Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

chronicle.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–49 of 49 posts

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

#41

Post by laksjd »

return0 wrote: post #15
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

Did OS/Hypergrid ever solve the avatar/inventory issues? I haven't followed SL/OS for the last few years so my information is probably out-of-date but when I last used it, it was still a hit-and-miss experience.

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

#42

Post by return0 »

laksjd wrote: post #41
return0 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Did OS/Hypergrid ever solve the avatar/inventory issues? I haven't followed SL/OS for the last few years so my information is probably out-of-date but when I last used it, it was still a hit-and-miss experience.

still is.

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

#43

Post by ilaksh »

Second Life is/was actually great especially in its open content and customization system and economy.

But there's kind of a weird thing about Second Life and VR and video games. Video games have really filled the virtual reality space without being called virtual reality.

For example, the detailed simulation of Los Angeles in GTA 5 or the details and immersive story in The Witcher 3. It isn't usually called virtual reality and doesn't usually involve HMDs, but these types of games are largely what people were thinking of when they started talking about VR many years ago.

Now there are things like GMod (Garry's Mod), Minecraft, Space Engineers, Scrap Mechanic etc. that allow you to satisfying your virtual reality engineering itch with component-based development i.e. snapping things together, which is just much more practical, efficient, and just easier for people who are trying to entertain themselves than doing a bunch of scripting in OpenSim/SL/OpenCroquet/High Fidelity/etc.

Look at the first person perspective in the Mirror's Edge series. Its a very cyperbunk-type vision along the lines of early VR concepts.

Anyway long story short, VR is a massive business, they just call it "gaming" and we don't bother wearing HMDs.

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

#44

Post by Karunamon »

logfromblammo wrote: post #22
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…

I played with SL for about a week in 2005 before deciding that paying Linden Labs for the privilege of producing content for them was a fool's game.

You realize the content is more produced for the other users, right? You maintain your copyright, and literally fortunes have been made in SL by selling virtual goods.

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

#45

Post by tlarkworthy »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #34
tlarkworthy wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I did a Hangout a few weeks ago from Europe to a startup in TX. At least on my end I was on a 1Gbps fat academic ISP; can't speak for the other guy, but he was in his office. Still, voice and video quality was poor and we had to restart everything once. Also have had many poor quality video conferences on Lync/Skype for Business where all participants have been on the same fat academic ISP.

Yeah it happens. I still have both Skype and hangouts and swap depending on who is having a bad day. Still, it used to be much worse, but it's nowhere near perfect yet

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

#46

Post by logfromblammo »

Karunamon wrote: post #44
logfromblammo wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I played with SL for about a week in 2005 before deciding that paying Linden Labs for the privilege of producing content for them was a fool's game.

You realize the content is more produced for the other users, right? You maintain your copyright, and literally fortunes have been made in SL by selling virtual goods.

...inside the captive environment maintained exclusively by Linden Labs. They may make noise about copyright, but the creator of the data does not have the same level of control over it as I might have over a book or music recording that I produce myself.

Linden Labs could, at any time, change the terms of service such that you must license all "your" assets in a particular way to keep them live on the servers.

The fortunes are few and far between, and largely the result of a negative-sum game with other users. You cannot take more out than other users pay in, minus the Linden tax. The house always wins, yet only about 5000 users have even profited as much as $10.

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

#47

Post by Karunamon »

logfromblammo wrote: post #46
Karunamon wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You realize the content is more produced for the other users, right? You maintain your copyright, and literally fortunes have been made in SL by selling virtual goods.

...inside the captive environment maintained exclusively by Linden Labs. They may make noise about copyright, but the creator of the data does not have the same level of control over it as I might have over a book or music recording that I produce myself. Linden Labs could, at any time, change the terms of service such that you must license all "your" assets in a particular way to keep them live on the servers. The f…

The creator of the data does not have the same level of control over it as I might have over a book or music recording that I produce myself.

How do you figure? If you take a music recording and want to put it out there on iTunes or Spotify, you have to license it to the company so they can do the thing you're asking them to do!

If you want to sell 3d models, textures, and code, you can do that on your own website right now. If you want to put that content up on Second Life (or literally any other third party), you're going to have to give them the rights to do so.

I'm also curious about the source on that 5K/$10 number. I'm a mediocre scripter, and made about $100 there on a small gadget that translates text based on a popular webcomic series.

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

#48

Post by logfromblammo »

Karunamon wrote: post #47
logfromblammo wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...inside the captive environment maintained exclusively by Linden Labs. They may make noise about copyright, but the creator of the data does not have the same level of control over it as I might have over a book or music recording that I produce myself. Linden Labs could, at any time, change the terms of service such that you must license all "your" assets in a particular way to keep them live on the servers. The f…

The creator of the data does not have the same level of control over it as I might have over a book or music recording that I produce myself. How do you figure? If you take a music recording and want to put it out there on iTunes or Spotify, you have to license it to the company so they can do the thing you're asking them to do! If you want to sell 3d models, textures, and code, you can do that on your own website ri…

It looks like I was relying on old information. It was from an article about Anshe Chung, the Second Life millionaire character of Ailin Graef. Other (more recent) articles indicate that in 2007, About 50k accounts were better than break-even profitable on a monthly basis.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=3527537&page=1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Second_Life

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/408413/making-money-in-se...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03...

You can put your music recording on both iTunes and Spotify, or neither. Or BandCamp and SoundCloud and your own CDs. If you don't like the terms of service, you can distribute your stuff by other channels.

When you're producing content in SL, for SL, it's like you're writing sheet music for the Gronxophone, which is a trademarked, patented instrument that only one person on Earth can play. If you don't like the terms, tough.

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

#49

Post by aphextron »

jff wrote: post #14
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.

Glad it's not just me
Post reply on HN