Mark Kingdon: For Second Life "Inworld collaboration is going to be a killer application."

When Philip Rosedale was gearing up to hand over the reigns of Linden Lab to its new CEO, we spoke about new directions the maker of Second Life could take. He noted that Second Life was seeing a strong increase in use as a tool for collaboration and that future hirings would likely reflect that. New CEO Mark Kingdon told us that he'd spend his early days at Linden observing the residents and employees to get a feel for where the world is going. After blogging about his first week on the job--and attending a few in-world meetings--it seems he shares Rosedale's view.

"Second Life’s communication tools (text chat and voice) worked brilliantly for a meeting like this – far superior to a video conference or web-enabled teleconference," wrote Kingdon. "If we had wanted visual aids, we could have screened a Power Point show, a web page or a video inworld. Philip even did an audience poll. I imagine this is why businesses and educational institutions are buying a lot of land. Inworld collaboration is going to be a killer application."

While there's been complaints from the business world--and the media peanut gallery--that Second Life is unsuited for work due to lack of control, an open-ended environment, and difficulty levels, Kingdon's certainly right that there is increased organizational attention.

Whether it's IBM taking Second Life behind its firewalls or Rivers Run Red building an enterprise-level Immersive Workspaces Platform with ties to the Second Life Grid, there's definite interest, which it seems like the management is keen to pick up.

I've been putting a lot of focus into catching up on enterprise solutions recently, but I'd love to hear your thoughts. How does the Second Life Grid stack up now for in-world collaboration and what will take to make it a truly killer app?

Comments

[roland legrand]

I agree SL has tremendous potential for collaboration and meetings.
However, there are some practical issues which make it for many companies impossible to use.
Many offices use office-type computers lacking the graphics needed to access SL, or there are firewall-issues.
These seem minor issues, but it is hard to convince an ICT department to replace hundreds of computers in order to enable experiments in virtual settings.

[Theory Shaw]

seamless import/export of various 3-dimensional file formats!

[len]

It isn't that it isn't doable. It's been done. The trouble is to do it well is expensive and the bang for the buck won't be there until the costs are low enough. Until then GoToMeeting is adequate with a conference phone.

To get the costs down, there has to be competition and standards. At that cross-over point, any reasonably competent IT organization can set it up and administer it just as we do with other web 2.0 applications, then who needs Linden Labs or IBM? They can only prevail if they offer clearly superior solutions or they corner intellectual property. Not much has changed in those requirements.

The problem of pioneers is they pay the costs of the trail the mass uses to overrun them. It doesn't look like a great deal for the IBM investors.