Virtual Worlds Open Forum – Recent Work and Developments

This Virtual World SIG meeting will offer insight into new directions virtual worlds are taking in 2010.

The past six months have seen a high degree of churn in the virtual world space, with some projects shutting down,  some projects changing focus, and still others continuing to break new ground. Presentations will focus on emerging opportunities in light of these recent changes.

Join us for a  look at some brand new projects in fast-paced 10 minute segments and explore crucial and current questions in virtual worlds.  This will be an open forum format. To suggest additional  segments, please send an outline and  your contact information to virtualworldsig@hotmail.com and bring any slides you’d like to share in .PDF format on a flash drive.

Confirmed participants with new projects include:
Greg Nuyens CEO, Teleplace, Inc
Maribeth Back,  Senior Research Scientist, FX Palo Alto Laboratory, Inc. (FXPAL)
Eilif Tronsden, Research and Program Director of the Virtual Worlds @ Work  (VWW) consortium at
Strategic Business Insights
Bob Ketner, Manager, The Tech Virtual
Damon Hernandez,  Mixed Reality guy,  IDEA Builder

We will likely have space for 3-4 additional segments, so send your suggestions and questions.
Looking forward to seeing you there.

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

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

Map : http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2475+Hanover+Street+Palo+Alto,+CA&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=38.092988,88.681641&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=2475+Hanover+St,+Palo+Alto,+Santa+Clara,+California+94304&t=h&z=16

Price:
$15 at the door for non-SDForum members
No charge for SDForum members
No registration required

Virtual Worlds Open Forum – Recent Work and Developments

The past six months have seen a high degree of churn in the virtual world space, with some projects shutting down,  some projects changing focus, and still others continuing to break new ground.

Join us for this exploration of current questions in virtual worlds, and a look at some current projects in fast-paced 10 minute segments.

Confirmed segments will be listed when available.

[Update 04-21-2010 - Unfortunately the Linden Lab presenters have had to cancel.  We are reconfiguring the session topic and will post an update here.]

We hope you’ll be able to join us on April 26 for our next Virtual World SIG

“A Second Look at Second Life:  Enterprise and Viewer 2″
Second Life has emerged as arguably the most important and diverse virtual world online today. The variety of uses and functions spans an astounding array of interests including 3D modeling, education, training and simulation, onboarding, events and meetings, and participation in the in-world economy.  Throughout it’s growth, business users in particular noted that to implement a full solution they would require secure on-site hosting of their  virtual world assets, and Second Life Enterprise (SLE) is the answer to that need. SLE Beta was released early last year, and has garnered great success with high profile customers ranging from IBM and Cisco, to government organizations such as the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC).  With SLE Version 1.0 release on the horizon, SLE will take advantage of Viewer 2.0 and Shared Media, representing a complete rethinking of the user interface and content access.

In this interactive session Dave Kamalsky, Product Manger – Enterprise, and Hamilton Hitchings, Executive Director of Core Engineering – Enterprise, will share a bit about the history of SLE (codenamed “Nebraska”) as it was built to become the product available today, and give a live demo of some of the tools and functions possible with SLE.  The release is complimented by a dedicated portal at http://work.secondlife.com.  Learn how institutions can create and manage firewall protected grids, use flexible avatar naming and more. We’ll also take a tour of the new features enabled by Viewer 2.0, which allows far greater integration of web content into the world. Join us for this hands-on look at the product of over two years of work in bringing these collaborative tools and abilities to the “serious” world of work.

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Dave Kamalsky bio:
Dave Kamalsky is a Product Manger in the Enterprise group at Linden Lab.  Prior to joining Linden in September of 2008, Dave held a diverse career at IBM spanning 18 years working in roles from VM Systems Programer, I/T Architect, Software Engineer, and Program Manager.  Notable achievements include co-founding several emerging business units at IBM Research; alphaWorks (1996-1999), ExtremeBlue (2000), Webfountain (2001-2005), and the Virtual Worlds EBO (2006-2008).  At Linden Lab, Dave has been part of the unit focusing on bringing Second Life Enterprise (SLE) to fruition, helping the company better meet the needs of corporate customers that want secure behind-the-firewall operations, as well as better services on the main public SL grid.

Hamilton Hitchings bio:
Coming soon.

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

Virtual Worlds SIG….

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TechCrunch reports that Blue Mars (http://www.bluemars.com) developer Avatar Reality (http://www.avatar-reality.com)  has received another$4.2M in funding raising the project’s overall funding to over $13M.   Virtual World SIG attendees got a sneak peak at the art assets way back in mid-2008 (http://virtualworldsig.com/virtual-space-entertainment-june-23-2008) via Richard Childers of Virtual Space Entertainment (http://www.virtualspaceentertainment.com) the company working on the world’s art assets.   It was later announced that the Smithsonian would also be using the platform for an exhbit, now in development (http://virtualworldsig.com/2009/06/10/smithsonian-to-use-virtual-space-entertainment-for-blue-mars-exhibit).

Via:
http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/24/avatar-reality

More coverage at:
http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2010/03/avatar-reality-raises-42m-hires-trent-ward.html

Press release direct link:
http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Avatar-Reality-Raises-42-Million-in-Additional-Capital-1136853.htm