Anyone care to brainstorm about ways to make Second Life more e-book-friendly? Hello, Jon? As I’ve noted in the past, I’m skeptical about the existing SL but would like to look ahead.
Publishing executive Joe Wikert at Wiley is excited about SL’s possibilities for virtual bookstores like the one that his company has built. You can even flip the pages of virtual books. But that’s hardly the way to read them hour after hour, at least for us PDA and tablet fans. Right now I’m thinking that bookstores and libraries could use SL for attention-getting displays of highlighted titles but—for serious reading—make it possible to go to a Web-style interface in a truly smooth way and simplify access to actual e-book files. What efforts like this are happening already?
Two other issues are navigation—I hate the existing SL interface—and more powerful search capabilities. SL is working on both. I’d like to see people able to click on any location with a mouse and zip there instantly with an avatar and along the way control the view better than is possible at the moment.
For now, my SL account isn’t working, so I cannot actually see the bookstore in action directly and may be missing out on some obvious details, but I’d welcome others’ impressions.
Related: Second Life: The Official Guide, from Wiley. Also see M.J. Rose’s post on Second Life as a vehicle for an ad-supported virtual online horror novel by Dale A. Moses. You can see a trailer on YouTube for He Still Watches.
Great article, David!
As I’ve said before, Second Life is a presage into the future of online 3-D virtual reality (O3DVR). The current SL is still very new and some might say experimental — like the Web was in 1993. It will continue to improve and we’ll see many innovations. And the future of O3DVR might not be led by Linden Labs (the owners of Second Life), but by someone else. Or, it might become something “open” like the Web developed. It’s hard to predict what will happen, especially in that both IBM and Google appear to be researching and investing in O3DVR technology.
So it is important not to view the future of O3DVR based on what Second Life is at present. Rather, we need to overlook the current “primitiveness” of SL and imagine what’s in store for us in the future, and how this will impact upon digital publishing.
We do live in interesting times.
Btw, about moving one’s avatar in Second Life. Yes, for us older fogies moving our avatar can be trying at times (I’ve gotten pretty good at it, but it took me a little while to learn.)
When my 23 year old son got on Second Life, in a few minutes he was moving around better than I can now! He grew up playing video games, both on dedicated gaming equipment, and pc-based games (using keyboard/mouse), so this is all second nature to him.
(I believe most children, even those without gaming experience, will quickly get the hang of moving their avatar.)
I do see innovation in the area of avatar movement in O3DVR so those of us older folk with little gaming experience can get the hang of moving around. Maybe Linden Labs or some third party will develop a USB device (like a gamepad) optimized for moving one’s avatar in Second Life?
Thanks Jon. Yes, an optimized gamepad would help, but the real solution would be a better built-in interface. That is the key to growing the SL population. Further thoughts welcomed from you and others on these issues. – David