ReadWriteWeb has already written about data visualization capabilities in sites like Second Life. Due to a fledgling economy, many suggested that these institutionally-branded education initiatives may also become popular. Nevertheless, apart from this recent endorsement by the University of Texas, mainstream educators still don't have the green light to teach in virtual worlds. Many argue that video teleconferencing and instant messaging have replaced the need for virtual world interaction. However, neither of these offer the same immersive experience.

While we know that face-to-face learning is currently the most successful teaching method, if you had to choose an online learning environment, would you consider a virtual world? Let us know in the comments below.

The software, Glasshouse by Green Phosphor, lets you take data from either a spreadsheet or database query and place a 3D representation of it into a virtual world environment where it can then be explored interactively. Users are inserted into the virtual world as an avatar which can then manipulate the visualization of the data by drilling down into it, re-sorting it, or even just spinning it around to see it from all angles.

The benefits to working with data in this way don't really need to be touted too much - many businesses already perform data visualization, often using expensive software and powerful computers to do so. What makes what Green Phosphor does so interesting is not that they've come up with a way to visualize data - it's that they've come up with a way to leverage the platforms of virtual worlds to do so.

How it Works: CICP (Think HTTP for Virtual Worlds)

Some of the company's solutions involve using a proprietary virtual world, "Glasshouse," for data visualization, but for Second Life, Sun's Wonderland, and other virtual world users, they've developed adapters that project graphs from Glasshouse into whichever virtual world you're using. The only requirement is that the virtual world be CICP-enabled.

CICP, or Content Injection and Control Protocol, was developed in-house by Green Phosphor CEO Ben Linquist and released to the public domain. The standard, cross-platform protocol essentially serves as HTTP for virtual worlds where it works as a communication mechanism that the Glasshouse gateway can use to generate temporary artifacts in the worlds. Already it has been added to Sun Wonderland and released under the GPL license there. It has also been implemented in Second Life with the help of a Java servlet and released under a BSD license. The company is currently working to add it to other virtual worlds, too.

Data Viz for Anyone: From Spreadsheets to Biotech

Depending on company size, there are three different levels of service available. First, a spreadsheet world lets you upload Excel spreadsheets that can then be visualized in a web interface. Next, there's a workgroup appliance that delivers data visualization and virtual conferencing needs to small or medium-sized businesses. And finally, enterprise solutions designed especially for virtual markets like bio-technology have also been developed as more customized solutions.

As Linquist explains in this YouTube video, the technology is even advanced enough to produce a virtual laboratory where researchers can perform model-based drug development.

If you have Java installed, you can test their web-based virtual world demo by clicking here (launches Java window). For more information about their solutions, visit GreenPhosphor.com.

Now, the shot in the arm for Second Life seems to be as simple as a redesign that emphasizes the benefits of the community to would-be users and encourages them to register to try the service for themselves. Plus, they've thrown some Cooliris-like panning interactivity in there for good measure.

After testing the new design for one week, Linden Lab is convinced the new design is doing a better job than its current home page:

"Over the past week we've been comparing the core metrics (traffic, registrations, logins, economic and inworld activity) of the new page with our existing new user home page. The data is encouraging: the new design performed better in almost all aspects, so we are moving full steam ahead with launching the redesigned page."

And so it seems that finding new life - or a Second Life - could be as simple as communicating more effectively. It will be interesting to see if this return to basics makes 2009 a better year for Linden Lab and the residents of its community.

Still, let's face it, playing what are essentially online computer games where the "fun" is in interacting with random strangers may have been an interesting experiment, but now that the hype has died down, we can see that they only attract a niche crowd. These worlds will not deliver the promise of the 3D web that we had once imagined they would.

Where 3D is Useful: Mapping

When 3D technology is implemented for more practical purposes, though, it can be incredibly useful. Some of the most innovative developments in 3D technology involve advances made in mapping. The newly redesigned Google Maps' Street View is a great example of this. Their recent update lets you drag a figure (the "Pegman") over any street to get a preview of Street View for that location. When the Pegman lands, the whole map turns into a Street View viewer. Google Maps with Street View has also been delivered to our mobile devices where it helps us navigate unknown areas of our world when we're away from our computers.

Meanwhile, Microsoft has also integrated 3D into their mapping platform, only in a different way. They launched their Live Labs project Photosynth in August, which lets you stitch together photos to create detailed 3D environments. Last month, they integrated Photosynth with Live Maps, letting you explore various landmarks and cities in 3D as well as share your own "synthed" photo collections with the other users of Live Maps.

Where 3D is Cool: Browsing

Also this year, we've seen some developments in the use of 3D to deliver better visual browsing experiences. Amazon launched their 3D Winodwshop site which lets you virtually browse through the company's top products.

We've also seen other web applications integrate this 3D visual browsing technology including ManagedQ's semantic Google-based search, Photo Stream's visual newsroom as well as newer search engines like Viewzi and SearchMe. Although none of those have hit the mainstream, they all are interesting experiments.

However, one of our favorite 3D browsing tools is the technology from Cooliris, a browser plugin that lets you transform the web into an immersive 3D experience. With Cooliris, you can surf a "wall of content" from sources like Google, Flickr, Yahoo, SmugMug, and DeviantArt. In October, the company also launched an iPhone application that does the same.

Similar to Cooliris's iPhone app, Microsoft took Seadragon, the technology that supports Photosynth, and released it as an iPhone application callled Seadragon Mobile. With this mobile app, you can browse several image collections including the Library of Congress maps from the TED demo, NASA images, a two-billion by two-billion pixel map of the world, and you can also load custom content via an RSS feed.

3D's Future: Shopping?

As The Guardian reports today, there are many people who think that online shopping is the next frontier for the 3D web. In particular, they make mention of a company called ExitReality, who is developing a 3D plugin that can transform any 2D web site into 3D. Visitors using ExitReality's plugin can change into avatars to wander through web sites and chat with other users. Says ExitReality founder Danny Stefanic, who has been working with virtual reality since 1994, "it's not a replacement for viewing the 2D page - that is still the best way to consume that content - but it gives everyone a 3D space that they can utilize if they want to. And what we have found is that instead of the two- or three-minute session times of 2D websites, when we are in 3D and exploring and chatting to people with similar interests, we spend 20 to 30 minutes there." He notes that sites implementing 3D could offer online sales agents that could chat to visitors or demonstrate products.

In other words, 3D for marketing and sales. Sigh.

Is There Nothing Else?

Last year, we had once wondered if 3D interfaces were useful or just a novelty. We think the jury is still out on that. Besides mapping of course (which extends to new developments in Google Earth, too), the majority of the 3D launches we've seen over the year are fun...even cool...but not incredibly life-changing. In fact, the newest uses of 3D are even more kitschy and even less useful than those that we saw earlier this year. The most recent 3D sites actually backtrack to 3D's beginnings and require you to break out your nerdy red-and-blue glasses to view them. For example, a site called Snowdin.com, is a new holiday Flash production by Colle+McVoy that's entirely in 3D.

For even more mindless fun, we just discovered that you can create your own red-and-blue doodles at the new Neave Anaglyph site.

Sure, we may have rushed out to the car to retrieve our glasses left over from the weekend showing of "Bolt 3D" to view these sites, but we don't imagine that 3D glasses will ever become the new must-have accessory for internet surfing. So where does that leave 3D technology for consumers browsing the web? Fun, games, and virtual worlds? Yes, that seems about right. Although some businesses will find 3D technology useful as we noted before, we did not see this technology become the most ground-breaking innovation of 2008...unless you count the pinching and zooming that took place on our iPhones.

Image credit: 3D images above courtesy of Adverlab; main image: ny3d

The multi-million dollar question of course is: can a virtual world ever be a serious enterprise tool, or is it destined to remain merely a fun thing that powers Coca-Cola's website? Forterra's report at least shows glimpses of how enterprises can use virtual worlds.

Let's quickly explain what Forterra does. Its main product is OLIVE (On-Line Interactive Virtual Environment), which it describes as "an open, distributed client-server platform for building virtual worlds". OLIVE features an API, licensable 3D content, 3rd party system integrations, and tools to create and edit virtual world content.

Virtual Worlds Compared to Web Conferencing

Forterra includes this graph in the report, comparing virtual worlds to audio and video web conferencing:

If the graph is to be believed, and we must remind you that it was created by a virtual worlds vendor, then virtual world technology isn't much more expensive for enterprises to deploy than web conferencing. The last two challenges listed for virtual worlds though are pretty key: "proven effectiveness" and "easy entry for employees". The Forrester report had suggested that usability in particular was an issue. To be fair, Forterra acknowledges those challenges and more in the report.

How ACS Tested Virtual Worlds for Training

The two use cases Forterra conducted, with Accenture and ACS, concluded that there was interest in exploring the technology more for business use. ACS, which is a $6.2 billion FORTUNE 500 consulting company with 63,000 employees, tested Forterra's technology for virtual training with one of their big 4 accounting clients who have extensive global training requirements. One of ACS' testers commented that they "see this [virtual worlds] becoming even more of a viable option for training with the advent of the next generation of network speeds and the continued increase in the capability of computers. The graphics will only become better and the world more immersive -- and with those changes, an even better fit for distance/remote learning."

Another comment from ACS was that "while 3D learning may not completely replicate the effectiveness of a face-to-face experience, companies will be challenged to consider that for some course topics, a slightly reduced effectiveness is worth the savings, risks, and work efficiency gained through deployment of learning in 3D." [emphasis ours]

Conclusion: Watch This Space

So enterprises are becoming more interested in virtual worlds. The pilots showed that there are still challenges deploying the technology, but even so it is seen as a cost-effective future option for training and collaboration.

Although we still aren't seeing major deployments within enterprises - and there is no indication in Forterra's report of this changing in the near future - it's a space to watch in 2009-10.

Users can choose from a number of preset animations for their characters, ranging from shaking hands with others, to applauding, crying, etc. By double clicking on certain items in the virtual world, users can also often activate some preset animations such as sitting down on a chair or jumping off a dive board.

Setting the plugin up and creating an avatar is a very simple process. Creating rooms, too, seems quite easy, as you can quickly import a number of templates to get started. Currently, all virtual items for Lively are for free, but chances are that Google will start charging for premium items in the future.

For now, the content in Lively is being created only by Google, though over time, they are planning to allow users to start creating their own content as well.

Rooms can be easily embedded into any webpage and worlds often launch with a basic skeleton of the room within just a few seconds.

Graphically, Lively runs very smooth on our test machine here and the visuals, while not comparable to a modern game, are not too bad either. Interestingly, there is no first-person view available, instead, the world is always seen from a camera perspective the user can control.

One area where Lively could definitely needs some improvement is in how users move their avatars around the rooms. To move an avatar, users basically have to drag them through the room, while most people we have met in Lively have commented that they expected to see a more game-like approach where users use the keyboard to move avatars through the rooms.

Second Life users might find the Lively rooms and the amount of customization they can do to them rather restricted - however, Google's idea seems to be less to create one large virtual world, but to give publishers an opportunity to create their own small virtual world for their readers and visitors.

It's interesting to see Google moving into this space. There have always been rumors that Google might be working on a similar product for Google Earth. As of now, the rooms in Lively are compartmentalized and there is no way to move or communicate from one room to another, but given that this is only a first release, this might (hopefully) change over time.

A couple of years ago, when Second Life-hype was at its peak, businesses flocked to the virtual world. But last year, the LA Times reported that as quickly as they had set up shop, many of them were leaving Second Life due to lack of interest. We reported a couple of months ago that Second Life's user numbers had plateaued, saying that the much-hyped virtual world "may have already proven itself too inhospitable to scale."

But could that trend be reversing? The same Los Angeles Times is now reporting that companies are taking a second look at Second Life in order to cut costs. Companies "are creating employee-only islands and office buildings, then encouraging their staff to meet there," says the paper. "Compared with plane tickets and hotel bills, it's not that expensive: A 16-acre private island in Second Life costs $1,000 plus a $295 monthly maintenance fee."

"Virtual worlds are relatively inexpensive, don't require a great deal of start-up technology infrastructure, and provide a naturalistic, immersive approach to simulating space, people and objects," according to Forrester Research analysts Erica Driver and Paul Jackson in a report entitled "Getting Real Work Done in Virtual Worlds."

Intel, Sun, and IBM are just some of the big name companies trying out work environments in Second Life.

Many companies that left Second Life the first go around did so due to vandalism, however. Can you really create a good learning environment in a place where giant, flying penises could attack at any moment?

"This is an adolescent technology that's lurching and pushing in different directions and getting a sense of itself," Kemp told the AFP. Of course, even while schools and companies attempt to figure out how best use Second Life to promote good professional and learning environments, some schools have already figured out how to exploit the technology for educational gain. Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, for example, are using Second Life as a cheap way to test out artificial intelligence for robots.

"The Brand Center," Catherine Linden writes for the company, "explains how Residents can promote their own brands, products and activities in the Second Life world and use appropriate logos to enhance their message." That's a remarkably positive way to describe what's mostly a list of thou-shalt-nots, combined with an ugly new logo that users are allowed to put on their stuff.

You can see the whole list of things you can't say, with generic alternatives, here. The list includes the name of the inworld currency, the Linden, for which users are instructed to substitute the word "dollar."

It sure would be great if Linden focused on improving the SecondLife experience instead of focusing on their copyright.

The Bigger Issues

Second Life's user numbers are stagnating. SL expert Wagner James Au writes at Gigaom that the population in-world has plateaued at just over a half million active users and new user retention is stuck at 10%.

The company's founding CEO is stepping into a new role, making room for someone not yet selected, with more managerial experience.

Service interruptions are rampant, reading the company blog is disheartening and reader comments on the BrandCenter post return again and again to the basic problems that even dedicated residents have to deal with.

In December, the leader of its vaunted platform for outside commercial designer/developers, the Electric Sheep Company, laid-off one third of its workforce and announced that it will move into other Virtual World platforms.

Scores of users complain that their own copyrights are going unprotected in SecondLife. These complaints make LindenLabs' move today all the more an indignity.

So who's ready to start buying stock?

Virtual worlds undoubtedly hold a whole lot of potential, but SecondLife may have already proven itself too inhospitable to scale.

The report, entitled 'Getting Real Work Done In Virtual Worlds', states that Virtual worlds like Second Life, There.com, and "more business-focused offerings" are on the verge of becoming valuable work tools.

"Information and knowledge management professionals should begin to investigate and experiment with virtual worlds. Use them to try to replicate the experience of working physically alongside others; allow people to work with and share digital 3-D models of physical or theoretical objects; and make remote training and counseling more realistic by incorporating nonverbal communication into same-time, different-place interactions."

The report goes into great depth on this trend, but the best way to illustrate it is to see what some forward-looking organizations are doing. There's some great stories of the 3-D Web being used for healthcare, training and simulation. But here's one about using Virtual Worlds in a corporate context, specifically Sun, Vivox and Intel:

"On any given day, 50% of Sun Microsystems’ workforce works remotely from home, the road, or a customer site. The company is constructing a virtual campus building called MPK20 using Sun’s Darkstar game server infrastructure and Project Wonderland 3-D tool for building virtual worlds. While the project is still underway — only the small team at Sun that is building the system is using it for meetings right now — Sun plans to create a virtual world where all employees can gather, meet, and collaborate. In other examples, Vivox, a technology company that provides integrated voice and communication services for virtual worlds, including Second Life, tells us that its employees meet in Second Life at some point during every business day. Early adopters at Intel use Qwaq Forums to improve their teamwork. And, understandably, most of Linden Lab’s internal meetings also take place in Second Life."

Hmmm, perhaps the ReadWriteWeb team could do this too! We're far flung all over the globe (well I am anyway).

It's clear though that there's much work to be done before the mainstream enters the 3-D Web. Forrester points out that many people, especially "those in their 30s or older", view virtual worlds as "frivolous games or places where deviant personalities exhibit their alter egos." I don't know about the deviant bit, but certainly most people over 30 aren't comfortable using virtual worlds. Forrester also states that set-up and actually using Virtual World software is difficult. So there are a lot of hurdles yet to clear: attitudes of users towards virtual worlds, the technology (e.g. integration with other workplace software), bandwidth, ease of use, and more.

Forrester encourages organizations to experiment with virtual worlds, but using guidelines and policies to control this -- which is much the same advice that Forrester gives for any 'web 2.0' tool. But also Forrester notes that you don't have to go full-bore and use Second Life and 3-D avatars. A "more modest or targeted application", such as Qwaq’s virtual world technology or Unisfair’s virtual conference technology, may be a better introduction to "getting real work done in virtual worlds."