Seed Money: USD 2mil Funding Virtual-World Innovations – itsReal

By Charles Storch
Chicago Tribune
08/18/07 4:00 AM PT

The MacArthur foundation is accepting applications until Oct. 15 in two categories: one for “entrepreneurs and builders of new digital environments for informal learning,” with prizes of $250,000 and $100,000; the other for “communicators in connecting, mobilizing, circulating or translating new ideas around digital media and learning,” with prizes from $30,000 to $75,000. Winners are to be announced in January. 

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation continues to pour money into explorations of digital media and virtual worlds — and we’re not talking Linden dollars here.

The giant Chicago philanthropy is creating prizes totaling US$2 million to recognize innovation in digital media and learning. It also is funding a series of programs at the Second Life Community convention, to be held Aug. 24-26 in Chicago. (For the uninitiated, Linden dollars are the currency of that online virtual world known as Second Life.)

MacArthur said the new awards are part of the five-year, $50 million program it announced last fall to explore the influence of digital technologies on young people’s learning, play and civic participation.

Read More: TechNewsWorld 

end of work as we know it – itsReal

Increasing connectivity will change how and where we labor—even the very notion of an employer.

You have no idea how you’d get any work done on business trips if you didn’t have a laptop. You can’t remember quite how you lived without your BlackBerry. Your cell phone might as well be surgically attached to your ear, it’s so crucial to your job. Then there’s the Internet. It’s hard to conceive of getting through the day without Google (GOOG )—or, if you’re under 40, text messaging or even joining Facebook to stay in touch with your extended network of colleagues. In just a decade or less, technology sure has done a number on the way you work, hasn’t it?

Well, brace yourself. Over the next decade, the relentless march of computer power and Net connection speeds will bring more profound changes to work than anything we’ve seen so far. Consider just a few of the breakthroughs technology visionaries think we’re likely to see in coming years. Picture Apple’s (AAPL ) slick iPhone shrunk down to the size of a credit card. Then imagine it can connect not only to your contacts on the latest social network but also to billions of pea-sized wireless sensors attached to buildings, streets, retail products, and your co-workers’ and business partners’ clothes—all sending data over the Net to you.

THE RESULT:

Read more at BusinesWeek

Virtual Worlds developers your roller coaster is departing…

Virtual World Developers, your roller coaster is on its slow upward climb getting ready to hurtle is way down steep declines, around tight impossible curves, flipping over upon itself to once again enter another breath taking decent and amongst all the screams of terror, joy, ecstasy the roller coaster continues unmercifully at speeds that can’t be imagined.. how long does the ride go for. Real roller coasters only minutes, but this roller coaster exists in a place called Second Life where you are only limited by your imagination & genius.. developers all over the real world had better engage their safety belts for the longest ride of their human lives…Linden Labs has pressed the start button – itsReal

Sad Days at Second Life or is it – itsReal

A bank maybe bankrupt, gambling restrictions need to be explained, enforcement of Linden Labs policies – it is starting to sound like life as we know it. The publicity machine is still operating with little effort from Linden Labs, the media hype is engaging minds worldwide… what really is Linden Labs bracing for us…

Ping.sg Community Unleashes Creativity – itsReal

First came the Ping.sg ads, and now we have the Ping.sg Video ADS see this very humorous Farinelli Commercial. What blows me away is how Ping’s community…

FaceBook Addiction is Growing vs Being a Business Drone in LinkedIn

Something freaky is happening to APLINK…an addiction is slowly creeping up on me… for the social networking platform called Facebook…why is this happening.

I think primarily it is because no one can feel threatened by a facebook profile …its friendly, it’s free, it’s easy, it’s interactive hehe dare i say — itsReal.

The more I get to be in facebook the more i discover things that can be done, I have a linkedin profile and also plaxo, Zing & others but of all these I think facebook allows me to mix my social lifestyle with my business style. In other words you can be yourself in facebook NOT some business drone that you seem to need to be in the others….

When i happened on the link to include this blog into my facebook profile and then seeing how easy it was to do, i think this is the turning point…still when will someone integrate second life into facebook, i would love to have a doorway from my facebook profile to my office in second life…then the addiction would engulf me completely –itsReal

Image: APLINK at The Pacific West Communications Second Life Office

Fly 4 hours in a 747, vs fly via avatar for 30 secs to the virtual meeting

APLINK Pick of the WEEK – Imagine if you will that by some freak of undersea volcanic activity, a brand-new continent suddenly appeared in the middle of the ocean, and within a two-year period, 8 million people from 105 countries worldwide decided to make it a vacation destination, some of them on a daily basis…..

read more | digg story

Brave NEW World – Interview with Philip Rosedale CEO Second Life – itsReal

Brave New World

In a few short years, Second Life has grown from an experiment to the world’s largest virtual universe. Inside the mind of its founder.

Web Exclusive Read More HERE

Virtual Worlds we will physically walk into…and how the NET Revolution began – itsReal

Many of us have short memories on the evolution of the Internet…what it is today had to have started somewhere…virtual worlds have begun…and despite the current media attacks based the media’s own create hype… I still wonder how explosive will Virtual Worlds be in changing human behavior and interaction…i read a brief item today how a company has developed a pod which projects onto walls so that you and I can walk into a virtual 3d world…awesum !!

Second Life: Now in Pod Form

At an Obscura Digital event last night, the company showed off, among other things, a pod that immerses the occupant in Second Life. Teaming up with Phreak Interactive, a company dedicated to blurring the boundary between virtual and real, Obscura created an egg-like structure that projects the virtual world on its walls.””Traditional media is square, flat and 2D,” said Patrick Connolly, CEO of Obscura. “People should be immersed into it the virtual world. (They) can step into it instead of watching it.” [via SFGate.com]

Watch this video and be amazed how people talked about the internet that had a REVOLUTION population of 15million

Second Life emerging competitors – itsReal

Source

Virtual worlds at UTR: social networks, or experiments?

By Josh Lowensohn – June 28, 2007, 4:12 PM PDT

Wrapping up the group presentations at Under the Radar’s Entertainment & Media conference is the virtual worlds group. Only two of these companies (Doppleganger and Kaneva) offer what most would consider “virtual worlds” or a replacement for real life interaction with others. The other two consist of user avatars, and a video gaming platform.

Doppleganger is a 3-D world similar to Second Life. It survives through a mix of micropayments, and partnerships with various companies who want branded areas and appearances for celebrities, movies, and music. We checked it out a few weeks ago and came away impressed, albeit a little bewildered.

The service currently has 150,000 users, and CEO Tim Stevens says it’s growing by 10% weekly.

Kaneva is part social network and part 3-D virtual world. I looked at the service in early February, shortly before the site went public beta in April. Despite the fact it’s incredibly similar to social networks like MySpace, Kaneva’s creators view its competition as movies and television programs. Like Doppelganger, Kaneva makes its money on the sale of virtual goods and sponsorship from content creators.

Meez is one of the more interesting virtual worlds services due to its specialization. Instead of trying to re-create real life, Meez focuses on user avatars. They recently partnered with Photobucket, and provides user avatars for several other services. The site has 2 million registered users, and is now getting 425,000 new users a month.

The site makes its money off partnerships and micropayments, where users use their virtual currently on clothing items. One of their competitors Gizmoz recently launched a face mapping tool that will take a digital photo and stick it on a 3-D avatar.

Multiverse is a development platform for anyone who wants to make their own massive multiplayer online game (MMOG). They’ve built the system to work with a “world browser” which co-founder Corey Bridges compares to a Web browser since users can visit a network of different games built on the platform.