the colorfully varied buildings. Lula is easily one of the most charming shopping sims in all of SL.

This list isn't just limited to gorgeous builds. Keep reading for two more stores that provide eye-catching and ingenious shopping experiences!

Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation on Ending its Second Life Partnership: The Virtual Replicas Weren't Wright Enough

I recently noted that the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation had ended its licensing relationship with the Frank Lloyd Wright Virtual Museum in Second Life, run by the registered non-profit Virtual Museums Inc, which recreated a number of Wright's buildings and other designs in Second Life. Educator Ignatius Onomatopoeia contacted the Foundation, which manages the great architect's intellectual property, and received a lengthy official reply, including this clincher:

The Foundation terminated the license agreement with VMI for numerous reasons, including the fact that several of the buildings as constructed in Second Life and displayed by VMI did not accurately reflect the buildings as actually designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.

This seems quite different from what VMI board members have said about the termination; for instance, one asserted that a key conflict was over the sale of unapproved Wright knock-offs in the SL marketplace. My sense is we're not getting the full story from either side, as is often the case. In any event, it's unfortunate the Wright museum in Second Life is evidently no more.

Image credit: In a Strange Land.

Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Withdraws License to Virtual Frank Lloyd Wright Museum in Second Life -- Then Sends Cease-and-Desist

Sad news for architecture lovers in Second Life: The Frank Lloyd Wright Virtual Museum in Second Life, a non-commercial, education-oriented installation which operated under a licensing agreement from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation (established by the great builder himself), is disappearing from the metaverse this Sunday. Why? Because according to Rowan Derryth, a Board member of Virtual Museums Inc. (which runs the site), the Foundation let the agreement expire, then sent a cease-and-desist to the group. This happened even after another VMI member made an in-person trip to Arizona, to plead the Second Life installation's case with the Foundation. One interesting (and disappointing) reason for refusing that entreaty is reportedly this: The Foundation blamed VMI for commercial infringement of Wright's intellectual property sold on Second Life's commerce site -- when other content creators were actually to blame for doing that:

[T]he most surprising complaint the Foundation aimed at us was the erroneous assumption that items on the SL Marketplace which were being sold under the name Frank Lloyd Wright (and of course not approved by the Foundation) were somehow the responsibility of the FLWVM/VMI.

And indeed, searching for "Frank LLoyd Wright" in the Second Life Marketplace brings up a number of items with his name in the marketing. So ironically, the rights-respecting, non-commercial group seems to be the one being punished in this case.

All that said, be sure to visit the Frank Lloyd Wright site before it becomes unofficial, and gone. It's impressive: Direct SLurl teleport at this link.

Second Life for Architecture? Don't Expect Wide Use For 10 Years, Says Expert

Pictured: "Porchdog" Katrina relief housing design constructed in real life, and recreated in Second Life

For the longest time I've believed architecture design would be the most likely real world business application of Second Life to gain traction. However, outside a few notable projects like David Denton's Cleopatra Water Courts design (which was commissioned with and originally developed from a Second Life model), there isn't much evidence that architects or their clients are embracing SL or OpenSim in their work.

Why is that? I put the question to RL architect Jon Brouchoud (known as Keystone Bouchard in Second Life), co-creator of the award-winning Wikitecture design platform made for SL, who's speaking about his metaverse work at today's Metanomics show at Noon SLT (details at this link.)

"I am absolutely certain that online virtual environments like Second Life or OpenSim will become widely used in architectural practice," Keystone told me, "but it could take a decade or more to fully percolate into the profession.

Rutgers Prototypes New Building Design by Major Architecture Firm in Second Life and OpenSim

What you're looking at below is the proposed design for the new business school of Rutgers University. Created by the internationally acclaimed design firm Ten Arquitectos, it's depicted here not as a real world model or an artists' 2D illustration, but as a scale reproduction created in Second Life:

As commissioned by the University, the translation from schematic plans and illustrations to a building in Second Life was done by RL/SL architect Keystone Bouchard (Jon Brouchard IRL), who writes about the process on his blog, ArchVirtual. "Looking at an illustration of a building is helpful, but being able to invite anyone, anywhere in the world to experience the design in an immersive, realtime environment is better," he argues there. Looks a great building in both realities. An even more detailed replica will soon be created in OpenSim, the open source spinoff of Second Life.

Linden Suburban Home Owners More Likely To Treat Their Place As Extension of the Real Life Self, Academic Suggests

Wiviott and Soup

Who would buy a new prefab virtual house in Second Life, and why? That's a question longtime Second Life users have been wondering, and presumably the Lindens thoroughly researched that topic before they launched their Linden Homes product. A Resident named Remington Soup is also interested, but for a more particular reason: that's the avatar of Matthew Wiviott, an academic in Cultural Mediation and Technology studies with Canada's world-ranked McGill University.

"Essentially I'm conducting research that will document a community of Linden Homes," he tells me. "I hope to provide an analysis that offers insight into the kind of relationships that Residents have with spaces they claim as 'theirs'. Linden Homes is fascinating, I think, precisely because of the severe restrictions imposed on modifications. Ideally, I would like to see people discover ways to subvert these restrictions, but any kind of personal expression is potentially interesting."

Wiviott believes there will be pronounced differences in who purchases which kind of Linden Home (pictured), two of which are contemporary and realistic, the other two historical/fantastic.

"My hunch was that people who inhabit SL in a similar way that they inhabit Facebook, i.e., as a virtual projection of their social identity, would prefer the California Modernism of Meadowbrook -- or perhaps the quaint rusticity of Tahoe. The two others -- Tolkien-esque Elderglen and Medieval Japanese Shareta Osumai - would attract those in SL as immersionists." It may seem obvious that people interested in online roleplay would prefer the fantastic or exotic choice, but for Wiviott, this exposes an interesting assumption:

Architect Says Second Life's Dynamic Shadows Greatly Enhance Building in SL

Architect Keystone Bouchard (co-founder of the award-winning Wikitecture platform) has been building in SL with dynamic shadows enabled lately, and says they greatly enhance the process: "When you rez and stretch a prim with shadows enabled, it has a much deeper visual impact – more like working with physical materials that have a greater weight, or sense of presence than they do without shadows. For me, it definitely has an impact on the realtime design experience – through a deeper sense of depth and space than non-shadowed prims convey." Question is, how much will shadows change the architecture of Second Life? Image: The Arch Network.

Mixed Reality Project Uses RFID To Connect Interaction of Real Objects to Virtual Ones in Second Life

Mixed reality design project (2/3)
Uploaded by huggy

What you're looking at above is a mixed reality project by French developer Hugobiwan Zolnir, which uses RFID chips to connect the interaction of real world objects to virtual objects in Second Life. This is done by linking objects with an RFID touchtag to a web database that tracks object coordinates and position, and in turn sends that data into SL. Full details on Zolnir's site here. The upshot, as you see above, is pretty cool: put an object on the real world grid, see it rezzed (or de-rezzed) on the Second Life grid.

It's not just a fun hack, however, because Monsieur Zolnir sees real world applications coming out of this: "The idea is to design an immersive space on the fly by just moving tagged physical objects," he writes, "and to share and exchange in this generated space in order to experience and improve it. No mouse, no technical skills for the user of the design tool." So imagine using it, for example, as a platform for architecture and urban design conducted in two or more remote locations. Follow Zolnir's progress here.