Welcome to a new regular feature of this blog … “10 questions for … “ where we talk to interesting people in the Microsoft world through a series of 10 questions (more or less, but who’s counting?) Think of this as a cross between James Lipton (Actor’s Studio) and Robert Scoble (Scobleizer). For the inaugural entry in the series, Microsoft Subnet interviewed two of the people responsible for Microsoft’s presence in Second Life and other virtual worlds. This interview was conducted as a live chat in Windows Live Messenger. The following is a two-page edited transcript of the conversation.
Microsoft Subnet: 1) What is it that each of you do for your day jobs?
Zain: I’m a developer evangelist for Microsoft in the South Central District. That means I reach out to the community and engage them any way I see fit to help them use our technologies to great effect.
Microsoft Subnet: 2) All Microsoft technologies or do you focus on specific ones?
Zain: Mostly developer stuff but with virtual world evangelism I don’t limit myself to developer stuff. For that, I work with admins as well.Kyle “G”: I do web software development — things that work online, in a browser. I used to be an aerospace test engineer. I used 3D there to educate engineers and visualize data. In those days I worked for a company but it led to forming G-Squared (G2). G2 was started to use 3D online to visualize data and educate users using models and collaboration
Microsoft Subnet: 3) G2 is your own company? What is your relationship with Zain … just friends or do you work together in some way?
Kyle “G”: Zain is definitely a great friend
Zain: grrrrrreat
Microsoft Subnet: lol … ok, love fest understood …
Kyle “G”: He has really been the inspiration for us to use Second Life and now OpenSimulator to do what we wanted to do with 3D. And we have been hired by Microsoft via Zains efforts for several events in Second Life and hope to do many more but we also work with the community of developers.
Zain: Yep LOTS of events. So I am doing what a good evangelist does and helping to see that vision to fruition. I see G2 as the prototype for the future of ISP’s everywhere. Not only will web sites be offered but also virtual worlds.
Microsoft Subnet: 4) What appeals to you about virtual worlds?Zain: Virtual worlds are the future of interfaces IMHO. They are the conduit through which we will achieve human interaction without the major friction of actual physically relocating.
Kyle “G”: Wow nicely said.
Zain: I’m cool like that.
Kyle “G”: For me it is purely born from the ROI I experienced using it in aerospace. We were able to retrain people who used to stack piles of paper into people who managed DVD’s and 3D Excel Plots. We changed how people worked. We even saved our firm a major government inspection by building a 3D model to explain how we were retraining our staff to engineers and sales staff worldwide. And now with Second Life and OpenSim, we can have those engineers tour the part in 3D and even overlay data on the part to discuss why performance failed at and what length in the part
Microsoft Subnet: 5) Did the people ever conduct meetings in the virtual world?
not to mention the ability to show a part like the one here
Kyle “G”: Well we lacked the tools to collaborate. We used 3D everywhere but not as a group. However today is the time to approach that again and tie it all together online — walk through a CAD part with a worldwide team, in world translators, CAD drawings pulled up, etc. We used to fly the sales staff from around the world to show them a bryce 3D animation I did. Think of what I can do now. A 24/7 tradeshow for every company. So this is pure ROI for education, collaboration, training, etc.Microsoft Subnet: 6) I’ve read stuff that talks up training quite a bit as a good thing for a typical enterprise to do in a virtual world. What can you do via a virtual world training course that you can’t do in other distance learning formats?
Kyle “G”: There’s a certain feel to a virtual world — you don’t feel anonymous or that the hosts are anonymous. You feel like you’re “there” at a place with peers. Not logged into chat or video where you can see the others but the “space” is not there. So what you can do is recreate a real world event, closer than any other way by far. It’s the 3D element that is the point — you can talk with people in other languages use gestures and movements not possible in Webex, etc.
Zain: I agree. There are some psychological aspects there as well. People are more likely to participate it seems in this type of environment than in a real-world equivalent. And we always have the option of blending those 2d type things if we want. In the 3D space we can mix to taste.
Kyle “G”: 2D resources always best for reading, etc., but to engage users on a one-on-one type of level, 3D worlds are a compelling tool, even though they are still in their infancy. 7) You recently conducted a Microsoft event in Second Life. Tell me a little about that a bit. Like why did you do it? Who came? What did you do?
Microsoft Subnet:
Kyle “G”: Microsoft wanted to explain the new features of Service Pack 1 for their Visual Studio 2008 and .NET 3.5 products/platform. So we suggested a tour with interactive elements. The Microsoft Developer community showed up as did those who use Second Life to script and want to learn more powerful tools. Also a lot of members of the www.opensimulator.org community came to the event who wanted to learn more. We used 3D metaphors and clickable interactive objects to illustrate the new features and Zain and another Microsoft employee explained the features as we progressed.
Zain: Yep, we did lots of great stuff — the treasure hunt rocked!
Kyle “G”: The key is to use the 3D space and play to its strengths, not try to recreate the “real world” inside the virtual world –things “not possible in real life” unless you are willing to build the Epcot Center for each event.
Microsoft Subnet: You mentioned SL and OpenSim. What are the virtual worlds that have captured your interest? Which ones and why?
Kyle “G”: OpenSim and Second Life are my choices because they are by far the most expansive and offer the broadest toolsets.
Zain: For me there are 3: (1) OpenSim, (2) Second Life, and (3) Croquet. OpenSim = is the open virtual world platform of the future IMHO and has a lot of support/interest behind it. Second Life = the 800 pound gorilla in this space so far. Croquet = NSF support and lots of European support but not as compelling to me personally.
Kyle “G”: Correction on SL, though — in terms of numbers they are not near the top but they are in terms of overall ability and name recognition, they are. As for what you can do in some of them. We recently brought https://greenbush.org/ into our OpenSim program and www.educationgrid.org as well. Here’s a YouTube video of Greenbush, too.
Microsoft Subnet: So these two organizations have their own worlds or events in OpenSim? do I understand that correctly?
Kyle “G”: They basically conduct virtual education for K-12. They have some trials but they hit hard limits which our developer community has fixed. We showed them how to use Microsoft SQL Server as the engine for OpenSim which has allowed for over 30 users in a “classroom” as opposed to the 5-6 these groups achieve now. The source code for opensim is open source and you can use MySQL, SQLite or MSSQL for your database to store user data, 3D data, etc. But we chose the free MS SQL Server (SQL Server Express).
Microsoft Subnet: 8) What do you say to the virtual world critics who say SL has become sleazy, or full of scams, etc? (not sure if this is true of OpenSim or Croquet, but SL reflects on them all …)
Zain: I think Second Life is what you make of it. I think there are plenty of opportunities for improvement without a doubt but you decide what you want it to be and make it that way. For example we have had maybe two incidents on our island that I am aware of that needed tending to. Other than that we have had great success with not having major issues on the island. Having said that OpenSim gives you a lot more control over who, what, when, and where. Plus, you don’t have to worry about incidental traffic.So it’s really a person’s choice in the end.Microsoft Subnet: 9) What is one question (with answer) that you always hope people will ask you about virtual worlds but they never seem to ask? Q: “Why are virtual worlds important?” A: Because they provide a level of human interaction and experience that is increasing important in this disconnected world we live in; plus they provide a platform for enhanced learning and collaboration.
Zain:
Kyle “G”: Q: How will virtual worlds affect the everyday user? A. I would answer using myself as an example, I have learned to do my job far better, far faster and for the first time in 10 years of working now am part of a community of peers. And I feel any discipline can do the same in here, doctors could meet famous doctors they never would otherwise be able to. Students could be taught occasionally by top experts. It makes these things affordable. Like the printing press made books common through lower cost. Microsoft Subnet: 11) OK, I’m over my limit of questions but I promised you both this one … what upcoming events do you planned and which are best for virtual world newbies?
Zain: For me the big things are duplicating some of the big real world events in the virtual world space.
Kyle “G”: I have ideas for a Robotics Studio event, and have started designing it, and basically we just watch for big releases from Microsoft to see how we could recreate them in 3D. We also are working on persistent resources like video streams and distance learning objects for the 3D world so there’s things to do 24/7, and a new Microsoft Office group. That will being us a level of education for the more standard office worker. We also have a great persistent platform for learning Excel in development, so we are forming plans now for the normal productivity worker.
Zain: as for which ones are best for n00bs, we deal mostly with the technical community and we have lots of virtual world newbies who come just to see out events.
Have you tried virtual worlds for training yet? What was your experience? Drop a comment here or send me a tweet about it … I’m microsoftsubnet on Twitter.
More blog post from the Microsoft Subnet posts:
