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MA ADA 2009 > articles > WHAT'S NEXT? _The application of VR_002

WHAT'S NEXT? _The application of VR_002

May 9, 09:53 AM · Manki Park

Context

Virtual worlds will be categorized into three “worlds” which are as follow; the Real World, the Digital World (2D Web,Internet), and the Virtual World (3D Web) (4). As mentioned before several times, virtual worlds are emerging universes, ranging from MMORPGs (massive multiplayer online games, such as World of Warcraft [www.worldofwarcraft.com/index.xml], and Metaverses (Virtual Worlds that are primarily social vs. game oriented, such as Second Life), to MMOLEs (focused on learning and training environments), to Intraverses (putting up a virtual world inside the corporate firewall), to Paraverses (often also called Mirror Worlds, such as Google Earth) [www.earth.google.com] (ibid).

What is next?

Virtual Worlds will be improved by technology and acceptance for the future and next generation. However, environments such as Second Life are moving and evolving so fast.

1) Virtual Browsers – Many experts and participants expect that the introduction of a “virtual browser” as the next breakthrough, allowing avatars and cyberspaces on the users’ screen to interact and move easily between users in virtual world, installing 3D web browsers (2). Eventually, it aims to build 3D web or Internet. It is quite necessary to form multi-user environments and achieve personal virtual spaces as Internet innovation. For example, SL and other virtual worlds have been developing the post-2D Web platform, transforming it to a 360-degree 3D experience (4). Personally, I wonder how can be utilized avatars and virtual world to attain 3D web browsers or 3D Internet.

2) Ubiquity)– this technology would be used for mobile phones and net books that are fundamentally for communication. Through the combination of these digital gadgets and virtual technologies, data sent by the server to a mobile phone can be displayed on the phone’s screen or on external display devices such as a head-mounted stereoscopic display system (3). These displays can be connected to the mobile phone and home pc or other ways as communication devices.

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The application of SL and other virtual worlds have possibilities to become the next generation interface for connections, content, and collaboration.

Bibliography

(1) Hemp, Paul. “Avatar-Based Marketing”.
Harvard Business Review. June 2006: pp.48-57

(2) Guissani, Bruno (2006) “Second Life: the next platform”.
Lunch over IP: Bruno Guissani’s Running Notes on People, Places, Technologies and Ideas. 31, Oct. 2006. www.lunchoverip.com/2006/10/there_is_a_medi.html

(3) Media freaks 3D Animation Studio Blog (2008) Virtual Realities in Mobile Phones Sun, Oct 19, 2008 http://blog.media-freaks.com/virtual-realities-in-mobile-phones/

(4) Susan Kish (2007) Virtual Worlds: Second Life and the Enterprise, Xing, Zurich, Switzerland

URL References

Defining and Understanding Virtual Worlds

Google Maps is changing the Way we see the World

Second Earth