Join us for the Virtual World SIG Monday
6:30 PM (August 25) for a presentation by
Entropia Universe’s John Bates. Learn about the
Entropia virtual world that is leading in graphics, gaming, and
entrepreneurial economic models.

We will be streaming *LIVE* from the Palo Alto meeting into Second
Life with all venues linked from http://www.virtualworldsig.com

Full Description:
Perhaps no other virtual world has pushed the concept and execution of
virtual economies as far as Entropia Universe. Launched in 2003, the
free-to-play Entropia has a user base of over 800,000 users today,
generating over $400 Million USD in-game turnover in the economy.

Blurring the lines between games, virtual worlds, and real economies,
Entropia was chosen in 2007 by the Beijing Municipal People’s
Government as the platform of development for the Chinese “Cyber
Recreation Development Corp” (CRD). The project will create a
cash-based virtual economy for China that encompasses
business-to-business transactions and other sophisticated economic models.

Not only innovative in economic terms, the Entropia world is being
deployed this year using the CryEngine 2, which will deliver stunning
graphical experiences not yet seen on a wide scale on the web. On
nearly every level Entropia Universe is leading in virtual world
innovation, while extending the reach of the experiences from the game
directly to real-world ATM’s.

The change brought about by virtual collaboration is only beginning to
be understood. Join us for a unique look inside the merging of real
and virtual economies via one of the most fascinating virtual worlds
today – Entropia Universe

More about this event: http://sdforum.org/vwsig

Time:
6:30PM Monday Aug. 25, 2008

Silicon Valley location:
Pillsbury Winthrop Office Silicon Valley
2475 Hanover Street
Palo Alto, CA 94304-1114
Directions:
http://www.pillsburylaw.com/bv/bvisapi.dll/portal/ep/ofcDetail.do/ofc/14

Virtual Locations:
Streaming media links posted day of the event at:
http://www.virtualworldsig.com

Be there or be virtually irrelevant!

-MRO

New browser based VW application just launched today from Google.

Virtual World SIG location is up and running so let’s meet up there.
I chose the “island” room in keeping with the Second Life ™ tradition. We don’t need walls anyway. Check it out!

The URL is:

http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=-4023305174264225962

And you should see it below:

MRO likes the sound of this.

I found this interesting article about how Microsoft has internal “Quests” that are worked on collaboratively.

You can safely say that the reality that “Work is an MMOG” has arrived.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080626/D91HVAS80.html

I commented on:

Copybot comes to the Music Industry

as follows:

Thanks Prokofy for standing up (over a period of years now) for intellectual property rights. IP protection is the backbone of our economic system which keeps people fed, housed, etc. etc.

Just look at the results:
* Second Life ™ has become the most rapidly adopted and most profitable virtual world ever, creating income for thousands of residents and developer businesses. How? By creating a business based on IP protection and a closed, subscription based (hosting) model.

* iTunes has risen to become the #2 music retailer within 7 years. How? By creating a business based on IP protection inside a closed, limited use system.

* World of Warcraft has become by far the #1 MMOG, surpassing uncountable thousands of “free to play” games with essentially equivalent graphics and gameplay. How? It’s based on a closed, subscription model.

* Kindle is rapidly becoming the first successful ebook reader, with those ebooks now accounting for 6% (!) of Amazon’s book sales. How? With sales of IP protected digital books in a closed system.

Meanwhile the major music labels suffer year after year of declining sales of CD’s – disks of digital files lacking any copy protection whatsoever.

Meanwhile, the YouTube “stunt” remains the repository of all things infringed. It’s still under fire by Viacom – likely on the hook for over $1 billion USD to Viacom alone for “brazenly exploiting the infringing potential of digital technology”. Everybody knows what they did, it’s not even debatable.

Second Life ™ is one of the rare few places online where your IP can be created and reasonably protected. It’s a place where you can finally escape the awful plague of mindless and manipulative corporate content.
Isn’t that a good thing? Or is their some perverse power trip in the “rippers” and copylefters for some reason needing to threaten to drown everyone with “all the music from 1950″. Puh-leeze people, leave it alone!

No matter what they go on about, reality check: code is not law – law is law.
The real IP laws protect real writers, painters, and musicians and yes, even coders. The same laws protect you in the event of theft, even when the door can’t be locked.

In coordination with Dedric Mauriac tonight we had a MRO Show to benefit Relay for Life. Acedia Albion donated a venue, I chipped in with the hosting and stream, and everyone brought a lot of enthusiasm.

Core organizers of Relay for Life Fayandria Foley and Dedric were on the line * LIVE * to fill us in on this phenomenal set of events.

My take-away is that getting involved with Relay for Life is one of the coolest things to do in SL!  I”m really honored to have been host for this little get together. Tons of fun from what turned out to be an event where you can really connect.

We had a cycle of folks through and watched videos until at least 7 and beyond. Let’s do it again!! -MRO
posted by Orange Montagne on Acedia using a blogHUD : [blogHUD permalink]

For those of you in SF…. Here’s the torch route for April 9 via Mercury News.com

“The Olympic Torch Relay Run will be held in San Francisco on Wednesday, April 9, starting at McCovey Cove. The Torch Relay Run will begin following a brief opening ceremony at McCovey Cove at 1:00 P.M. The route is as follows: McCovey Cove northbound to Third Street.
Third Street to the Embarcadero.
The Embarcadero to Jefferson Street.
Jefferson Street to Hyde Street.
Hyde Street to Beach Street.
Beach Street to Polk Street.
Polk Street to Bay Street.
Bay Street back to the Embarcadero.
The Embarcadero to Justin Herman Plaza for a concluding ceremony.
The route comprises a total of approximately six miles.

This route is subject to change as deemed necessary”

via Mercury News.com

again

woooot it works on the edit??

Hello Metaversals.
This weekend kicks off three straight days of metaverse chat -

NASA Jan. 26 Virtual Worlds conference Day 1 with Will Wright and Virtual World SIG Co-chair Corey Bridges of Multiverse.

More at:  http://amesevents.arc.nasa.gov/virtual-worlds/
NASA Jan. 27  Virtual Worlds conference Day 2 featuring
Virtual  World SIG Jan. 28 7pm SL time  with presenters Gemini Mobile

My talk at NASA is called “Shrinking Space: Designs for Augmented Exploration” and will focus on emerging technologies and how they will interface with and become part of – virtual worlds.  The whole event may be streamed into SL at a NASA sim like CoLab or Spaceport Alpha – I’m not sure but will try to logon from there.  You know MRO….have laptop will stream! 

I will try to logon from there if bandwidth allows.  Major kudos to Bruce Damer, a former SIG presenter who pulled the better part of this together.

Be there or be virtual!

Hello Virtual Worlders,

Rob Osborn of Gemini Mobile (http://www.geminimobile.com/) will present information about the company’s eXplo platform (http://www.geminimobile.com/products/community.html) on Jan. 28.

Here’s the description of the SIG:  (http://sdforum.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Page.viewPage&pageId=650&parentID=483&nodeID=1  )
This will be a joint meeting with the SDForum Mobile SIG.

The idea is, how can the MMO / Virtual World experience and services be extended to mobile platforms?

Virtual Worlds News had complete coverage of their latest news here (http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2007/11/wireless-mobile.html)
And shortly after agreeing to present, Gemini Mobile got blogged at Massively.com (http://www.massively.com/2007/11/07/new-product-will-let-you-mmo-on-the-go/)

So this is shaping up to be quite an interesting presentation, as we find out how virtual worlds can become lodged in the palm of your hand!

Location for Second Life and simulcast to be posted here.

Save the event for your calendar and tune in for it!

I hope to be better able to stream this time… anyone care to donate a web-cam to the SIG??

Thanks for your continued virtualness,

MRO.