VastPark: community collaboration for enterprise
June 16, 2009
VastPark have announced the launch of VastPark 3C (Community Collaboration Centre), which “connects an easy-to-use social network platform with an immersive real time meeting system, allowing users to self organise within a collaborative environment.”
It’s another noteworthy integrated virtual worlds / social media entry into the enterprise market – like its competitors however, VastPark still faces an uphill battle with businesses that already have well developed intranet platforms.
That said, Victoria’s Department of Justice and RMIT University are on board with three other undisclosed organisations, so there’s a small userbase established. Growing that base will obviously be a priority for VastPark, and to date they’ve demonstrated a real commitment to working with government and business over what’s been a very lengthy development phase for the VastPark platform.
If you’re an organisation and interested in joining the closed beta of VastPark 3C, here’s where to go.
Popularity: 2% [?]
Second Life offers enterprise solution
April 6, 2009
It’s been rumoured for months now, but Linden Lab have finally confirmed that they’ve entered the alpha phase of “a server solution that is completely disconnected from the main Second Life environment with all of the rich functionality in the box.”
As far as virtual worlds and enterprise, it doesn’t get much bigger than this. The announcement has a bunch of significant implications:
1. Key security issues / intellectual property issues minimised
The ongoing and legitimate criticism of Second Life for business is its limitations in ensuring security of information. I constantly cite the power of Second Life for prototyping, but most businesses aren’t going to put key intellectual property on the public Second Life grid. The new solution will allow all the development to occur internally, with the company then potentially able to do some more public testing if desired.
The more obvious security benefits come around improved monitoring of activity and on-site backup of key data. I’m assuming the ability to do roll-backs will come with the package, which gives business greater peace of mind that they alone are ensuring their own information can be retrieved in the event of problems.
2. Enterprise virtual worlds now have a crowded marketplace
The proposed new product is far from assured of being the dominant player in the enterprise marketplace, but its brand recognition will certainly help it get a substantial foothold. OpenSim is the obvious competitor on the face of it, but no-one would be claiming they have a viable enterprise solution yet. The more realistic competitors are platforms like Forterra’s OLIVE, the open-source Project Wonderland and business function specific offerings like NoviCraft. The advantage most of these incumbents have is an ability to argue direct business outcomes, whether it be improved remote training, better team-building skills, or some other outcome negotiated as part of the enterprise-specific installation.
Where the new Linden Lab product will gain true traction is where it’s able to compete on ease of installation and the all-important price. It’s hard to imagine Linden Lab will launch something that’s more expensive than current offerings unless they can make the case for markedly superior features. I’d also expect some third-party vendors like Rivers Run Red are well underway in their preparations to offer development services for enterprise once this launches, and there’s probably a bunch more that will seriously look at expanding into development in the space now that the uptake is potentially more widespread.
3. Another nail in the mirror world coffin?
If the Linden Lab solution does gain traction, it really starts to squeeze out any enterprise arguments made by mirror worlds such as Twinity. The ability for business to run a grid internally and the large user base of the public grid to leverage from makes the smaller worlds vulnerable to losing the businesses they may have already attracted. That said, enterprises that are in the virtual world space for purely marketing purposes may still find worlds like Twinity a worthwhile investment.
4. The unknowns
At this early stage there’s more not known about this new product than known. The key questions I’d like to see answered are:
a. What interoperability will there be with the main Second Life grid?
b. Will there be off-the-shelf capability to connect to other enterprise grids?
c. As mentioned above, what will this cost, and will there be discounts for educators or other non-profit entities?
d. What support mechanisms will be in place. Will those mechanisms be Linden Lab driven or outsourced?
5. The sum up
It’s hard to put anything but a positive spin on this development. At worst it may lead to some loss of variety as smaller players have difficulties. At best it may be a catalyst for more widespread adoption of virtual worlds for enterprise. The most likely outcome in the short-term is slight growth in interest by business and some strong encouragement for Second Life developers.
What are your thoughts? Do you see the announcement being a game-changer?
Popularity: 4% [?]
Group instant messaging and successful meetings in Second Life
March 21, 2009
Linden Lab have posted two useful stories on their blog that are worth passing on.
The first is a heads-up on a Knowledge Base article on how to instant message a group of up to 20 of your friends without them being in a group you’ve created.
The second is a look at how an in-world meeting was held for 160 people in Second Life. The standout sentence for me was:
Gronstedt led all participants through a 30-minute training session and all speakers and exhibitors through a 60-minute training session to ensure that when the conference day arrived, everyone was ready to walk, talk, text chat, and participate in this new virtual event experience.
Half an hour to an hour of training to be able to participate isn’t that high a premium, although without doubt it’d be a disincentive to a lot of people. To me, that’s a big hurdle for one-off meetings but a more than worthwhile expense for a business using virtual meetings regularly. Of course, the enterprise solution that reduces the learning curve even further will have an advantage as enterprise comes on board with offerings that reduce real-world travel expenses.
Popularity: 4% [?]
Enterprise 2.0 and virtual worlds and a free discussion paper download
February 24, 2009
Today, I had the pleasure of facilitating four small group sessions at the Enterprise 2.0 Executive Forum 2009. The topic was virtual worlds and enterprise, and thanks to the participants in the groups, it turned into a very interesting exchange of ideas. The agenda of the overall forum was much wider: the use of Web 2.0 technologies in business. What’s impressive about this forum is the breadth of roles amongst participants – CEOs, CIOs, learning and development professionals, marketing professionals and general operational staff were in attendance.
As I’ve found before at these events, there are a growing number of people in business who see the potential of virtual worlds, but they struggle to get the same recognition throughout the business. That said, Australian business continues to lead the way in the area and it was great to see the level of passion for the opportunities virtual worlds provide.
Some other points that came out of the groups for me:
As part of my involvement I produced a four-page discussion paper: Virtual Worlds in the Enterprise – hype or high-performance?. It’s a bare-bones overview of the opportunities virtual worlds provide for business and a brief summary of five virtual worlds to watch (Second Life, VastPark, OpenSim grids, OLIVE and Metaplace) – there are obviously many more but as an overview they provide a good snapshot.
Anyone regularly exposed to virtual worlds won’t get a lot out of the document, but if you’re one of our readers who’s just dipping their toe in the water, it provides a basic launch pad for a wider exploration.
You can download Virtual Worlds in the Enterprise – hype or high-performance? for free by going to this page.
You only need to provide your name and email address to be able to download a PDF of the paper.
Popularity: 6% [?]
Virtual worlds: the next online banking
February 24, 2009
Aside from the group discussions on virtual worlds I facilitated yesterday, the only other time I witnessed them discussed at the Enterprise 2.0 Executive Forum 2009, was when Westpac’s David Backley spoke. As we reported last year, Westpac had trialled the use of Second Life to induct new employees in more remote locations.
Backley reflected back on the pilot, stating that it “had worked well and had been a good idea”. That said, the pilot did not continue due to the departure of the project sponsor – there was no key person to keep the momentum going. The learnings for Backley were that it was a concept ahead of its time, and that until the cost of implementation and maintenance came down, it would be difficult to argue a cost-saving case. Given the tens of thousands of employees Westpac has, it’s a pretty downcast assessment of virtual meetings as cost-saver. That said, Westpac’s platform of choice was Second Life. With the growth in alternate platforms, those costs are reducing, but there’s still a long way to go in that respect.
Aside from that, Backley provided some very interesting statistics around Westpac’s internet banking service. Presently, up to 6000 people are logged in to Westpac’s online banking service at any given time, with close to 700 thousand sessions a day. More value is transacted with online banking per day than is done in Westpac’s branches or call centres. When it was launched a little over a decade ago, the expectation was that perhaps a few thousand people Australia-wide would use the service. For me, that’s a key parallel with virtual worlds. It may be a ‘niche’ for business at present, but like internet banking, the public’s takeup is likely to surprise enterprises in a big way.
The other similarity is in platform: the original internet banking options tended to be standalone applications, then they evolved to be web-based. That’s when the rate of adoption exploded. There’s a very obvious lesson there.
Popularity: 6% [?]
NoviCraft: virtual world team building
February 22, 2009
NoviCraft is one of the more fascinating virtual world business offerings by Finnish company, TeamingStream. That fascination comes not from the platform itself, but the theoretical underpinnings of it. This is a world designed purely for business-related training and team-building purposes.
I took the opportunity to fire a few questions at TeamingStream’s CEO, Petri Ahokangas, about NoviCraft.
Lowell: What platform is the application built on?
Petri: NoviCraft is built on Epic’s Unreal Engine and it was officially launched in December last year. NoviCraft is off-the-shelf multiplayer teambuilding, collaboration, and leadership training game developed by a group of learning scientists, human resource development specialists, and serious game developers for the corporate learning industry. Our customers include top HRD consultancies, big and medium-sized companies, universities and other training organizations.
Lowell: Could you give more detail on the team building specifics that are encountered in the game?
Petri: The game is pedagogically scripted to make the participants aware of the different elements of collaboration, team learning, negotiation, and leadership through five team puzzles – and thus learning from the game experience. The first puzzle focuses on enhancing communication, building of psychological trust, and giving and receiving help among the participants. The second puzzle is about encouraging exploration, coordination of work, and establishing goal orientation. The third puzzle encourages
Thinking–out–loud as a team, sharing of information and helps to create an efficient problem-solving skills for the participants as a team. The fourth puzzle brings in risk taking and strategy creation as a team. The final puzzle is about joint planning and efficient execution of the plan.
In a nutshell, all major challenges of the modern workplace have been modeled to the game and can be practiced in a safe environment in a cost effective way. NoviCraft is not a simulation, it is real collaboration between people which makes it very effective as a learning tool. The learning process is theoretically grounded, supported by metrics, and the trainer or consultant (the game master) can monitor and control the performance of the playing team.
Lowell: So what have been some of the more common utilisations of NoviCraft to date?
Petri: Typical use cases for NoviCraft include leadership and management training, cross- and multi-cultural collaboration, virtual and distributed team collaboration training, team building, supervisor training, personnel evaluation/appraisal, and coaching boards of directors and management teams. Our customers have said that NoviCraft is a fun and efficient way to learn about their teamwork skills and it helps both individuals and teams to improve. After the game the participants can go through a workshop where they can analyze their performance, strengths and areas where they need improvement. The NoviCraft game experience can also greatly add the value of traditional management and leadership training.
Lowell: What level of expense is an enterprise looking at to deploy NoviCraft?
Petri: NoviCraft’s price depends on the number of users and the constellation of the software, but the typical limited license is between twenty and forty thousand Euros (20000-40000 €) depending on the case.
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Serious games initiatives are nothing new, but Novicraft seems to be one of more fleshed out models for business. At close to forty-thousand dollars Australian to implement, only the larger enterprises would consider NoviCraft, but its breadth remains appealing. What will truly differentiate NoviCraft is its touted metrics: if tangible benefits for a business are realised, its implementation costs may suddenly seem less of a barrier.
Thanks to CyberTech News for the heads-up.
Popularity: 7% [?]
Linden Lab’s enterprise momentum
February 12, 2009
In one of the more illuminating posts on the Official Linden Blog in recent months, Linden Lab’s Director of Enterprise Marketing, Amanda van Nuys (SL: Amanda Linden), has outlined the potential uses of Second Life for business.
There’s nothing groundbreaking in the information, but it’s worth regurgitating some of her points to illustrate virtual worlds and enterprise in a wider context.
Ok, I admit it. When I first joined Linden Lab to head up Enterprise Marketing three months ago, I wasn’t 100% convinced that working in virtual worlds really works.
A refreshingly honest take and one that most people would identify with, when introduced to virtual worlds for the first time. There’s a fundamental skepticism that I come across on a daily basis – one that’s hard to combat, even with facts around virtual worlds usage and their advantages for business.
The virtual medium is extremely powerful and the ‘sense of presence’ is real—and that’s the magic ingredient that makes a meeting truly productive.
For those who inhabit virtual worlds, this is also self-evident, but it’s another aspect that’s difficult to illustrate to the business skeptic. The recent increase in awareness of virtual meetings as cost-savers may actually be the factor that overcomes the initial wariness so that the power of the solution comes through.
Ok, I’m the Marketing gal who drinks my own Kool-Aid—true. But, I’m also a believer, and if you’re not already—you will be, too. Just try it and you’ll know what I’m talking about.
Of course, Linden Lab touting the power of virtual world meetings is a little like a hamburger chain espousing the health benefits of their burgers. That said, the growing evidence around the efficacy of virtual worlds for enterprise supports their case, although it continually needs to be communicated in disciplined business terms. It’s been stated repeatedly that the current economic climate may actually be beneficial for virtual worlds and the enterprise. That may be true, but only disciplined ROI arguments will fully overcome the intrinsic skepticism entrenched in the minds of most business leaders.
Popularity: 5% [?]
