Tuesday, August 12th, 2008
Gary hayes of Personalize Media created this 7-minute video which takes the viewer on a tour of over 40 social virtual worlds. Hayes is working on a commercial report exploring the creative, business, and educational potential of the metaverse and has some preliminary insights in his post here.
via Librarians Matter
Posted in 3D Worlds, Second Life, Video, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Tuesday, August 5th, 2008
Rafael C. Alvarado, Director of Academic Technology Services at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania writes for Educause Quarterly with Overcoming the Fear of Gaming: A Strategy for Incorporating Games into Teaching and Learning. Alvarado discusses opportunities for the effective use of immersive games in academia.
“Ultimately, to take full advantage of games as engines of learning, we should move from a critical approach to a creative one and encourage the innovative use and development of games (and gaming engines) within our colleges and universities as collaborative new media projects. Such projects would take advantage of our unique social arrangement of students, developers, and faculty and allow us to rely less on consumer culture to provide game content. The design of these games would be guided by the experience of managing the pedagogical outcomes of games in real-use contexts, forming a feedback loop that would identify and select for better games.”
Posted in 3D Worlds, Change & Innovation, Gaming, Learning Spaces, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Thursday, July 10th, 2008
I’ve created a faculty office in Google Lively where my students can drop-in and chat in a virtual space. Up to 20 people can join and interact in a room at once, although 100 can enter rooms with view-only access. If you’ve installed Lively, stop by and say hello. If you’re just getting started you may find these resources helpful:
Official Lively Help Group
Lively Help Center
Blogoscoped’s Google Lively FAQ
Posted in 3D Worlds, General, IM, Learning Spaces, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Wednesday, July 9th, 2008
On Tuesday, Google launched a virtual world called Lively which allows players to embed their avatars and even “rooms” from within the world into their websites and blogs. Similar to Second Life, users must download and install software in order to enter, but then can access the world from social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace. A search of Lively’s rooms reveals that several libraries may already experimenting with the service including the Alliance Virtual Library, ASU’s Noble Library, and Rutgers University Law Library.
For more coverage check out:
Google ventures into virtual reality with ‘Lively’
Google Tries To Go Lively With Its Own Virtual World Effort
Lively: Google Launches Virtual World
Posted in 3D Worlds, Gaming, IM, Social Software, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Thursday, June 19th, 2008
Kathryn Greenhill at Librarians Matter has created a step-by-step guide to how to stream audio and video live from a webcam into Second Life. She has video clips of this amazing feat which she accomplished in preparation for an upcoming conference presentation. If you’re at all interested in presenting or streaming media in-world, you’ll want to check this out.
Posted in 3D Worlds, Change & Innovation, Second Life, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Wednesday, June 11th, 2008
Educause has come out with another of their handy 7 Things guides, this time about the popular virtual world which many libraries and librarians have decided to join. In 7 Things You Should Know About Second Life, the folks at Educause answer the following questions:
Posted in 3D Worlds, Second Life, Social Software, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Wednesday, May 28th, 2008
Laura Milligan at CollegeDegrees.com has compiled an all-in-one guide to creating a learning space in Second Life. Her annotated guide presents 50 resources which will help you make the most of the virtual world. Her tips, tricks, and resource links are divided into the following categories:
Posted in 3D Worlds, Guides, Second Life, Web 2.0 | No Comments »