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Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

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Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#11

Post by ideonexus »

I once loved Second Life. So many science demonstrations (NASA, NOAA, and many museums setup virtual campuses there that are still amazing), gatherings, museums, and educational experiences that only a virtual world can provide. Then it became a ghost town (with some mostly-NSFW exceptions).

The problem is that SL is closed source. I once tried to run a virtual field trip with 10 kids to show them around, but Linden Labs blocked us for having too many users access SL from the same IP address. You have to lease property on Linden Labs servers for a presence there. Why am I going to invest the time and energy into building something amazing on rented space that will vanish the moment I stop paying for it?

If SL were to be released as a open-protocol, like WWW, where anyone can pop a server onto the Internet and host a community, I think SL would thrive again. I would love to see that.

I found a nine-year-old blogpost I wrote on the science attractions in SL. It really was an amazing place. I would really like to see something like it again, but open. I think there's a huge opportunity there for someone with the right technical capabilities.

http://ideonexus.com/2007/03/03/science-in-second-life/

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#12

Post by napworth »

azinman2 wrote: post #4

Just because something is in 3D doesn't make it automatically better -- often times it's worse as you now have artificial constraints that you didn't have before. For example, it's far easier to scroll through Instagram with your fingers (a UI win) and have every photo at 100% scale than to glide through a 3d representation where much more work has to be done. Certainly you wouldn't want the world to scroll you in VR…

Correct. However on the otherhand, walking around a 3D art gallery where each wall is dedicated to one of the accounts you are following would be a benecicial use of the technology. You could easily scan the small framed images for those you like, and click on them to visualise them at full size in front of you.

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#13

Post by tlarkworthy »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #9
arcanus wrote: post #2

The biggest issue for VR is similar to that of Second Life: outside of gaming, it needs to seamlessly augment reality. If the pervasive influence of social media in our times has taught us anything, it is that a platform that does interface with our everyday existence will never be more than a cool tech demo. Off the top of my head, for success VR needs to provide: * Virtual Conferences * Remote Home Sale Walk-throug…

I hear "Virtual Conferences" as a big VR application. But how about we solve videoconferences first? Skype/Hangouts etc. hasn't improved noticeably in the last ten years. Videocalls still suffer from latency and poor image quality.

really? I frequently video conference to places will 11 hour time differences, and I am constantly amazed how well it works. I am pretty sure 10 years ago this wasn't practical.

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#14

Post by jff »

ideonexus wrote: post #11

I once loved Second Life. So many science demonstrations (NASA, NOAA, and many museums setup virtual campuses there that are still amazing), gatherings, museums, and educational experiences that only a virtual world can provide. Then it became a ghost town (with some mostly-NSFW exceptions). The problem is that SL is closed source. I once tried to run a virtual field trip with 10 kids to show them around, but Linden…

High Fidelity is supposed to be that open replacement: https://highfidelity.io/

The problem I've run into is that it runs worse on my brand-new computer than Second Life ever did, and that's even on the mostly-empty demo areas they have.

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#15

Post by return0 »

ideonexus wrote: post #11

I once loved Second Life. So many science demonstrations (NASA, NOAA, and many museums setup virtual campuses there that are still amazing), gatherings, museums, and educational experiences that only a virtual world can provide. Then it became a ghost town (with some mostly-NSFW exceptions). The problem is that SL is closed source. I once tried to run a virtual field trip with 10 kids to show them around, but Linden…

There is opensim[1], which is used to run thousands of similar 3d worlds (shameless plug[2]), and the upcoming open source highfidelity platform [3].

1. http://opensimulator.org 2. http://opensimworld.com 3. http://highfidelity.io

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#16

Post by Jtsummers »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #10
Jtsummers wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Negroponte's failure with the OLPC project comes to mind. A mix of cheap netbooks, tablets, and phones made it quickly irrelevant. To be fair to OLPC, it just predated those other devices. It [the hardware] was developed precisely because cheap laptops didn't yet exist, and then the form and market came into existence and obsoleted a large part of the project's efforts (the physical hardware development, not its ed…

Not really, but the time they were actually shipping the olpc in non-trivial deployments, the netbook revolution was already here. Intel also had the education aimed Classmate netbook as well. 2007 article on the two competing platforms: http://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2007/03/acomparison-of-... >nd then the form and market came into existence and obsoleted a large part of the project's efforts It was also a ter…

N.B.: I agree with pretty much the entirety of your post. My point was, and I still stand by it, merely that OLPC (hardware) was developed because nothing else in the price and performance (particularly battery performance) existed at the time. The relatively poor hardware was, unfortunately, necessary to achieve the 20 hour battery life that it could pull off. It's important to recall that one of the major targets for the device was areas with poor power infrastructure. The 4 hour life of the Classmate PC would not have been conducive to that environment.

However, I agree with the rest of your post. I was much more interested in the project from when I first heard about it (2005 or 2006) and lost a lot of interest once netbooks (and similar) came about, at reasonable costs, a couple years later. OLPC would have been much better off if they had focused on their software and curricula components, particularly being OS agnostic as much as possible (I recall a lot of teeth-gnashing about the idea of distributing Windows to 3rd world countries, particularly from FOSS zealots of the time). Let the hardware and OS vendors compete, provide a compelling suite of software, tools, and digital library that they (vendors) can all ship on their own systems instead.

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#17

Post by pjc50 »

Jtsummers wrote: post #8
drzaiusapelord wrote: post #5

Do these planned top-down approaches ever work? Especially in education? It seems like when technocrats have questionable ideas they try to shove it down the throat of kids instead of having a more decentralized approach with more choice. Negroponte's failure with the OLPC project comes to mind. A mix of cheap netbooks, tablets, and phones made it quickly irrelevant. If we see social VR in education it'll be imprompt…

> Negroponte's failure with the OLPC project comes to mind. A mix of cheap netbooks, tablets, and phones made it quickly irrelevant. To be fair to OLPC, it just predated those other devices. It [the hardware] was developed precisely because cheap laptops didn't yet exist, and then the form and market came into existence and obsoleted a large part of the project's efforts (the physical hardware development, not its ed…

No, there was plenty of existing hardware and software that could have been used, but the whole thing was full of extraordinary "not invented here"isms that made learning the OLPC a learning dead end of nontransferable skills.

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#18

Post by Jtsummers »

pjc50 wrote: post #17
Jtsummers wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Negroponte's failure with the OLPC project comes to mind. A mix of cheap netbooks, tablets, and phones made it quickly irrelevant. To be fair to OLPC, it just predated those other devices. It [the hardware] was developed precisely because cheap laptops didn't yet exist, and then the form and market came into existence and obsoleted a large part of the project's efforts (the physical hardware development, not its ed…

No, there was plenty of existing hardware and software that could have been used, but the whole thing was full of extraordinary "not invented here"isms that made learning the OLPC a learning dead end of nontransferable skills.

In 2005, what was an existing, portable, long battery-life device that cost under $200 that would have satisfied the goal of getting a PC into students' hands?

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#19

Post by Karunamon »

sandworm101 wrote: post #6
amateurpolymath wrote: post #3

I recently listened to an interesting discussion[1] about VR on a friend's recommendation. One of the guests had a great test for quality VR: can it perform as a hiking simulator? Can it mimic all the qualities of a good hike -- visuals, body movement, sounds? It seems to me we're much closer to a great AR experience than truly great and immersive VR. [1]: https://www.relay.fm/rocket/20

>> Can it mimic all the qualities of a good hike -- visuals, body movement, sounds? I've got some VR hiking goggles to sell you. They are cheap, lightweight and totally wireless, but only work in the woods. They were featured on a recent SouthPark episode. Too many discussions focus on VR being a drop-in replacement for reality. Nobody should expect them to mimic reality any more than they expect computer screens to…

Err.. not to sound like a total pedant, but isn't that the exact goal of VR and the one thing that differentiates AR and VR?

I mean right now, VR is very, very rough. We're basically wrapping the senses in hardware. (Analogy: Building a robot to press keyboard keys).

Eventually we'll get to the point of not needing that anymore. (Analogy: The robot is connected directly to the keyboard port)

..and the "drop-in replacement for reality" dream that's been around since the 90's or so can begin happening. The tech is in its infancy.

Re: Fans of Second Life Hope to Bring VR Back to the Classroom

#20

Post by azinman2 »

napworth wrote: post #12
azinman2 wrote: post #4

Just because something is in 3D doesn't make it automatically better -- often times it's worse as you now have artificial constraints that you didn't have before. For example, it's far easier to scroll through Instagram with your fingers (a UI win) and have every photo at 100% scale than to glide through a 3d representation where much more work has to be done. Certainly you wouldn't want the world to scroll you in VR…

Correct. However on the otherhand, walking around a 3D art gallery where each wall is dedicated to one of the accounts you are following would be a benecicial use of the technology. You could easily scan the small framed images for those you like, and click on them to visualise them at full size in front of you.

Have you tried this? I've done a couple of 3d museums in the oculus & cardboard and it's a terrible experience. Scanning small images is not an improved experience over existing feeds on mobile phones, especially for something where you end up only looking at a photo you like for 0.4-2 seconds anyway.
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