Philip Rosedale spoke at the US House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet yesterday, April 1. I thought it was an April fools joke at first, but this is real.

Audio and video is here: http://energycommerce.house.gov/

Philip starts speaking at around 29:00 after an introduction. Almost the entire 90 minute meeting is focused on Second Life. A major score for Second Life in getting established as “the” virtual world. Dr. Larry Johnson of New Media Consortium likens Second Life to the opportunities that were brought about from settling the wild west, the rollout of electricity, television, and the internet itself.

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.