Second Life Future Salon

New Podcasts of Ray Kurzweil and Vernor Vinge from Accelerating Change 2005

IT Conversations has new podcasts of Ray Kurzweil and Vernor Vinge from Accelerating Change 2005. I hope you enjoy, and even if you furrow your brow and purse your lips at some of the further out stuff, wait a few years: these gentlemen have deep historical insights and make forecasts that are falsifiable on 5-10 year time scales. I'll see you then! And 5-10 years after that, too! ;-D

History/Future, George/SNOOPY, Books/VWs, Search/AI, Text/Avatar, Sun/Google, Fun/Fun

Quick mix of some interesting things I saw today:

George Dyson, "historian among futurits," writing on Edge.org:

"My visit to Google? Despite the whimsical furniture and other toys, I felt I was entering a 14th-century cathedral — not in the 14th century but in the 12th century, while it was being built. Everyone was busy carving one stone here and another stone there, with some invisible architect getting everything to fit. The mood was playful, yet there was a palpable reverence in the air. "We are not scanning all those books to be read by people," explained one of my hosts after my talk. "We are scanning them to be read by an AI."

SNOOPYbrown Zamboni, "futurist among avatars," wrting on Second Life Future Salon:

"As goes text, so goes graphical virtual worlds. As ROAM is showing, video games and virtual worlds are just another part of the Web and search engines can and will index their content — so your avatar will be read by an AI, and as Prokofy Neva has said, "The avatar is the window to the soul.""

And the plot thickens: Google and Sun Microsystems are entering into a partnership and, in seperate but all things related news, Sun is stepping up and saying that they make the world's biggest massively multi-player game (Slashdot).

From the Next Generation article:

"Sun's chief gaming officer, Chris Melissinos explains, "I argue that we've been the principle architect of the largest massively multiplayer online game in the world. It's Wall Street. If you took a look at all of the mechanics that go in to building an online trading system, they're almost one-for-one, the same functions needed to build an MMOG. Except we've done it with more redundancy, reliability and scalability than pretty much anyone else."

"And it's with that experience that Sun has been quietly applying resources toward building what it considers to be the most versatile and scalable MMOG middleware ever conceived. With the imaginative working title of Sun Gaming Server, the first SDK's will be delivered for free to developers in the first half of 2006."

Thomas P.M. Barnett's Second Life Transcript and Slides

[Update: Hamlet has an awesome series of event write-ups with edited transcripts and lots of pics starting here]

Thomas P.M. Barnett joined us in Second Life today to discuss his new book, Blueprint For Action: A Future Worth Creating. Read on below the fold for the transcript (with slides), which is outstanding. Thomas rapped with us for two full hours, held nothing back, and seemed to really enjoy his first foray into the metaverse. He's pictured below onstage in Second Life and at Pop!Tech 2004 (as prep many attendees listened to his podcast from that event).

Big ups to Hamlet Linden who masterfully split the organizing duties; Ichiro Tokugawa for creating the virtual United Nations Assembly Hall where the event took place; lilith Pendragon for sculpting Thomas's lifelike avatar; Falk Bergman for publishing the virtual Blueprint book; Frans Charming for coming up with an alternate text interface, and Csven Concord for the super cool rotating globe highlighting the Gap countries. Another great team effort.

Avalon Film Festival Kicks Off

The Avalon Film Festival is underway and will run through October the 30th.   The short films I've seen so far are pretty darn good.  Detailed schedules and a variety of viewing areas can be found at Avalon.   Shout out to Fizik Baskerville (bottom right) and crew.

Blueprint For Action Flashes Forward: "Online Game Triggers Dictator’s Departure" (or "You can sit down now.")

With all the Bill Clinton writing, world flattening, Democracy Island-style hijinx happening on this blog in the last few weeks, it's absolutely fitting that globalization strategist Thomas P.M. Barnett will be inworld for next Wednesday's SL Future Salon. The Afterword of his new book, Blueprint for Action: A Future Worth Creating, will be available to read inworld. The Afterword is subtitled "Blogging the Future" and Barnett uses it to forecast some geo-political scenarios he sees as likely to take place in the next 20 years, written in blog entry form. Continue reading below the fold for an entry projecting significant real world political effects coming from massively multi-player online worlds circa 2020 that resonates with Saddam Hussein's current trial (video clip: "You can sit down now."):

“Online Game Triggers Dictator’s Departure; Stunning Victory of ‘People’s Diplomacy’” [2020]

Thomas P.M. Barnett Comes To Second Life Next Wednesday, October 26th

New York Times-bestselling author and globalization strategist Thomas P.M. Barnett (pictured left in regular and avatar* form) will join us inworld for the next Second Life Future Salon, 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM PST, Wednesday, October 26th. The event is being organized in collaboration with Hamlet Linden who has an excellent post describing Barnett's work and featuring pics of Ichiro Tokugawa's virtual re-creation of the United Nations General Assembly Hall where the salon will take place.

Excerpts from Barnett's brand new book, Blueprint For Action: A Future Worth Creating, will also be available inworld thanks to Faulk Bergman's magic press, souped-up from Cory Doctorow's visit. The event will begin with this 1/2 hour podcast of Barnett at Pop!Tech 2004 on The Pentagon's New Map. Check that out for a head start and make sure your RSVP your attendance by joining the Barnett Readers group in Second Life (Find > Group > "Barnett Readers" > click Join Now). Space is limited!

IM me in Second Life as SNOOPYbrown Zamboni or email me at jerrypaffendorf[at]accelerating[dot]org with any questions. *Thomas' avatar by lilith Pendragon

Nintento's Pocket Metaverse

I'm posting this in response to Alvis' last entry.  I thought it was too good to leave it just as a comment.  :)

Believe it or not, we don't have to mention Second Life in every post!  This is an example of news that reaches much farther then Linden Lab and the little ol' world we're creating.

This next generation of gaming consoles is gearing up to be hte most interesting yet; with Nintendo unleashing their free wireless network, and with Xbox live blurring the lines between different games.  I think we'll find that the Metaverse won't be a single platform, but many different platforms that begin to interoperate with one another in various ways.  Nintendo has an interesting take on the entire thing because when the Revolution comes out, you'll be able to play with anyone at a McDonalds from the comfort of your own home.  There's also a chat client built into the DS which I'm sure is going to have a Revolution equivalent.  Second Life aside, this is significant because it's laying down what could become the infrastructure (at least the social infrastructure) for a portable metaverse.

Add WiMax and a bit of voice over ip and suddenly our portal to the Metaverse is also our cellphone, our camera, personal information manager, etc.  Augmented reality comes into the mix at about the same time.  The avatar won't just be a representation of the self, but an overlay that allows for the transmission of data from one person to another in the same room (or not).  The Metaverse becomes fully ubiquitous and part of everyday reality when we can carry it in our pockets.

Strange Bedfellows

Unconventional allies McDonald's Corp and Nintendo are now partnering to hop into things metaversal.  As the economy gets weirder, what new parnership possibilities are emerging for the quirky little company called Linden Lab?  Is the idea of SLoogle already too conventional?

An Open Letter to Bill Clinton,

I was recently thinking 'How many politicians have heard of Second Life, the Metaverse or Web 3.0?  Wouldn't the world be a better place if someone like Bill Clinton signed up for an account?'  If anyone knows Bill personally, please relay the following...

Second Life + Google Shirt...and more?

Sharing my new Second Life t-shirt graphic mixing SL and the Google logo:

No relationship between the two companies yet, but do you think there could be? Would make sense for Google as they extend into surprising new frontiers: partner with NASA, stake out outter space and the Universe; partner with Linden Lab, stake out inner^space and the Metaverse.

BTW check out SL's Google-style shamrock sun from back on St. Patrick's Day. Feeling lucky? Funny. Haven't seen anything like that inworld since.