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Virtual worlds are changing and moving beyond strictly physical capabilities (i.e. push button, shoot missile). The goal is to get to the point of emotionally engaging games. Michael Zyda, Director of USC Viterbi School of Engineering's GamePipe Laboratory, discusses the potential applications of emotional interaction in games, as well as training and negotiation tools. Already, companies such as Emsense and Neurosky are creating technologies that will enable biosenors to guage emotions. He comments on what needs to be done to measure and qualify an emotional state, and get to the point where an avatar in a simulation can reflect a users emotions, and impact the responses of other players or components active in the simulated environment.
Phillip Rosedale, CEO of Linden Lab, demonstrates examples of content and communities being created in Second Life, the 3-D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents. Originally characterized as entertainment, Second Life has become a virtual society complete with all the physical, economic and social properties of the real world. Users can purchase land to develop their own creations. Over 2600 separate islands have been created, complete with homes and businesses, such as planetariums and museums completed built and managed by individual users. Each month millions of US dollars are exchanged in commercial transactions using Second Life's in-world currency which can later be converted to US dollars. Rosedale concludes by comparing Second Life to the early days of the Internet, "where people are taking a new medium and technology and doing anything they can with it."
Michael Zyda is Director of USC Viterbi School of Engineering's GamePipe Laboratory, a USC Professor of Engineering Practice, and a staff member of USC's Information Sciences Institute. Professor Zyda's research interests include computer graphics, networked 3D virtual environments, agent-based simulation, modeling human and organizational behavior, interactive computer- generated story, modeling and simulation, and interactive games. He is a pioneer in the fields of computer graphics, networked virtual environments, modeling and simulation, and serious games. From 2000 to 2004, he was the Founding Director of The MOVES Institute and a Computer Science Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School. Prior to the MOVES Institute, he was Director of the NPSNET Research Group. He currently holds a lifetime appointment as a National Associate of the National Academies.
Philip Rosedale is Founder and CEO of Linden Lab, the makers of Second Life. He has an extensive background in the development and pioneering of streaming technology, having built his first computer in 4th grade, and started his first computer software company while still in high school. In 1995 he developed FreeVue, a low-bitrate video conferencing system for Internet-connected PC's, resulting in the acquisition of his company in early 1996 by RealNetworks. Rosedale previously served at RealNetworks as Vice President and CTO, where he was responsible for the development and launch of RealVideo, RealSystem 5.0, and RealSystem G2. In 1999 Rosedale, joined Accel Partners as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence, and began the basic research that would become the technology behind Linden Lab. Rosedale holds a BS degree in Physics from the University of California at San Diego.
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