I attended a conference on virtual world (VW) technology for the first time, yesterday. The New Ventures and Leadership in Virtual Worlds conference at UT Austin’s McCombs School of Business was an opportunity to hear about some research into conducting business in VWs, visit with folks who are thinking about creating a presence in Second Life (SL), and meet the First Life avatars of a couple of SL acquaintances.

Arriving late, I walked into a small lecture hall for the first session to find about fifty people listening to Tony O’Driscoll (image) who seemed to be presenting a historical perspective of technology (and perhaps social media?), discussing how that might play out with virtual worlds. (Question by a visitor to a virtual tech museum: “What is this room?” Answer: “This is what used to be called a classroom”.) Having missed much of his talk, I was glad later to learn that he documented his presentation online.

My first conversation began with small talk over bagels and fresh squeezed orange juice (what a world!) with Hugo, a visitor from outside the U.S. He mentioned his company’s interest in developing a virtual world presence and that an exploration of platforms was underway. He said that he knew little about OpenSim, so I made a note to send him some information…and later decided to simply develop a page about OpenSim at the new blog to serve as a reference.

Many of the folks I spoke with were very new to VWs. Often, I found myself in the role of a VW ambassador, sharing glimpses of the metaverse and describing various aspects of VWs; functionality and opportunity of user-generated content in SL/OS, challenges in designing content for education, and the potential of OpenSim to deliver a more robust VW than SL. I enjoyed the opportunity to visit with several of the speakers, who all seemed enthusiastic.

Stockholm School of Economics’
virtual meeting space in SL

The conference was a mixed reality event, with VW participants contributing to the conversation, and slides and audio simulcast in SL (image). MLani Montgomery, one of the SL attendees asked a question that went unanswered:

Question: As a K-12 educator in a rural area, we have a cutting-edge distance learning program in terms of delivery, but not content… Is there documentation to bring from the business world to outline basic tech skills future employees will need as a baseline?

Hmmm. Basic tech skills that today’s students will need tomorrow, as employees. I think I’ll break from this to root around a bit, and see what I can find…

Where the Studio Wikitecture 4.0 (SW4) challenge produced an architectural space, the interactive features are the wiring and plumbing of that space. How can scripts ease the delivery of synchronous instruction in a virtual world? So, what are the fixtures and utilities of a classroom?

The Interactive Classroom was submitted to test these waters, and three features from that design were included in the final idesign installed for the University of Alabama. They are described here.

Automatic Notecard Delivery

Provide a notecard to all students by dragging it onto the classroom podium (after selecting that option in menu). When a user takes a seat in the classroom, the notecard is delivered automatically.

Hand Raising

Seated avatars can raise their hand by clicking on a “Raise Hand” icon in the front of the classroom. Click the icon again and the hand is lowered. When clicked by the instructor, the icon/object offers the options of resetting the object or reporting the number of raised hands in chat. Resetting the object results in the report of the tally, clearing of the tally, and causes all avatars hands to lower.

Parcel Media Display

Assign Internet URLs to the parcel media stream by dragging a notecard onto the display. Once assigned, touch the display and a menu prompts the teacher to select any of the URLs. Once selected from the menu, the URL is streamed onto any prim assigned with the parcel media texture. The object also detects the parcel media texture automatically, in case that changes between sessions.

Discussion

The design challenge assumed that instruction would occur as a synchronous event. So, what are the activities that can be expected? What actions are an instructor likely to take? Answering these questions in tedious detail provided interactions that might be simplified or even automated. Chronologically, a traditional lesson might involve the following:

1. Teacher arrives at location, prepares for lesson
2. Students appear at location and sit down
3. Teacher notes which students are in attendance
4. Materials are distributed, such as a lecture notes*
5. Lesson content is introduced
6. Students are prompted for feedback*
7. More content is presented, with any variety of multimedia sources*
8. Students are prompted again (possibly a quiz), and invited to ask questions
9. Discussion is mediated
10. Assignment is made for further study
11. Students depart
12. Teacher goes for a beer.

This list simplifies a very complex process. But, for providing a starting point, any of these steps might present an opportunity to develop some type of interactivity. I took the approach that scripting could help with every step in this process, and tried to imagine an associated behavior for an object in each step. A script was then developed—in every case—to assist with or automate each event. (Everything except the “quiz”…I know a can of worms when I see one.) Several of these interactions would be field-tested along with the other aspects of the space that were being explored.

Some features were discarded; they were either developed too slowly (Wikitecture runs with deadlines, too) or implemented too poorly. Some were included in the first submission, but did not seem to offer much advantage…the three that made it worked, for me.

First, the notecard distributor…Most every SL user who gives a presentation or leads a class is likely to have a notecard giver. Some may even choose to drag notecards onto every avatar. This script is simply a time-saving device. On taking a seat, any avatar will receive a notecard if one was made available. No need to mention a notecard giver, no wondering if anyone has missed the offer. The teacher makes a notecard available by dragging the notecard onto the podium, and the notecard is deleted when the classroom is reset (touch podium, select “Reset All”).

Avatar with hand raised

Second, a “Raise Hand” image was assigned to a prim and linked to the podium and all of the seats. The same script that tells the podium that you have taken a seat (and so, to deliver a notecard) also communicates with the Hand Raise prim, which now serves as a button. Touching that button results in the broadcast of a signal that “Avatar X” has just touched it. The script in your seat evaluates the signal and checks to see if it was you that just touched that prim, if you are “Avatar X”. If so, your avatar’s hand goes up.

Yes, most avatars already have a hand raising gesture or animation. But, do they always have it ready when they need it? By the time I drill into my Inventory and activate the animation, I’ve often missed the next question in a presentation. And what about student gesture HUDs? Well, this new feature does not claim a spot in the client viewer, and also tracks the number of hands raised, reporting that tally into public chat if the teacher chooses to do so. Also, with many hands raised, the teacher can—with a touch and a menu-click—report the tally, reset the counter, and lower the hand of every avatar. (This is the scripted equivalent of a teacher saying “OK, twelve out of nineteen hands raised; you can put your hands down now.”)

The hand raising feature was surprising in its complexity. And, suspecting that linking prims does not provide an advantage over many objects listening to remote channels, I might develop this feature differently. As with any feature, the users will have to learn how to use it (a simple thing, here). Still, until installed and tested we cannot know the value of such interactive features.

Parcel Media Display

Third, the Parcel Media Display accepts a formatted notecard containing URLs and titles to manage the display of audio files, images, web pages or video content available on the Internet. On touch, the object presents the teacher with a menu of buttons from which to choose a URL.

The globe (see other images) converts into the display, whose script then assigns each selected URL to the land parcel’s media stream. This alleviates use of the About Land panel by a teacher during a lesson, since the Second Life client does not have media presets.

Last bits

Interactive Classroom Pods

I would like to see an organization such as NMC or ISTE sponsor a project that is similar to SW4. There was plenty of opportunity for educators to participate, yet few were around. Maybe if the project was hosted within the SL educational community…

Interactive Classroom Pods

There was some discussion, early in the project, about a standalone, self-serve media kiosk; a learning lab with many stations. I plan to continue developing this idea.

One comment made during an early presentation to the UofA pointed out how these interactive features represent “more to learn”. That is fair. Yet, I wonder if that individual has made a presentation in Second Life, making use of the full range of bells and whistles already embedded in the platform. Yes, to employ new, interactive features does require an additional step or two up an already-steep learning curve. However, if new approaches are not tested, we leave every repetitive, manual task in the hands of the teacher.

Rather than compare button selection in a dialog menu with the use of the About Land panel I will step back, and hope that some in the Alabama cadre will give these these tools a try, and offer their feedback.

Studio Wikitecture 4.0’s Virtual Classroom, Final Design

Wikitecture facilitates collaboration in virtual world architectural design. Participants submit virtual models by dragging objects from inventory to the Wiki-Tree (image below). Each design is represented by a colored sphere and can be viewed by clicking on that “leaf.” You can see this in action at the U of A site (link above), or at the award winning Wikitecture 3.0 site [slurl]. Just look for a tall white column with bonsai branching, and touch any of the multi-colored balls. (Betcha can’t touch just one!)

The Wiki-Tree

Once a design is submitted, members can rez it from the tree, and they are encouraged to submit comments about the design at a companion website. Many ideas were kicked around in the website’s forum; not all of those made the cut. The role of the website may not have been clear to everyone, at least at the start, and some folks did not even know it was there.

Occasionally, members vote on each other’s contributions. Designs with the most votes are carried forward, and new design elements are folded in. The final design emerges (hopefully) as an collection of all the best features.

Cream, rising to the top.

As essential as the Wiki-Tree was the management of the group by Jon Brouchoud. During many a chat, members became critical of the process, the designs, and even other members. I was doing some of the talking, too. Jon always seemed to field our gripes with the calm of a zen master.

Writing about it now, I am reminded of something an educator said about working with groups in SL…something about herding cats.

The Wiki-tree tree has potential. It helps a group to juggle ideas. Sure, it was down at times; but was probably as reliable as SL itself. And, there are other “holodeck” styled rezzing tools in SL. However, the Wiki-tree is not meant to simply present multiple builds, one after another. You can review many designs in a short time, take a copy and riff on that design, even roll back to earlier versions. The tree also preserves the relationship among diverging strands of development (the branching of limbs reflects those relationships). Everybody adds their bits, patching together the best design possible.

This may be the closest I ever get to Granny’s quilting circle.

The Interactive Classroom
(image by keystone1111 [Flickr])

My own contribution focused on interactive features meant to simplify some activities (i.e., distributing handouts and URL selection). Several elements from my Interactive Classroom were included in the final design, and I will write about those in another post. First, I wanted to explore here the Wikitecture Way.

The Wikitecture project had its share of hiccups. But the Wiki-tree and the Wikitecture process are both evolving, according to Studio Wikitecture co-founder Ryan Schultz (Theory Shaw in SL). New ideas will be implemented with the 5.0 project (yet to be announced). And, finally, the the Alabama faculty will have to judge the worth of the virtual classroom design. But, there can be no question about the educational value and success of this project, because…

I learned plenty.

At about 11:00 AM, Linden, Ruth arrived on an OpenSim server
- Zha Ewry

This seems significant.

What it could mean: Soon, parents and school administrators down the street will not have to worry about Mature Content, because they can run their own grid and minors can TP in from the Teen Grid for lessons…

I certainly botched the freebie vendor for Pollster. For nearly a year, visitors who clicked on the vendor at the ICT Library (SLURL) received the display version of the tool (not a working model).

I thought Pollster had real potential as a tool for teachers and presenters in SL, yet I never heard a word from folks who had received the object. Recently, I returned to SL after a six month hiatus and learned about my error. The message read:

The version of your Pollster in the ICT library is only the demo. Can I get the full CC licensed version anywhere please?

/me whacks self on forehead.

I remember the night well…scrambling to prepare my first SL presentation, editing images for the slideshow…popping into the grid for yet another snapshot, and another…scripting and testing the Pollster Presentation version (yet a third variation of the tool I was juggling that night). I had scripted a freebie vendor a week earlier, planning for the tool’s release to occur on the day of the presentation. It was in this last-minute rush that I (apparently) loaded the vendor with the Demo version.

I was dumbstruck on receiving that message. Hundreds of people had received the wrong version (distribution data is tracked); and nobody said a thing!

That is, until one user had enough interest to inquire about a week or two ago…(Thank you, Simon)

There are at least two possible explanations for the lack of feedback from Pollster recipients:

1. Folks just do not expect much from SL, yet (and so, are not surprised when they obtain tools or objects that do not work) or…
2. Folks just opened their Pollster Set folder, rezzed the tool for a look, and never actually tried to use it.

Likely a combination of both.

The situation has been corrected. The working version is now being distributed. Thank you, Milosun. (And yes, this too shall pass.) Might even get to see it in action one day.