Just wanted to give a quick update and explanation for my absence. I’ve had to work a bit of overtime lately. School also started back up for the semester. I do both full time, which doesn’t leave me a lot of time for other things. On top of that I just put together a new computer and have been getting everything installed and configured and working out all of the inevitable bugs. As a result, I haven’t even been in SL in the past couple of weeks except one time for a couple of minutes just to make sure it would agree with my video card.

Rest assured, however, that I have no intentions of fading this blog, and I have been thinking about a few topics I’d like to discuss, some I’d like to do more research into before I open my uninformed mouth about them, and I’ve put some thought into the responses I’ve gotten to posts and I’d like to continue discussion of those.

So, now it’s just a matter of finding the time to actually type up what I’ve been thinking and hopefully I will be able to once I get my feet under me with the new classes. Until then, take care, and thanks for checking out the blog and taking part in the discussions.

I’ve gone back to school and I’m studying computer science. Since I’ve always been interested in virtual reality, it occurred to me that I would like to do my undergrad and graduate research in virtual worlds like Second Life. One of the first things that occurred to me was the possibilities virtual worlds hold for doing different kinds of simulation and training. One idea that came to mind was the ability to train firefighters in a virtual world. You could perhaps have your crew logged in to SL, all equipped with voice, and they could move their avatars around to put out a simulated fire. It’s interesting to think you could test the firefighters by throwing unexpected situations at them to see how they react. Maybe during the fire you have a floor suddenly and unexpectedly collapse and test how well they are able to cope with the situation. This sort of thing would be ideal for training NCOs and officers in the military to lead troops in different situations.

There are a lot of benefits to this kind of training. The most obvious is safety. Another is the fact that you could burn the same building down several times until the trainees get it right. You can’t do that very easily in real life. The costs would be much lower and there is no harm to the environment.

Another idea I’ve considered is using virtual worlds as a much fuller way to debrief people or teach them about events that have occurred in order to learn from them. I think of the big shootout police in California had with armor-clad bank robbers a few years ago. Imagine if you could recreate that situation in a virtual world. Instead of reading about the event or being lectured on it, or using various charts or slides to explain what the actors in the situation did, imagine if you could show them in 3D space? Imagine the benefits of seeing what it looked like from ground level as it happened. Imagine how useful it would be to stop the action and camera around to show what’s going on from different angles. It would be a much more immersive way of teaching what happened in that situation. As a learning tool you could even stop the scene, rewind it, and then show a better way it could have been handled.

I think we are all familiar with the 3D simulations that many TV shows employ to give us a better view of what happened. But those simulations are not interactive, and they tend to only be used for short periods. It is probably too difficult and costly to put together an entire simulation from scratch. But in a virtual world, the platform is there already. You don’t need to recreate it for each new simulation. And there is the advantage that you could actually bring avatars into the action where appropriate.

One thing that disappoints me about the article on the mining simulator is that they refer to “gaming” technology. I think that could tend to hurt the credibility of the project. I think I understand why they put it that way, but it tends to make one think that the simulation is some sort of first person shooter. One problem with the first person shooter idea is that you can’t simulate the physical actions of mining through a computer interface. If you play sports games on a console, you may feel immersed in the game, but the simple fact is that pressing the “X” button in a baseball game teaches you nothing about hitting a slider. There is no physical correlation between the two things. But Dr van den Hengel, one of the heads of the project at Adelaide says something very interesting about the simulation:

“Virtual reality simulation and computer gaming are powerful tools for conditioning human behaviour,” he says. “Both technologies enable users to experience a range of situations that would otherwise be impossible, or prohibitively dangerous or expensive.”

“Conditioning human behaviour” is one of the key phrases, in my opinion. Without some really expensive VR suits which probably don’t even exist yet, you aren’t going to teach someone the physical aspects of doing the job. And that’s fine. You can teach them the muscle stuff in a safe environment. But the strength of these kinds of simulations is in teaching people what behavior is appropriate in a given situation. Until we have experienced situations over and over, we may be stuck at the point where we have to spend a relatively large amount of time assessing a situation, and then we have to think of the proper response. In a dangerous situation you don’t want to spend that kind of time. Pilots in crippled fighter planes don’t have the luxury of thinking, “I guess in this situation the best thing would be to eject. Now, where is that ejection handle?” I’ve seen video of pilots ejecting from planes in less time than it took me to realize there was a problem. Those kinds of decisions have to be “conditioned” in to you. That is where I think simulations in virtual worlds really can have some impact. Train people how to do physical things in the real world. Train them how to make the right assessments and decisions in a virtual world.

The other thing I’m disappointed in is that the article seems to indicate that the researchers are building this simulation from the ground up. Probably they have to because of their specific needs. What I really hope is that we can get to the point where researchers doing similar work don’t have to re-invent the platform but rather, can plug into an already existing platform in the metaverse, and then build their specific needs on top of that platform. Hopefully there will come a day when it’s much easier to get an island in SL, or put in their own OpenSim server online to run the simulations. As intriguing as this kind of research is, I think it would be a real shame if all simulations such as this end up running as standalone projects with no real connection to the rest of the metaverse.

But, never fear. I do have plenty I’d like to discuss. Or maybe you should fear, now… But, then, why would you be here if you were sick of reading my rambling (…you masochistic bastard)? I think I need sleep.

Oh, and our pal Crap Mariner was even written up on the blog recently for some sort of video related madness.

Mad Clockwork Destroys Controversial Landmark

I know in the real world architects have studied and explored how to make living and working spaces that are more efficient and pleasing for meat based life forms like us to spend our time in. I’m sure they study things like what’s the best size for a bedroom or bathroom or kitchen. I’m sure there are numerous reasons why you don’t typically find living spaces over garages. Bathrooms are usually pretty similar. There are good reasons to have certain window sizes on certain sides of the house. Some people prefer a big open living room, even at the expense of less second floor space. There are a lot of design decisions that go into making homes and buildings that people want to be in.

I don’t think those same design rules apply in a virtual world. Avatars have different wants and needs. Physics don’t hold the same in Second Life. In a virtual world you have more possibilities because you don’t have to think about the strengths or durability of the materials you use. You don’t have to worry about fasteners being strong enough or load bearing walls or anything like that. You can even suspend rooms in mid-air and call them skyboxes.

I’m sort of reminded of the game The Sims. Anyone who has played that a while knows that you don’t do well by building the kind of house you’d like to live in. The Sims have different ideas about what makes a good house. They want small spaces with all the most important areas right together because they don’t have much time to roam around. You simply have to learn to build houses differently to make a Sim happy. I think we’ll find it’s similar in virtual worlds.

I really like a lot of the houses I’ve seen in SL. The meticulously realistic buildings look very cool. And if you are trying to show prospective students what Princeton looks like, you want to show them the coolest looking buildings on campus and you want them to look like the real thing. But I wonder why it is that we all go into our Second life homes and put in dining room tables and kitchen appliances and such that we have absolutely no use for. They don’t do anything. They are just for decoration. So why don’t we get rid of them and save our precious prim counts for something that might be useful to us in some way. Chairs aren’t necessary, but at least they do make us feel comfortable when we are chatting with others, so they serve a purpose.

The one thing that I find really curious is that the way houses and buildings are laid out in Second Life seems to follow real life pretty well, but makes it difficult for avatars to actually get around. I even hear seasoned SL residents joking about how they still run in to walls. I think my least favorite thing in SL buildings is stairs. Some are downright frustrating to navigate. I had a really hard time once getting to the top of a lighthouse because of the winding stairs going to the top. In one shop I went to I tried to get up a really nice looking winding metal staircase about half a dozen times before I gave up and used the teleporter. It was so tight of a space that I would always get to a point where I could no longer make upward progress, but if I turned slightly to get around, I’d fall back down to the floor. In a lighthouse that you are trying to represent realistically, I can see the point of the staircase. In that shop, it seemed like just a waste of prims. If it’s mostly for decoration, then just make it phantom so no one is tempted to try and use it. The point is, things like staircases really aren’t necessary in a world with teleporters.

So, I’m really curious what buildings might look like in a few more years when more people start to think differently about what’s possible in virtual worlds. Will we cease to see stairs, in favor of teleporters? How about if we make inside walls phantom so they still give us the feeling of separate rooms without the need to navigate around them? Will we see more open spaces allowing people to fly rather than walk? Will we have less rooms because we don’t need kitchens, bathrooms or bedrooms? (You can always rez your toy bed for those special moments, right?) Do avatars need/want privacy? What good are locks on doors if someone can camera into your bathroom unobserved while sitting across the sim? Will we build upward instead of outward with skyboxes to save space and save on tier? If we do, will that eventually cause problems when we can no longer see the pretty Windlight sky because of all the high-rises?

I’m really curious about these things, so give me your ideas. And if you know a good architect I could talk to, please point him/her/it my way.

I wouldn’t say that this place is mind-bogglingly innovative or high-tech or anything like that. In fact, it seems rather simple when you first see it. And if you are looking for something “exciting” to do, The Far Away may disappoint you. But it’s what I would consider a great example of less-is-more.

I don’t know all the details behind The Far Away, but I gather that the creator is an artist in real life and the build is based on a real wheat field that he came across. The artist is AM Radio in SL and I believe he has done or is working on other projects as well.

What I like about this place is that it definitely creates a cool mood. AM has created a wheat field with some 3-d objects in it, which he has surrounded by walls and a roof which are textures made of real photos of a wheat field. So you are standing in a wheat field and feel like you are surrounded on all sides by field and farm buildings. He has also sprinkled some objects around the field that help with the atmosphere. He has done a really good job of interspersing 3-d with 2-d to create a place that seems much larger than what it is. And all you have to do to get a sense for the effect is to walk through the phantom walls and see what is outside to realize that this parcel really does seem like a place removed from the rest of the grid. If you look back in one corner you see some prim buildings a few meters in front of some buildings on the wall texture, and the effect is to make it seem as though there is much more depth than there really is. I also found this effect especially well done on the one side where AM has placed a prim fence just in front of the wall.

As a side note, I’ve noticed one really big benefit of having a 3-d virtual world. If you were to put a real life model in front of a picture background, it still wouldn’t look quite right in a photo. You can still tell there is a contrast between the two. But in second life, since it’s all rendered on a flat screen and the 3-d objects and the 2-d textures have basically the same resolution, you don’t get a sense that there is that contrast. From some of the “photo” exhibits I’ve seen in SL, I think it’s obvious that you can use it to quite the advantage. Add to this the fact that you can use poseballs instead of trying to explain how you want a model positioned, and it makes me really wish, as a serious amateur photographer in real life, that I could do the same thing outside of SL.

But back to The Far Away. Three things I would highly recommend to add to the immersiveness of the place. First, turn on the parcel music. It was not chosen accidentally. Second, make sure you play around with the windmill toward the back of the build. Third, make sure your draw distance is like 128m or so, so you can take in the whole thing at once. With very little imagination, it’s not too hard to get lost in the place, at least for a little bit. Add to all of this the way the artist has added some chairs, tables and cupboards to the field (often with people sitting in them) and you end up with something that seems awfully surreal.

One last note that I’d like to add about this place. AM has made it possible to purchase copies of various parts of the build for your own use and the proceeds go to charity. With all of the commerce going on in SL (which I’m sure I will be blogging about at some point) I always find it refreshing to see people donating their proceeds to charity. I mean, really, SL doesn’t have to cost you anything at all if you don’t want it to, so there is no real need to have money. Why not create something for others to enjoy and do some good in the world, too?

I thought about posting some pics I took of The Far Away, but I really think it’s a lot better if you go see it for yourself, even if you just pop in for a moment and look around. Oh, and watch out for those pesky dragonflies.

Mathaios Brandenburg [e-mail]

I was talking to my friend Radar Masukami* while he worked on a build high in the sky. After he added something to the side of the building, I naturally walked over to get a close look at it. Then something hit me and I said to Radar, “Did you see what I just did? I walked over to look at something instead of just camera-ing around to see it.” And he had noticed that.

Yes, in many ways I’m still rather new to Second Life. But I don’t think what I did is just about being new. It’s about comfort level. Walking over to look at something just seemed natural. That’s what you would do in real life. Camera-ing around just isn’t intuitive and takes a bit of time to get acclimated to.

So, to an extent, I get why people work so hard to make things in SL which are “realistic”. Commonplace is comfortable. But what I think is often missed is that “realistic” doesn’t apply the same way in a virtual world. Realistic in someplace like SL is whatever you can actually do. (I guess apart from things that require hacking the code or somesuch.) In the context of SL, flying is perfectly natural, and it’s somewhat surprising that you don’t see much of that. But I guess this is another example of comfort level. (As well as flying being really difficult if your system suffers from low frame rates.)

Something that was sort of an epiphany for me early on stemmed from my experience with MMOGs such as Everquest, Anarchy Online, DAoC, etc. Those games are set in fantasy contexts, so there are things that simply don’t seem realistic. For instance, in the interest of some mild role playing, I would remove my weapons and walk when I entered towns. Running around a town with sword drawn seemed rather uncivilized.

So, on my first SL avatar, I had collected a briefcase that I carry around and a laptop that appears when you start typing in chat. I was thinking one day of creating a script that would allow me to put my briefcase down when I got out the laptop, because having the briefcase just disappear didn’t seem “realistic.” After thinking about this a few minutes, it hit me: why is that not realistic? I mean, even at this time I was carrying around a small village in my inventory and there’s nothing remotely realistic about that, right? So it occurred to me that if the briefcase just disappeared when I started typing, within Second Life, that is realistic.

Now, theres nothing grid-shattering about these revelations. But they underscore the fact that when we’re in virtual worlds, we can, and I think we should think differently. And that’s what I want to encourage people to do. Instead of just trying to recreate the world we already live in, we should, as a community, test the limits of what “real” is in Second Life.

I hope you all will help me with this vision.

Mathaios Brandenburg [e-mail]

* Incidentally, Radar hosts a podcast called SL Under the Radar which I would recommend. It is part of the SLPN (Second Life Podcast Network.)