Boulanger3D

I was first alerted to this sim by an article in that veritable treasure trove of virtual tittle-tattle, Virtual Worlds News. There have been precious few atomic world companies coming into Second Life recently, so I was intrigued to read: "The French retail company Boulanger announced today [October 7th] the opening of a store in Second Life with development and planning help from IBM Research and Global Business Services. The goal is to complement Boulanger's physical stores and website with an additional distribution channel and additional services. Initially the build allows users to view and interact with Boulanger objects in a familiar context, click to be taken to the purchase page on a website, watch service and repair videos, or talk directly to a maintenance aide." Wow...! An IBM build! Given IBM's continuing large presence in Second Life, and its cutting edge use of this and other virtual worlds, the prospect was mouth-watering.

But first - a little about Boulanger. Actually, for once Wikipedia has let me down, but I will plough on. Boulanger is a general electrical retailer in France, selling anything from kitchen white goods to mp3 players and consumer electronics. The British equivalent would be someone like Currys. Joining the dots, this would suggest that their outlets are largely out-of-town, in large retail parks. What is clear is that the Second Life build has a particular purpose - to promote their recently opened store at Englos, an arrondisment of Lille, in the North of France. It ties in with - and indeed provides links to - a dedicated website.

I was not able to leg it down to the Boulanger3D sim immediately, and I chose to avoid the details of the Mindblizzard post, so I could arrive fresh and without preconceptions (albeit, with some expectations). I finally pottered along to the sim today and... well... where do I start?

IBM described their aims for this build as: "[to] develop a community aspect through the 3D universe and propose new services (configuration of kitchen, cooking lessons, guides, etc.) -- while integrating the three complementary distribution channels." On arrival, there is a large guest book, where you can post comments - so that suggests some interaction between the island and the visitor. Oddly, the guest book is at the arrival point, when you are least likely to have anything to say - but let's skip over that.

The sim itself is, quite frankly, a confused mess. One strand or theme is to model the island a little like the real Englos site - with its approach road, car park and, of course, the store itself. However, only yards from this is a gigantic luxury yacht, replete with helipad and helicopter - not something normally encountered in the suburbs of Lille. I don't know why it is there, and seems grossly at odds with the "augmented reality" being attempted in the virtualisation of the Englos store.

Another strand or theme is in response to the requirement to give people something to do that is "fun." In the car park you will find numerous vehicles that you are supposed to be able to drive. The sup'ed-up Beetle with the "Try Me" sign signally failed to allow me to drive it! Though I did get a decent razz on one of the motorbikes. Along the coast from the yacht are some windsurf boards that I assume are also available for your use. More fun, perhaps, is the helicopter - which you are free to fly. It is nicely done, but I did not check its provenance. Was it made specially? Or a rebranding of an existing Second Life vehicle?

But returning to the "augmented reality" view for a moment - I expected the virtual store to bear some internal resemblance to the real thing. After all, there's a decent 2D representation on the website. But no... the virtual store seemed somewhat perfunctory inside, with little detail, and little to attract the eye or retain the attention. It seemed unfinished to me.

The "kitchen design" was a disappointment too. A nice looking kitchen/diner, to be sure - but the only thing you could do was change the colour of the units. Even my LSL skills could probably stretch to that - and it fell somewhat short of the "configuration of kitchen" that most punters would expect.

There is a presentation auditorium. Now this is something that is normally done well in Second Life - there are endless examples. Yet somehow this one manages to fail. The seating for attendees is fine - it is the area for the presenters that feels wrong, somehow managing to be cramped, awkward and claustrophobic in what is otherwise an open space! Now that takes some doing.

There are a number of other buildings, but nothing of any note - and I include the "cooking demonstration area" in that observation. Instructions inviting me to click on images of computer games to get more information failed to link to any information in any form - not even notecards or URLs. I could go on, but that is more than enough.

So... there you have it. After the bordering-on-genius of the 7Days Magic Bakery, I found this sim profoundly disappointing - and largely failing to come close to its hype. It seems to me to have been launched before it was good and ready, and before anyone had really given it a thorough critique internally. I have some photos - but don't trust me - you should go along and form your own opinion:

7 Days Magic Bakery

I've not written much recently, mainly due to the difficulty of finding anything new and interesting to write about. There seem to be no new corporate sites in Second Life, and many that have been here a while are closing up shop. It therefore comes as a pleasant surprise to visit not only a new corporate sim, but one that rewards the traveller handsomely in terms of build quality and entertainment value. The sim in question is 7Days Magic Bakery.

Sound quaint, huh? A sim for your local neighbourhood bakery? Ummm... not quite.

7 Days is a brand within the the Baking and Confectionery division of Greek food conglomerate, Vivartia, formed as a result of a merger in 2006 with Chipita. In total Vivartia employs around 13,500 people, and markets its bakery goods throughout Eastern Europe. On a darker note, in December 2007, Vivartia was found guilty of colluding with other milk producers to fix milk prices in Greece, and its earnings for the year were reduced by nearly 22million Euros as a result. Nevertheless, the company had a turnover of around 1.5billion Euros, with the Bakery Division bringing in some 412million Euro. So as you can see, 7 Days is far from being a little local bakery! If you want to see something of their product range then try here.

OK... so what about this sim? It opened just over a week ago and if I had been slightly quicker off the mark I could have posted a rib-tickling pun about taking 7 Days to write this post - but I wasn't, so I can't.

I have to say that I think the build quality and approach knock just about every other corporate build into a cocked hat. In large part this is due to the decision by involve3d, the builders, to execute most of the build work outside of Second Life, using Maya. The resulting structures and textures were then uploaded for final placement in the sim. The result is a spectacularly successful marriage of forms and detailed textures - which is my pretentious way of saying: it looks great!



Yeah.. yeah... but what does it look like?

You arrive at a landing that is faintly reminiscent of the Crystal Palace - lots of baroque ironwork - and your first action is to proceed thru the door in front of you into a windowless vestibule, where you will trigger the first of many audio commentaries (for the deaf, there are notecards too). A slightly peeved and aggrieved robot will tell you something about the sim - his amusing ramblings giving time for the sim itself to rez behind the scenes. When all is set, you can open a door and proceed into the sim proper. They've aimed for a "Dreamworks/Pixar-like" cartoony look and feel, and they've achieved it. Not only visually amazing, the music and audio fit the theme too.

Your main objective is the Bakery itself, but you should take the time to meander up the hill on which this Wonka-some construction sits, and take in some of the sights and sounds. In the bakery, you can control a machine to make your own personalised baked item - sweet or savoury. As their press release notes, you can concoct such oddities as the Chocolate Symphony Cosmic Satisfaction Croissant or Oregano Grated Cheese Electric Burst Pita Bakes. Whatever you end up with - and there are many, many variations - you really must eat it to get the full benefit. (A slightly cumbersome arrangement - you have to "Buy" for zero L$, then "Wear" the item)

During your wanderings you will encounter, and should pick up, the Vendomaton. I think I was a little too full of sugar-rush to fully absorb how this beastie functions. But in essence, everything you've made can be added to your vendomaton, and that means you can rez it at home and share your baking bounty with your pals; and vice versa.

But why? Why build the sim? I think the answer, in part, lies in the quality. I don't see this place setting new records for concurrent visitors, or establishing itself as the Place To Be Seen in SL. It might - but that would be a side benefit. Is it there just to promote the company? Well, yes, of course... but it is more subtle than that. Simply promoting within Second Life is largely a waste of effort, as many companies have discovered. But using Second Life as a stage in which to create ads - both movies and stills - that can be pumped into the real world. Now that is something different - hence the need for high quality, essentially non-SL constructions. I look forward to seeing how this story unfolds - and to the opening of their orientation sim, which also promises something new.

There's a lot more I could say about this place - but really the only thing I would say is: add it to your 'Must See' list. No.. don't do that. Just go there. But a word of warning... I found the triggered audio really impacted performance on my machine - and SL crawled along abysmally at times. This probably improves with cacheing... I went back with a friend, and found performance was much better. But don't let that stop you!

As regular readers will attest, you can judge how impressed I am with a sim by the number of pictures I take of it. I think I might have set a new record for myself:

The Oracle of Culturegion

if it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck, is it a duck?

That is the question posed at a new art installation, which opened yesterday on the German art sim: Culturegion. The installation, called 'Oracle', is the work of nonnatus korhonen / andrew burrell, an Australian "hybrid media artist". The accompanying notecard informs me: "He is no techno-utopian but nevertheless is excited to see a hastening collapse in the divide between techno speculation and reality. He understands the privilege of the artist to be the use of a subjective voice and here he is using this voice to investigate a certain interplay of art, philosophy, technology and the life-sciences." So there you have it. You can find out more about this and other art work on his website.


The Oracle of old would offer up inscrutably worded solutions to problems posed. And so it is with this Oracle. Create a notecard containing your question - no more than 20 words - and place it in the urn provided. Then let the Oracle work its magic. At the far end it will spit out the answer.

I suspect that I only got part of my answer, as I was too busy watching the process. But my question is taken from Firesign Theatre's "I think We're All Bozos On This Bus". In the World of the Future our anti-hero, Clem, gets to put a question to The President, now no longer flesh & blood, but an artificial intelligence. His aim appears to be to crash the AI and talk directly to Doctor Memory, effectively the operating system running The President. If you don't know it, track it down... if you do, then this will all be familiar to you! Anyway, the question he posed was:

Why does the Porridge Bird lay its egg in the air?

This was enough to break The President... and it looks like it did a fairly weird job on The Oracle too. This is the reply fragment I did recover:

Aleister Kronos: I say to you : have statistically future why lay its egg in dimensions future statistically included. statistically and body . . . . . . a
Aleister Kronos: I say to you : (which into the number Universe the cognitively

Hmmmm... I have no idea what is going behind the scenes on this, but it is a diverting build and nicely crafted. Why not give it a go? And take time out to explore the sim too. There's always something worth perusing here.

IslamOnline dot Net

Have you ever wondered what happens on The Hajj, when Mecca becomes a mecca for muslims from around the world? I've seen plenty of pictures of the crowds going round and round that huge black cube, the Kaaba, but otherwise I've little idea about the rest of it. In fact, to be honest, I'm not entirely clear why they go walkabout around the Kaaba - although I do recollect it has a chunk of meteorite built into it. Well if you can no longer suppress your curiosity - or if you'd like to find out more - then help is now at hand in the form of the 'IslamOnline dot Net' sim.

The sim, along with its sibling 'IslamOnline dot Net2' have been constructed on behalf of (drumroll, please...) IslamOnline.net, in order to promote a greater understanding of Islam, its culture and history. The wider mission of IslamOnline.net is "To create a unique, global Islamic web portal that provides services to Muslims and non-Muslims in several languages. To become a reference for everything that deals with Islam, its sciences, civilization and nation. To have credibility in content, distinction in design, and a sharp and balanced vision of humanity and current events."

The main "virtual Hajj" sim provides you with plenty of information - in the form of notecards - about the rites, routes and traditions, in a range of languages. While it compresses the whole route into a single sim, which inevitably means there are compromises, on the plus side, you are not likely to get trampled in the crowds, given the finite limits on the number of visitors to a sim. The overall build quality looks a little rough around the edges by today's standards, and I can't tell whether the sim is actually supposed to be finished. Everything appears to be there, but I think it needs more polishing. My doubt is also heightened by the fact that the second sim is definitely still under construction.

This sim houses an auditorium, a large building whose purpose I haven't fathomed (looks like offices and meeting areas from the outside) and - no doubt controversially - the Palestine Holocaust Memorial Museum. The purpose of this is described as "to prevent the crime of silence. By telling the stories of the victimized Palestinian children, we are saying 'no to any form of Holocaust." At the moment this is under construction and is awaiting further development, however you see it towards the end of the pictureset below, including the full text explaining the background to the museum.

Homemade Soops

A short one this: SoopsVirtualFactory.

This sim belong to Soops Group which is, their website informs me, "a dynamic software company founded in 1992 [who] offer software solutions varying from shrink-wrapped applications, tailor-made applications up to requirement analyses." It has offices in Amsterdam and Wurzburg, where they specialise in Object Oriented software development; indeed, the name is an acronym for 'Science Object Oriented Products & Systems'. The group is small, comprising Soops BV (Netherlands) and Component Studio GmbH (Germany), and employs around 30 staff overall.

The S~~~~d L~~e sim seems to be quite new - or perhaps, little used - and, unless I am very much mistaken, is a self-build, being assembled from a number of familiar basics. I say it appears to be new because there is not much here... a few buildings, including the attractive and familiar free beachhuts on stilts, a cafe, a tennis court and a dance area. But none of these seem to be particularly well developed, and they lack coherence; there is nothing pulling them together. It looks like the team (of one so far as I can tell - and I know how that is) is playing with ideas, with no particular endpoint in mind. I cannot see that it is intended as a place for the general rambling public to visit, and in its current guise is unlikely to make anyone's 'favourite sims list'. It looks like someone is having fun, with an entire sim at his/her disposal. The "soopies" group has 6 members, but it is Soops Carter who appears to have done the bulk - perhaps all - of the development to date.

As discussed on many other occasions, if you want a company sandbox - and that is a great idea, by the way - then you should consider making it private. It is easy to get things wrong - and damage your brand as a result. This is a small company, and this may not be a concern - but I would suggest it is something worth thinking about.

Not much in the way of pictures, since there's not much there:

Money, so they say...

I'm not sure of the whys and wherefores, but it seems that the semi-mythical money sim is open for business. At random points in recent months I've noticed this apparently plain-speaking sim and given it a go, to no avail. However, following a tip-off (no names, no packdrill) I had another go this evening and was surprised to find nothing barring my access, even though the sim is clearly not quite finished.

But some history... or what I know of it. All of this comes from the NPIRL blog, a great place to get scoops on the latest arty or challenging sims. It seems NPIRL members (who have the ear, eye or other body part of many in the arty community) visited this sim around November,2007. The sim is the work of well-known virtual world artist/creators Light Waves (mainly), Pavig Lok and Littletoe Bartlett. It appears to have been built for languagelab.com, whose "approach combines the interactive and social potential of virtual environments with highly qualified, innovative teachers from around the world to provide a unique space for formal and informal learning." The virtual environment in question is S****d L**e - but not this sim (yet).

So what's the big idea? You'd be best off reading the interview at NPIRL with Edgeware Marker (David Kaskel in atomic life) . First, I got to understand the relevance of the sim name. languagelab.com actually owns many (closed/private) sims , with names like Art, Life, Jobs and Nightlife, so Money seems to fit quite well with these. As believers in experiential learning, the company use the virtual world environment to drive the learning process - and the deeply strange Money sim is a further extension on this apprach. The article goes on a lot further, but that's enough gleaning for my purposes.

I hope the pictures tell the story - because I don't think I can. You arrive by a large, industrial lift. In front of you is a house, but the setting feels odd in a way that is hard to pin down. The first hint of paranoia might just start tickling at the back of your head at this point. The house itself (aside from the Greenies, who strike me as being interlopers) is empty. It appears to have been left in a hurry, perhaps after some kind of struggle or kerfuffle. There's a weird science lab in the cellar, and an even stranger bedroom-cum-workroom in the attic, which is covered in graffiti both scientific and scatological. There's a robot(?) gorilla's head on a bench, the top of the cranium removed. hmmmm....

Back at the lift there are 3 corridors leading to some sci-fi stuff. I've not an inkling what this is about, but in a downstairs chamber there is evidence that someone.... or something (dan--dan--darrrrr!) has broken IN. If you manage to work your way to ground level (the lift is not working yet) you will find further signs that all is not well.

What the heck is going on is anyone's guess. Some of the site (not much?) is still under construction, and it is not at all clear why the general public is able to gain access. But hopefully you will enjoy reviewing my slide show, and will agree that the site is well worth a visit - even in its current state - though how much lingo you will pick up is anyone's guess.

UPDATE 06-04-08: According to Lem (see comments), the doors have been closed again on this sim. I tried too, to no avail. I suppose that's the way with Money - it can easily slip thru your fingers.

Telstra Experience Centre

Now, for a bit of a change - an Australian sim. While exploring far out in the Western Oceans of Second Life, I espied this sim, and grabbed the opportunity for a visit. It is actually one of a pair, the other still being closed to visitors. Although, in my view, this sim is not really ready for visitors either. But more of that anon.

The sim belongs to Telstra, Australia's principal provider of local and long distance telephone services, mobile services, dialup, wireless, DSL and cable internet. In fact, they address just about all one's antipodean telephonic needs. The company name seems to be a twiddly contraction of its original name, Telecom Australia. Its ISP, BigPond, has had a popular presence in Second Life for aboutr a year, but it seems the parent telco is now moving in, too.

This island is actually more accurately: Telstra Experience Centre. In November, 2007, Telstra announced that they would be opening such centres in the atomic world. The Centre is a place for people to try out the various products and services offered by the company and its partners, and get a glimpse of the new technologies arriving soon. Incidentally, in researching this post, I found that the Second Life site has been mentioned in the Metaverse Journal, an Australian metaverse website. They seemed okay with it. I think it is open too soon.

The sim consists of 2 large buildings. One is labelled as the Experience Centre, while the other is unnamed, but appears to be an alternative Experience Centre. The main Centre has a number of public spaces, each with its own media stream. Most of the spaces provide notecards, which give more information about the site. For example:

The Telstra Experience Centre (TEC) has been designed to provide business and government customers with hands-on experience with Telstra’s world-class technology, service and media capabilities. Customers will be able to see, touch, feel and use Telstra’s products and services. Most importantly, this centre allows customers to explore solutions using Telstra’s Next IP™ Virtual Private Network and Next G™ high-speed wireless broadband network. This Telstra Experience Centre in Second Life is designed to give visitors a taste of what to expect from the RL centre. It also allows us to experiment with the use of Second Life for RL collaboration and projects across business and government applications.

We are also told that the 95-seater auditorium "will provide a world-class briefing and presentation venue for key Telstra and partner events. The presentation experience will have state-of-the-art audio visual technologies, and includes Telstra’s DVN (Digital Video Network) capability allowing Television crews to broadcast directly from the centre to their TV networks."

While a lot of work has been done on the main Centre, it feels far from complete. For reasons I don't follow, there are corridors full of closed, locked doors - which hardly gives an open, friendly impression. The ground floor is inaccessible, and the second floor non-existent. Meanwhile. the other building has no information and seems part-built (nice "shiny" floors though!). Oh... and no freebies as far as I could tell.

In short, it seems like the island is not really ready for use. But as they've chosen to open, I thought I'd have my say. And now for the piccies...

See what I mean about the corridors?

Second Oldham

Tonight's flying visit was to a sim whose first life counterpart is (very approximately) in my neck of the woods: Second Oldham. This is a relatively new sim - and part of the small cluster of Manchester sims that also includes Urbis.

It is great to see such unglamorous places as Oldham getting a presence in Second Life. Oldham is a town of over 100,000 inhabitants, situated in the county of Greater Manchester, to the NorthEast of Manchester itself. While there is evidence of habitation in the area since Neolithic times, it was not until the Industrial Revolution that Oldham moved beyond a few ramshackle dwellings. The first cotton mill opened in 1778, and the town grew quickly as cotton spinning became the boom industry. The decline started with the cotton famine of the 1860s, brought about by the blockade of the Confederacy during the American Civil War. But it was a gradual process - the last mill final closed in 1998. Along with cotton there was a successful coal industry - also now deceased. In the post-industrial age, Oldham is now struggling to redefine itself.

It is using Second Life as a vehicle for informing people about developments in the town, and to promote the town's industry and leisure opportunities. The sim itself is largely empty - with one corner taken up by the Second Oldham complex. A path leads visitors from the main dome, past an exhibition area, auditorium and finally a sandbox (not actually open to all-comers). It all feels quite 'early days' and may change significantly in the coming months. Certainly, there is a large slice of sim that is currently unoccupied. While the complex is nicely constructed, I think they are failing to use the exhibition space to best advantage. At the moment, there is a rolling display of 2D images regarding proposed new construction in the town. It would be nice if this was also modelled in 3D. Perhaps that is to come.

Anyway - as ever - a few snaps for you:

Something Wrong with the State of Texas Instruments

Tonight I thought I would take one of my periodic peeks at the sims dotted around those belonging to Millions of Us. I have been aware of a Texas Instruments sim for many months, but on all previous occasions it has been closed. I was therefore pleasantly surprised to find it open this time, and popped in for a look around.

The sim is actually advertising the company's DLP high-definition screen technology, and features a number of examples where you would see the benefits. There's also an attractive auditorium. As all of this is the work of MOU, the build quality is as you'd expect. And all of it is placed on a fairly small island in the middle of the sim. So far, so good.

Now for the not-so-good. I don't know when the plan is to open this island to the public - maybe it already is - but someone seems to have made a blunder with permissions. Right now, the island appears to be a Griefers Paradise. There seems to be no build restrictions at all, as far as I could tell, and all manner of oddities are already appearing... a helicopter, a luxury yacht, a few extraneous islands, a number of "money pyramids" and at higher altitudes there is more construction work underway. OK, to be fair, most of the "defacing" to date seems to be people treating the place like a perpetual sandbox. However, there are signs that less innocent souls are at work.

While I have had suspicions in the past about companies using "free to build" as a mechanism for driving footfall (I won't mention the events in question), I don't think that this is the case here. Besides, despite my cynicism and paranoia, I still err on the side of 'cock-up over conspiracy'. I will be mildly intrigued to see how this pans out.

Here's a few snaps (you might just make out the dodgy pyramids in the first picture):

Accenture Careers

How odd? No sooner do I blog about one recruitment site, than another hoves into view. Thanks to Torrid Luna for informing me about this. It seems that the sim - Accenture Careers - opened today. This is actually one of a 6-sim cluster, but the others - if the map is to be believed - are still largely wide open, pastoral spaces. I have been keeping a beady eye on this one for some time, waiting for it to open - or for some news to emerge about it.

I have posted about Accenture before - indeed, I have posted about this 6-sim cluster - so you will forgive me if I don't go over old ground. Instead, I will endeavour to tell you a little about the sim. Most of the sim is there to offer the Accenture Challenge (there's a picture of the trophy in the slideshow below) which appears to consist of a number of fun tests, under 3 categories: Physical, Mental and Team. There are 3 tests in each category.

Can you: remember stuff? Do anagrams? Aim a trebuchet? Solve puzzles? If so, you might enjoy the challenges on offer here. Or you might prefer to watch your mates' pathetic attempts. I don't know when the Challenge comes to a close - if ever - but you at least stand to get your name on the leader board. And before you mention it - I know mine is not present. I might take an alt through these puzzles and tests, but as sure as eggs is eggs, I ain't exposing poor old Al to the rigours of this lot! Elsewhere on the sim there is a chatbot for you to talk to about Life, the Universe and Everything - though don't be surprised if it fails your personal Turing Test. There's also a guided tour of the sim, if you haven't already strolled through it. For those of a more nautical bent, you can grab a paddle and propel a canoe among the creeks and streams that criss-cross the sim. There are places around the sim where you can supply feedback too.

As well as the various challenges - there is a multi-lingual tower of information. Or to put it another way... there is a tower, in which each floor offers the same company information and quiz in a different language (ground floor for English). Hmmm... I'm not sure that explained it any better... oh well. Next door is the interview room (I think).

Rather than being an out-and-out recruitment venue, I get the feeling this site is more a means for engaging with SL residents, and in particular,making contact with those that might be a good fit for a career in Accenture. But all of this in a very relaxed way (a term I would not normally apply to Accenture!) : "Come and have fun in our intellectual playground, and who knows? You might want to know more about us - and vice versa."

The build itself is very enjoyable. It mixes almost ghostly, washed-out or semi-transparent shapes with sharp, crisp ones, giving a gently surreal yet serene air to the place. If you know anything about building with Windlight you are probably familiar with the "glow" setting on textures. I may be wrong, but it looks like this has been used extensively, and may account for the otherworldly lighting effects and soft-focus look. I like to nose about, as you probably know, and by checking "created by" properties on several diverse objects I can conclude that the build has been carried out by a team from The Project Factory, who really should find time to update their website some time!

One final point - possibly already fixed: there is an Orientation Zone on the adjacent Accenture 5 sim that should presumably be open, but is currently closed. Interestingly, the auditorium, which shares the same sim is open to the public.

Well enough of the wordage - here's my extensive slideshow. It's a fairly safe bet with me that the more pictures I've taken, the more impressed I am with the build. There's 19 here - which I reckon is a thumbs up from me:

Second Astana - Virtual Kazakhstan Part 2

Following on from my post about Kazakhstan I thought I should see if I could track down Second Astana. As you will see from the picture show below, I was successful. In fact, it spans two sims: Astana and Astana City.

It still looks to be early days to me. Sure enough, the advertised Bayterek and Palace of Peace and Reconciliation are there, together with a domed palace (or is it a goverment building?) and a couple of pseudo-Stalinist concrete polit-buildings. By way of contrast, to show the Kazakhs' humble but proud beginnings, there is also a yurt and some horses. The pictures of rugs in the set below, come from inside the yurt.

In terms of interest and interactivity, the Bayterek tower offers the most. You can teleport to the top and experience a 360degree photo-panorama as seen from the building in the atomic world. Probably the closest I am likely to come to "being there". A rather unusual feature of the real building is a handprint of President Nazarbayev. Visitors to the tower are encouraged to place their palm against this handprint, as a metaphor for friendship and a sense of commonly shared humanity. Well... you can do the same here, if you climb the stairs to the top of the tower. The other buildings are just shells - with no access inside and, indeed, no insides to access.

But enough of such bagatelles - here's the photostream:

At the moment the site is more of a curiosity than anything else - but it will be interesting to see how it develops. I noticed that there is also a teleport to a range of Russian islands from here.

Kazakhstan Goes Virtual

Interesting news coming from the steppes of Central Asia. While we have witnessed a few governments dipping their toes into the virtual waters of Second Life, these have tended to come from the 'developed' nations of Europe, North America and Asia. It therefore comes as an unexpected pleasure to hear that the giant Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan is opening a presence in Second Life. If your Russian is up to it, you can read all about it here. Whether this is part of a wider bid to shake off the image given by comedian Sacha Baron Cohen (in his guise of Kazakh TV journalist, Borat) I do not know.

Second Astana takes its name from the capital of Kazakhstan… umm… Astana. Curiously, “Astana” means “capital city” in Kazakh. How spooky is that, eh? (hehe) Oh, and for any New Yorkers, you might like to know that Astana has recently been named "Manhattan on the Steppe." You can find out more about that in this Chicago Tribune article.

I’ve not yet had the pleasure of a trip to Second Astana, but according to reports in the Kazakh press, they have “recreated the central area of modern Astana from Baytereka to the pyramid of the Palace of Peace and Reconciliation. " The Bayterek, or "Tree of Life”, is the emblem of the city - a large glass sphere perched at the top of a 100-meter metal shaft. The renowned architect practice, Foster + Partners, designed the 62-meter glass pyramid, the Palace of Peace and Reconciliation. You can find an extensive report on the real life Astana at Spiegel Online.

Both of these buildings, along with the impressive array of monuments, palaces and offices in between, have been built for President Nazarbayev; part of his bid to put Kazakhstan on the map, and guarantee himself a prominent place in history. To describe Nazarbayev as “controversial” would be putting things mildly, with allegations of human rights abuses,nepotism, brutality, corruption and megalomania. Indeed, many point to the explosive growth of Astana as proof of this megalomania – and will doubtless see its expansion into the virtual realm of Second Life as yet further evidence.

I have read that the development is not officially sanctioned, yet it is intended to tie in with Kazakstan’s plans for digital development and improving the international image of the country. There are plans to expand the presence , with Second Life versions of Kazakh tourist destinations: Almaty, Turkestan and Borovoe.

Oh… if you don’t fancy visiting the Second Life version of Astana, it is also available as a 3D map on Google Earth. Here's a snap I took of the 3D map:


UPDATE: Follow this link for more on the Second Life site.

Virtual Healthcare and Hospitals

I dunno... you wait months for a virtual health service, then 2 come along at once. In the space of only a couple of days we witnessed press announcements from both IBM and Cisco/Millions of Us, launching healthcare-related sims in Second Life.

I will deal with the IBM one first - since I am clearly not ill enough to gain access to the site in question: IBM Healthcare Island. The island, which debuted at HIMMS'08 healthcare conference, is described in the press release as "a unique, three-dimensional representation of the challenges facing today’s healthcare industry and the role information technology will play in transforming global healthcare-delivery to meet patient needs." It is split into a number of locations, ranging from the patient's home, to clinics, laboratories, hospital and the ER. The main aim is to show the use of Personal Health Records (PHRs), the interactions with Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems and the development of an Electronic Health Record (EHR). I am slashing the description to the bone here - read the extensive press release for more.

Perhaps ironically, given the currently closed status of the island, Dan Pelino, General Manager, IBM Global Healthcare & Life Sciences Industry says: "The island allows each healthcare stakeholder to envision how the total system can be affected by intercession at each juncture of the healthcare delivery process.” As a 'patient' I'd like to think I count as a 'healthcare stakeholder'. Oh well, in the meantime I will continue to take aspirin and plenty of liquids, while giving some consideration to...

PalomarWest Hospital. Where IBM appear to be using the 3D world to walk us through medical processes and information flows, MOU are using it as a visualisation tool, modelling a hospital that is not due to open in the atomic world until 2011. They have developed the visualisation on behalf of Palomar Pomerado Health and Cisco Systems who, between them, are developing a "hospital of the future" in which state-of-the-art ICT networks and systems will help deliver premium levels of patient care. You can read the press release to glean the features they seek to demonstrate in the virtual world, including "telepresence", robotics and 3D imaging.

The sim itself looks very impressive - though I could not quite get a handle on the scale. Nor could I get a reliable fix on the level of detail. Arriving in the car park, you are presented with the medical centre in all its proposed finery. As this is about visualisation, it should not have surprised me to find that so much of the centre was effectively shut. In large areas I could admire the outside, but not wander around the inside. In fact, I found my route heavily constrained. I could get into the ground floor lobby, and after picking up a RFID tag I should have been able to access treatment facilities. However, it told me these were in use (though I seemed to be the only person on the sim) so I can't comment on these. I may try another time. Incidentally, I was a bit surprised to be told that I needed to have my gall bladder removed - I certainly did not have that in mind when I came to the sim!

There's a couple of movies that talk you through some of the concepts of the hospital, while also promoting the joys of Cisco wifi access. Maybe it was my inability to actually obtain treatment, but I saw none of the features listed in the press release. Perhaps they are still being worked on, since I did notice a basic cube prim on the stairs leading up from the lobby. Oh... it would be nice if the wheelchairs worked too. Overall I liked the sim, and can see that it is a big step ahead of 2D presentations when trying to imagine how the place will look and operate. However, I'm not sure that the press release bears much resemblance. I suppose I'd better go back and get that gall bladder whipped out.

Here's some views of the outside:


The lobby and the basic, cube prim:


A Cisco wifi access point - and and infomercial:


You can find out more about the proposed Palomar Medical Center West here.
You can download a .WMV format video for the virtual hospital here.

Oh...and finally - I couldn't help but notice, in checking through press releases, that Cisco has just established the rather wonderfully entitled Academy of Digital Signage. I dunno... it tickled me, anyway.

+++

UPDATE: I am given to understand that the IBM Healthcare island should be opening to the general public in a few weeks. So just wrap up warm and avoid chills until then.

Waiting for Rumsey Maps

Tonight's quite interesting find, ironically perhaps, came about from some random searching of the Second Life map. You have to be something of a map nerd to spend as much time as I do poring over maps - including the Second Life grid map. So it was an unexpected pleasure to hit upon the 4-sim island of Rumsey Maps.

The island is the Second Life presence for the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection. This is an online collection comprising some 17,400 maps (and one I plan to delve into in more depth when the opportunity arises). To quote the website: "[The] Collection was started nearly 20 years ago, and focuses primarily on cartography of the Americas from the 18th and 19th centuries, but also has maps of the World, Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania. The collection includes atlases, globes, school geographies, books, maritime charts, and a variety of separate maps, including pocket, wall, children's and manuscript. Digitization of the project began in 1997."

Not surprisingly, the island is full of maps. Indeed, the main ground plan of the island consists of one large map, with valleys and hills contoured in 3D. Floating above these are a couple of globes - one terrestrial, one celestial - with phantom surfaces. Inside each is a giant orrery, where you can take a seat for a leisurely view of the globes' inner surfaces.

Elsewhere there is a richly textured modernist building where you can find out more information, and pick up some nice freebies - including orreries and a variety of globes. There's also a small, comfortable seating area and a meeting room. Outside there's a large map where you can place your own map pin, with up to 140 characters of text.

The one big downside of the site - indeed, the only downside in my view - is that the size and number of map textures means that lag was a huge problem for me. OK, I was using Windlight, but even with the settings turned down it was taking an age to display anything. In fact, it only started to make much sense when I'd been there fully 15 minutes. As you will see from the pictures, there seems to be a lot of "map eggs" - but these, in fact, serve to provide some infrastructure, as the 3D terrain is overlaid on top of them.

I can't find any reference to the Second Life island on the Rumsey website, so I do not know if it is officially open yet. But if you like maps - or just want to see somewhere a bit different - I can recommend the trip. Oh... and that map of the UK? The map pin is very(!) roughly where I live.

UPDATE 8th Feb'08: I've been having a bit of a think about those "map eggs" and it has dawned on me that they're actually sculpted prims, but seen in their half-rezzed state. Give them long enough and they will finally snap into chunks of contoured map. Just thought I should clarify that one!

Pachinko with Anshinchodoma

This evening's post features another new island in Second Life, this time from Japan. The island, which goes by the rather unwieldy name of Japan Anshinchodama, apparently opened to the general public on 1st February, or so I gleaned from the Anshinchodama website. I also gleaned that Anshichodama is probably a company that runs pachinko parlours - and may be part of J-Net. Trying to unravel what the companies do and how they are related is far beyond my abilities to determine. As for pachinko, this resembles a cross between a slot machine and pinball and is an amazingly popular pasttime in Japan - even though it seems to involve carrying around industrial quantities of ball bearings.

The island in Second Life is modelled as a pachinko machine. In fact, the place is full of them - of various sizes. The largest is the island itself, but perhaps the most fun is the next size down - which is more (ahem) avatar sized. In fact, you can become the ball (how Zen, huh?) and watch yourself being bounced around the machine. If you are fortunate enough to be caught in one of the hoppers, then you stand to win a prize - but you can check that out for yourselves. The smallest machines are "life sized" and allegedly you can camp at them to earn a few L$. For freebies, there were several T-shirts available. I availed myself of a Choda Man T-shirt. Choda Man seems to be the company logo - a little like the Pillsbury Doughboy or Bibendum(better known as the Michelin Man), but made of pachinko ball bearings instead. In any event, he features widely on the island - as you can see from the pictures below.

As usual, if you know more about this island, then please let me know.

That's Amore (Pacific)

February 1st saw the launch of the latest Korean presence in Second Life - a 4-sim island belonging to cosmetics firm, Amore Pacific. Part of the Taepyeongyang Corporation, Amore Pacific has been producing cosmetics since 1940 apparently. Over the years it has diversified into a number of brands, and has spread far beyond the shores of its native Korea. Several of the brands - including Laneige, Hera, mise en scene and Sulhwasu - have their own dedicated areas on the Second Life island.

The island has been built by leading Korean metaverse construction company, Acid Crebiz. It is arguably their most ambitious public release to date, and certainly the most impressive, even by their standards. I won't give you too much of a rundown of the features of the island as you can get all of that from the Acid Crebiz Newspage or watch the Second Life Korea News on YouTube.

I have to say, though, that this is one of the most absorbing commercial sites I've visited in a while. The fact that I took something like 26 photos to accompany this post is an indication of the impact it had on me - that and the disproportionately long time I spent here. Strange, considering the site is almost exclusively about women's cosmetics products - a topic that is a very long way from my heart indeed! The closest thing to anything butch and manly was the Green Tea Museum and Cafe. Mind you, if you are more in touch with your feminine side - or you are, in fact, feminine, then you might well like all the freebies available here. There is simply loads of free stuff - and not jsut cosmetics. You can help yourself to hair and skin, and there some nice porcelain, cushions and other goods in the museum.

The island not only spans 4 sims - but also exists on 2 levels, and is laid out as a kind of hub-and-spokes. At the higher level you will find the 5 brand halls, where you can pick up some freebies, admire the architecture and - if you so choose - camp for a few L$. The halls are linked by a walkway that circumnavigates the hub. At ground level you will find a more eclectic array of constructs - the beach, the green tea museum and cafe, and a large outdoor auditorium. The build quality is excellent throughout, and largely accounts for the large number of pictures I took. Even the unforgiving Windlight viewer was pushed to find any fault with it.

How the site will fare is another matter. 4 sims seems like a lot to me, and may be hard to justify if the foot traffic is not forthcoming. However, if Acid Crebiz and AmorePacific are clever about this, then this could be a very successful site. What am I talking about?? Well, on January 25th Korean games and media company T-Entertainment officially launched Second Life Korea. This means that we should see a sharp rise in the number of Korean Second Lifers, most of whom will be looking for places to hang out. T-Entertainment already has the large Sera Korea cluster of sims. But a 4-sim Korean presence like AmorePacific could be used to provide an alternative "home from home". It's a thought. Otherwise, without regular events and sense of community, the sim will probably fade from memory - beautiful and complex as it is.

Itau

Brazil, as you may be aware, was the first country to get a Second Life Grid Global Provider, in the form of Kaizen Games. There was an expectation that this locally-supported service would see Brazillians flocking into Second Life, but I'm not sure it has really done so. Nevertheless, many of the busiest residential sims in Second Life are Brazillian, and it is perhaps surprising that there does not appear to be an equivalent level of commercial interest.

Tonight I stumbled across one such Brazillian commercial sim: Itau. It belongs to Banco Itau, a privately-owned bank with its headquarters in São Paulo. It is the second largest private bank in the country, accounting for around 11% of retail banking services. However, the sim does not appear to be pitching itself as a major promotional tool for the bank. I really need one of my Portuguese-speaking chums to translate it for me, but at least part of seems to be concerned with environmental and ecological matters. Thus far, the build extends across half the island and comprises 3 buildings - an arrival zone, an auditorium and a "conviviality suite", where you will finding rolling displays, presenting a variety of eco-stats. A pathway winds through hilly woodland, linking the buildings. For freebie-chasers it looks like you might be able to grab a T-shirt or 2 - though I wasn't able to prise one out.

I don't really have much more to add - but you might want to go and figure it out for yourself. Oh, I've just been back for another look, and there is a quiz in which you can participate, on the subject of "sustainability."

Company Sim - Architects' Zone

As you may be aware, for the last couple of weeks I have been beavering away - when I can - on the new company sim. Broadly speaking, one of the aims of this sim is to provide common meeting areas for our various teams, spread as they are across geographies, lines of business and, indeed, just about any other distribution factor you care to name.

For example, I am a member of the UK Enterprise Architecture (EA) team. However, the members of this team are, at the same time, members of the company technical community, the global architecture practice and, at a more granular level, their various business units. This "membership matrix" is a real challenge when trying to sustain a cohesive sense of EA community - and this is where Second Life can help us. Sure, it is not a universal panacea - but it can provide a single virtual location for the community - which is otherwise spread out across the country, and in some cases, across the globe.

So I have been working on the EA Community area - the Architects' Zone - in the last day so. I had planned to post these to Flickr - but this is playing up at the moment, so I thought I'd post to Slambling instead. As you will see from the images below, while the sim remains private, there's nothing commercially sensitive to be gleaned. However, I would be interested in any feedback. This is just the basic Architects' Zone - I have yet to furnish it with content - but then that I may leave to others to do!




I'm not much of a one for walls, while the roof only exists because I like the look of it. It is phantom, in any case, since I can't see any good reason to stop people - quite literally - dropping in!