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Second Life, March 11, 2009

Saturday, March 14th, 2009 | 2009 Mar 11 - Second Life | chuck

Steve Mahaley, Chuck Hamilton, Tony O’Driscoll, Robin Teigland
What’s the Business Case for HR in the Virtual World?
A discussion among:
Steve Mahaley, Duke Corporate Education
Chuck Hamilton, IBM
Tony O’Driscoll, Duke University
Robin Teigland, Stockholm School of Economics

Second Life is the online 3-D virtual world. Not only has Second Life, the most popular of the virtual worlds at present, garnered more than twelve million residents (participants), IBM is leading the way, having allocated over $10 million to the virtual world’s development.

According to experts who study virtual technology, Second Life offers an interactive and absorbing sense of virtual communication. Since companies can build a specific setting within the virtual landscape, employees can use their avatars (a computer representation of themselves) to collaborate from different locations and interact as if they were face-to-face. Second Life residents have an expansive set of choices to make about their avatar, initially based on a male or female human form. From that initial choice, they may make countless adjustments to skin color, body style, clothing, hair length, etc. And once in-world, they may choose to spend their ‘Lindens’ on additional clothing, accessories, tattoos, eyeglasses, etc. One may even abandon the human form altogether, and assume the appearance of an animal. The choices for the avatar-resident extend beyond body style and clothing. Once in Second Life, residents can choose (or be invited) to join clubs or groups.

Second Life flattens the playing field, brings in a sense of play, and helps people to open up. Employees take more risks and are more open with their ideas in Second Life. They are extending their personal selves into a three-dimensional online environment that provides affiliations, interactions, experiences, and relationships.

5 Comments to 'Second Life, March 11, 2009'

Michelle Tenzyk
March 20, 2009

I came across this very interesting article/blog discussing very practical applications of use of second life, and other virtual worlds in terms of data visualization. It helps to “visualize” the use of this technology. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/finally_a_practical_use_for_second_life.php

Laura Mindek
March 23, 2009

There’s been a lot of discussion about creating a unique Avatar to participate in Second Life. Currently, I am more interested in the possiblity of using uniform, neutral body types and faces so:

1) Participants don’t have to take time and trouble to create an Avatar to participate in a group discussion, workshop, or meeting.

2) Diverse, global participants can be treated equally or on the basis of the quality of their comments instead of their looks.

3) We can study what thinking patterns characterize different types of participants, such as male-female, Asian, Spanish, Russian, undereducated-educated, etc.

The possibilities for research are endless.

Deb Seidman
March 24, 2009

I am particularly interested in how this technology is being employed for virtual team initiatives. The team-building exercise described was a good example. What are the opportunities and draw backs to conducting other team problem-solving workshops?

Michelle Tenzyk
March 26, 2009

Deborah..I would refer to the article I posted as it gives some great examples of using this technology for problem solving if you haven’t referred to it already.

Laura Mindek
April 5, 2009

Michelle,
That’s a great article. Thanks for participating.
Laura