ThinkBalm Innovation Community is now Tandem Learning Innovation Community
After we broke the news that we planned to disband the ThinkBalm Innovation Community, members of the community expressed lots of interest in finding new leadership for the community moving forward. We are excited to announce that effective immediately, Tandem Learning will assume the community management responsibilities of the newly named Tandem Learning Innovation Community.
The value of this community is in the membership and the collective wisdom and experience of the group, and Tandem’s focus on new technology, user experience, learning design, and strategic business innovation allows them to touch on the areas of interest that bind our community together. We believe the leadership at Tandem is committed to maintaining the integrity of the community while finding new and exciting ways to add value to everyone who participates.
Exciting times are ahead for all of us and we’re looking forward to what happens next!
Erica Driver, co-founder and principal, ThinkBalm
Sam Driver, co-founder and principal, ThinkBalm
We’re so pleased to have the opportunity to continue the amazing work that Erica and Sam began in 2008 as we assume responsibility for the newly deemed Tandem Learning Innovation Community. While we know many of you from our work in virtual worlds and immersive technologies, we’re looking forward to interacting with all of you in the weeks ahead as we plan for the future of the community. In our new role as the community managers, we will honor the tenants of the community as established under ThinkBalm and will seek even more ways to bring value to our members. Please feel free to contact me directly with your thoughts, ideas, and feedback…this community belongs to all of us and it’s your input that will continue to make it valuable and successful.
Koreen Olbrish, CEO, Tandem Learning
Koreen.olbrish@tandem-learning.com
Change is under way at ThinkBalm
by Erica Driver and Sam Driver.
At ThinkBalm we’ve had a couple of great years as industry analysts dedicated to covering work-related use of immersive technologies—an early-stage, emerging technology market. We have worked with some terrific people at great client organizations like Altadyn, BP, Chevron, Forterra Systems (now part of SAIC), Linden Lab, Moondus, ProtonMedia, Teleplace, and Tandem Learning. We’ve published nine comprehensive reports spanning market overview, business value, technology selection, barriers to adoption, and best practices—and made this research freely available via our Web site. We launched the ThinkBalm Innovation Community, grew it to more than 470 members, and hosted more than 35 facilitated work sessions, training sessions, and networking events. More than half of our research reports arose directly out of ThinkBalm Innovation Community activities.
We believe that mainstream adoption of immersive technologies in the workplace—virtual worlds, immersive learning environments, and virtual event platforms—is a matter of when, not if. But these technologies are still a new concept to most organizations and overall the barriers to adoption are quite high. In April, we modified our earlier prediction that we expected to reach the early majority adoption phase in 2013, to say we think it will take longer than this. (See the blog post, “Immersive tech for meetings/conferences must be scalable and easy to use.”) One thing is clear: this emerging market does not yet need full-time, dedicated industry analysts to cover it.
In early July, Erica will be joining the marketing team at QlikView, a business intelligence software vendor. Sam will stay on with ThinkBalm for some time to work on client consulting engagements. We won’t be publishing any more general research, and plan to disband the ThinkBalm Innovation Community.
Erica: “My ride is here”
For the past fourteen years, I’ve been a software industry analyst. I’ve researched, written about, and delivered consulting to clients on a wide range of topics. Emerging technologies have always been near and dear to my heart. You’ll find my name not only on ThinkBalm reports about work-related use of the Immersive Internet but on Forrester Research reports about enterprise collaboration platforms, virtual worlds, information workplace platforms, message archiving, and other topics.
One thing I haven’t done yet in my career is influence a software market from the inside. Here’s my chance! It is with great enthusiasm that I have accepted a position as Sr. Director, Global Product Partner Marketing at QlikView. QlikView is an innovative software company with a great product and culture and I can hardly wait to dig into my new role.
One of the greatest gifts of the past two years is the people I’ve met. The people who are working on Immersive Internet initiatives are innovators and free thinkers—truly a special breed. Thank you to all of you who have participated in ThinkBalm Innovation Community events and activities, and in ThinkBalm’s research. I hope you’ll stay in touch.
Sam: “Building businesses”
As a late entrant to the analyst role, the past two years at ThinkBalm have been a tremendous learning experience for me. I had always favored the experimentation and excitement of entrepreneurship and the act of doing things, so I’ll keep working on client solutions as we wind down the analyst business, and will continue to look at individual projects moving forward.
Perhaps the most exciting part of ThinkBalm for me was the exposure to so many innovative thinkers and problem solvers all concentrated in one area. The energy associated with startup businesses, be they tiny shops or a project team inside a larger organization, is what has brought everyone together and made our all-volunteer innovation community such a great resource for us all. I hope to see this spirit continue as the market matures. The connections I’ve been able to make within the community already serve up a wide variety of interesting business ideas directly or peripherally related to immersive technology, and I am looking forward to the future.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
In the name of engagement, InXpo adds game features to its platform
by Erica Driver.
The InXpo Social Suite leaderboard
Computer and video games are big—and they’re on their way to becoming big in the workplace. According to the Entertainment Software Association, people in 68% of American households play computer or video games. And according to the NPD group, a global provider of consumer and retail market research information, the average number of hours gamers spend online gaming has increased to 8.0 hours per week in 2010 from 7.3 hours per week in 2009.
When you combine this with the fact that people learn—and have always learned—new skills and information by playing games and engaging in competition, it becomes clear that game concepts and mechanics are destined to be transformed into business tools. It is not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when. Games in the workplace can increase engagement and productivity; help employees set priorities, share resources, and meet goals; facilitate team-building; and help organizations discover untapped leadership skills. (For great insights on these and other aspects of games in the workplace I highly recommend the book Total Engagement (2010) by Byron Reeves and J. Leighton Read. Another great book on the topic is Learning in 3D (2010) by Karl Kapp and Tony O’Driscoll.)
InXpo recognizes this potential and is dipping a toe in the gaming waters
InXpo customers deploy the InXpo Virtual Events platform for a wide range of purposes such as trade shows, meetings and conferences, career fairs, learning and training, and persistent virtual offices. Today, InXpo announced a new offering called InXpo Social Suite. This add-on to the InXpo Virtual Events Platform, slated for general availability in early May, will incorporate games and social network integration. The thinking behind this is that by offering increasingly compelling content and activities, InXpo customers (let’s call them hosts) can increase the engagement of users (let’s call them participants), thereby obtaining benefits such as improved knowledge retention, higher customer satisfaction scores, and increased revenues.
InXpo is working with a game design team from Tribeca Flashpoint Media Arts Academy to create a set of lightweight, casual computer games. The first two games InXpo will offer are a trivia challenge and word scramble. InXpo hopes to have 5 or 10 games in its library by the end of the year. Event hosts will be able to configure the games to reinforce learning objectives or advertise event sponsors’ products, for example. The system will track participants’ points and advancement in the game and list high scorers on a leaderboard.
What it means for business decision makers
If you are looking for ways to increase engagement—for example, increase the amount of time prospects spend on your Web site or attending your virtual conference or trade show, or retain employees or customers longer—adding games to your interaction portfolio may be a boon. Especially games that have a strong social element and allow people to compete with each other in a fun, challenging way.
If you feel uneasy about incorporating InXpo’s game elements into live customer interactions, start with internal trials. Perhaps hold an all-hands meeting or a regional sales meeting in the environment and solicit feedback from participants about their experiences with the game technology.
InXpo’s efforts to incorporate games and game mechanics into enterprise software isn’t new; providers of 3D enterprise immersive software have been offering game mechanics in their products for several years. But the launch of InXpo Social Suite is another sign that the market is driving immersive software toward richer, more engaging environments, regardless of underlying technology.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
Immersive tech for meetings/conferences must be scalable and easy to use
by Erica Driver and Sam Driver.
In our January “trends” blog post, we predicted that 2010 would be a year of churn in the emerging enterprise immersive software market. It’s only a few months into the year and already a rapid-fire series of events has occurred, setting many industry participants on edge:
- Forterra Systems was acquired by SAIC (see our February 8, 2010 post about it here).
- Oracle discontinued funding Sun Project Wonderland (now called Open Wonderland) (see our March 1, 2010 post about it here).
- Key roles on Linden Lab’s enterprise team were folded into the broader organization and several folks on the enterprise team have moved on, including former general manager Chris Collins.
- Virtual Worlds Management, the company that has held Virtual World Expo and 3DTLC conferences since 2007, renamed itself Engage Digital Media and has de-emphasized its focus on virtual worlds. The 3DTLC conference and 3DTLC.net blog have been suspended. 3DLTC.net editorial content has been folded back in to VirtualWorldsNews.com.
“Light immersive” (pseudo-3D) technology has advantages
From our perspective, this period of churn applies primarily to 3D immersive software, which we’ll refer to as “rich immersive.” Vendors that offer pseudo-3D technology (e.g., InXpo, ON24, Unisfair, and others), which we’ll refer to as “light immersive,” are largely unaffected—in fact, indications are that the leading vendors in the light immersive segment are in a growth spurt.* Why? Two reasons:
- Two of the most common use cases for immersive technology are meetings and conferences (see the May 26, 2009 ThinkBalm report, ThinkBalm Immersive Internet Business Value Study, Q2 2009).
- For meetings and conferences, ease of use matters a lot. And for all but collaborative meetings (which are by definition small), scalability matters a lot. As a category, rich immersive technology has not yet been able to deliver on these requirements to the same degree that light immersive technology has (see the September 23, 2009 ThinkBalm report, Crossing the Chasm, One Implementation at a Time).
In many cases, rich immersive technology offers a level of engagement that is hard to achieve with light immersive technology. Some use cases absolutely depend on 3D—like training simulations, some business activity rehearsal, collaborative prototyping, 3D data visualization, and remote facility operations. Collaborative meetings, which by definition comprise a relatively small number of people, also benefit from a strong sense of presence and collaboration, communication, and productivity tools built into 3D environments. But for presentation-style small meetings, and large meetings and conferences, the market is speaking loud and clear: ease of use and scalability are higher priorities than deep immersion.
Early majority in 2013: not for rich immersive software
Due to this string of events—and with more events sure to unfold as 2010 rolls on—we’re modifying our soft projection that work-related use of immersive technology will reach the early majority adoption phase in 2013. We made this projection several times, most recently in the January 19, 2010 ThinkBalm report, The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide. By early majority we mean that enterprise immersive software will have “a significant installed base within Global 1000 companies and large public sector organizations and at least a few successful very large-scale implementations.” We think our projection still holds for light immersive technology, but not for rich immersive (3D) technology. Early majority adoption of rich immersive technology will take longer than this. (Belgian Journalist Roland Legrand wrote about this trend in his recent blog article titled, “Early mainstream work-related adoption of immersive software: 2013 is a bit too early.”)
What it means for immersive software vendors targeting meetings and conferences
A few things are clear:
- Design decisions should favor ease of use. The user experience must be hassle-free and intuitive from the moment a participant RSVPs for a meeting or event to the time they fill out a post-event feedback form. Populating the user profile, navigating in the environment, moving from one meeting room to another, accessing and downloading meeting materials, communicating with speakers, and networking with others must all be straightforward experiences.
- A browser interface is a must. For the optimal user experience, technology providers must offer a web-based interface for meeting and conference attendees and participants. Ideally, no browser plug-in is required, either, because many workplaces shut down this option for their computer users.
- Scalability means thousands. Vendors targeting large meetings and conferences must offer the ability to bring not just tens or hundreds but thousands—or even tens of thousands—of people together in the same virtual place at the same time. By this we mean all participants should be able to be in the same keynote or general session together, watching and listening to the presentation and communicating with others around them.
* For example, ON24 held more than 300 virtual events in 2009. And InXpo, which held more than 500 virtual events in 2009, is seeking to fill nearly a dozen open positions.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
Pseudo-3D immersive tech adopters illuminate business decisions
by Erica Driver.
I recently spoke with three business decision makers who have been involved with deployment of pseudo-3D immersive environments in their organizations or for their customers. I spoke with Michael Doyle, executive director and editor of the Virtual Edge Institute; Kate Spellman, senior VP and managing director of UBM Studios; and Caroline Avey, director of innovative learning solutions at ACS Learning Services. We talked about why they are using pseudo-3D immersive technology rather than alternatives.
Pseudo-3D is used for conferences and trade shows—but it doesn’t stop there
When you think of virtual event platforms from companies like InXpo, ON24, and Unisfair, what likely comes to mind is large virtual conferences and trade shows. Here are a couple of examples:
- The Virtual Edge Summit. This conference, which was focused on virtual events, meetings and communities, was held over two days in February, 2010—both online and in Santa Clara, California. Michael Doyle, the executive director of the Virtual Edge Institute, said that 400 people attended in person and 600 attended online.
- COMDEX. COMDEX was a computer industry trade show last held in 2003. The event had become massive, with more than 200,000 visitors and 2,300 exhibitors. UBM Studios will bring COMDEX back this November as an online event focused on the show’s original audience: the high tech channel. Kate Spellman, senior VP and managing director of UBM Studios, said they expect to have about 35 exhibitors and 3,000 attendees.
While large conferences and trade shows certainly represent the bulk of usage to date, we’re starting to organizations use pseudo-3D immersive software software in other innovative ways. For example, ACS Learning Services held a launch event in January, 2010 for a new company-wide innovation program that leverages an idea management system. The company deployed the Unisfair platform for the launch event and now is leaving it up and running, for one year, to function as a portal for employees who want to learn about the innovation program and the idea management system. The idea behind the portal is to enable self-directed, discovery-based learning, a place to launch the program, a vehicle for social-networking to discuss ideas, and a front door to the formal learning via a deep link to both the learning management system and the idea generation system. The Unisfair platform provides a level of engagement above and beyond what people get from just the learning management system and a webinar.
Pseudo-3D technology meets requirements for scale and ease of use
Vendors like InXpo, ON24, Unisfair and others offer pseudo-3D immersive environments that can scale to tens of thousands of simultaneous users by giving participants the illusion that they are in a 3D environment, rather than delivering a full 3D experience. (See the related March 26, 2010 ThinkBalm blog article, “Pseudo-3D is a rising star, keeping barriers to adoption low.”) In a nutshell:
- Hundreds or thousands of event attendees requires a highly scalable solution. About 600 people attended Virtual Edge Institute’s Virtual Edge Summit online, accompanying another 400 who attended physically. UBM Studios is expecting 35 exhibitors and about 3,500 attendees at this fall’s COMDEX trade show. Caroline Avey, director of innovative learning solutions at ACS Learning Services, said, “Because we have 15,000 employees located in 170 countries, there is just no way we could have brought everyone together for a physical launch event.” None of the 3D immersive technologies can support this number of simultaneous users being in the same virtual place at the same time.
- Ease of use sometimes means that browser-based technology is the only real option. At ACS Learning Services, the project team had only six weeks to create the learning objects, design the experience, and customize the Unisfair environment. This required a solution that was simple to configure and deploy. Also, the team had limited insight into the computer setups and Internet access of employees around the globe. This required that a solution that adhered to the least common denominator; it had to be Web-based, with no plug-in.
Hybrid events will move beyond parallel experiences as technology and behavior evolve
A hybrid event is a meeting, conference, or trade show that some speakers and audience members attend physically while others attend virtually. Due to technical complexity and the habits of presenters and attendees, hybrid events are largely parallel events today. Networking activities are segregated: people attending physically mingle amongst themselves, apart from remote attendees. Speakers tend to address one audience or the other (physical or virtual)—not both at the same time.
With the Virtual Edge Summit, which took place in February, 2010, the Virtual Edge Institute has started to tackle some of these issues by:
- Connecting attendees with electronic communication tools. The event producers set up a Twitter hashtag (#ve10) and encouraged attendees to tweet throughout the event. The producers set up a dedicated screen in some of the meeting rooms to display tweets in real-time, and tried to incorporate tweets into the Q&A discussion. InXpo, one of the virtual event platforms used during the Virtual Edge Summit, provides voice over IP integration with Skype, which enabled participants who were attending via InXpo Virtual Events Platform to communicate with each other via text, voice, or video chat. But participants attending via other virtual event platforms, or in person, had no way of joining in on these Skype conversations.
- Attempting to cross the visual divide. The producers streamed video of speakers presenting remotely into the physical meeting room, where it was displayed on a screen. Likewise, presentations that took place on-site were streamed out to the virtual environments. Participants attending remotely could watch live video of the speakers presenting. This visual integration was limited to the presenters only. The on-site and remote audiences had no visual connection to each other.
My take: pseudo-3D immersive technology meets some burning business needs
My conversations with these early adopters confirm what I’ve been hearing from others. First, pseudo-3D technology meets requirements for scale and ease of use. When it’s not practical or possible to bring thousands of people together physically, pseudo-3D immersive technology provides an alternative. Full 3D solutions cannot scale to meet this need (yet). Second, pseudo-3D immersive technology will increasingly be used not just for large conferences and trade shows but other things as well, such as training. ACS Learning Services’ use of the technology as a learning portal is a great example.
And third, while hybrid events are largely parallel experiences today, they will move beyond this as technology and behavior evolve. I envision a time in the not-too-distant future when the walls of physical meeting rooms will be lined with displays showing the virtual audience’s communications (and avatars, when they exist), and the virtual meeting rooms will display not only streaming video of speakers but of the entire physical audience. Communication tools and networking opportunities will be available to all participants, whether on-site or remote. Speakers will become accustomed to having distributed audiences, and will more naturally be able to include them in their presentations and discussions.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
Pseudo-3D is a rising star, keeping barriers to adoption low
by Erica Driver and Sam Driver.
As analysts covering work-related use of immersive technologies, we have long wrestled with terminology to describe the trends we are tracking and put some bounds around an emerging software market. We aren’t the only ones; naming conventions continue to be a popular topic of discussion at meetings and conferences (see the Sept. 28, 2009 ThinkBalm blog article, “To cross the chasm, we must close the language gap.”) The question always seems to come back to, “Do we call it virtual worlds?”
Our answer has consistently been no. We use the term Immersive Internet to describe the big picture. 3D virtual worlds are, of course, an important part of the Immersive Internet—but they are not the whole picture. A glaring example is the adoption of pseudo-3D virtual event platforms from companies like InXpo, ON24, and Unisfair. Enterprises are utilizing virtual event platforms for marketing events, trade shows, training sessions, and more—all use cases that are also targeted by providers of 3D immersive software.
The name game is a red herring
The more important issue is, “What do the trends in adoption of immersive technology mean?” Our recent research findings shed light on our position to include both 3D and pseudo-3D in our coverage of enterprise immersive software:
- Look where the money is. In our January 19, 2010 ThinkBalm report, The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide, we sized the enterprise immersive software market at $50M USD in 2009. A substantial portion of this number revenue was from pseudo-3D virtual events.
- Production deployments tell a story. All together, the virtual event platform vendors hosted several thousand virtual events in 2009—InXpo alone delivered more than 1,000 500 and ON24 delivered more than 300. We don’t see any evidence of the pseudo-3D virtual events market slowing down.
- Customers are lumping it all together. The customers who buy immersive technology are placing little distinction between 3D and pseudo-3D (depending on the use case, of course). They want to solve their business problem; they don’t care about the nitty gritty of how it gets done. Many times we have talked with decision makers who are looking at both 3D and pseudo-3D solutions for bringing a few hundred people together for a virtual off-site event.
Pseudo-3D faces fewer barriers to adoption than 3D
When pseudo-3D wins out over a 3D virtual world (e.g., Second Life or ReactionGrid), 3D collaboration environment (e.g., ProtonMedia or Teleplace), or 3D immersive learning environment (e.g., ARI PowerU or SAIC’s Forterra OLIVE), it’s often because the barriers to adoption were lower (see table). (We covered barriers to adoption, and springboards for overcoming them, in depth in the September 23, 2009, ThinkBalm report, Crossing the Chasm, One Implementation at a Time.)
| Barriers to adoption of 3D immersive technology | Effect these barriers have on pseudo-3D immersive technology adoption |
Technology pre-requisites:
|
Pseudo-3D technology runs in a Web browser, with no plugin required. High-end graphics cards and computer processors are not needed.Computer headsets are not necessary (though may be desirable) because users are typically not speaking to each other via voice. Audio from presentations can utilize built-in computer speakers. |
| Technology pre-requisite: high-bandwidth Internet connection | While rich 3D graphics are not being rendered in pseudo-3D environments, video streams are common and can be bandwidth hogs in locations where multiple people are watching video from separate computers simultaneously. |
| Firewall prevents users from being able to interact with others or the environment. | Because the software runs in a Web browser, the needed firewall port is already open. |
The user experience:
|
The user experience is familiar to anyone who’s used a browser and attended a web conference. People are accustomed to using keyboards and mice to interact with the Web. |
Our take: pseudo-3D is on the rise
- Market forces support an inclusive definition of immersive technology. Some immersive environments are virtual worlds, but an increasing number are not. They are 3D or pseudo-3D collaboration tools, learning environments, or event platforms. We anticipate that over time, the lines between 3D and pseudo-3D will blur. 3D technologies are constantly pushing the limits of scalability and vendors are starting to include measurement tools, while pseudo-3D vendors are going after training use cases and always-on, persistent environments.
- Mainstream adoption will follow the path of least resistance. Tremendous power is built into 3D environments, especially when they are combined with communication and collaboration tools. But technology adoption has to be simple for the end user. A “DIY” toolbox or a super-rich 3D environment may not be the path of least resistance. If pseudo-3D continues to outpace 3D in ease of adoption, this is where the customers will go.
- The technology has to be browser-based—or as easy to use and manage as a browser. Our research has illuminated a number of barriers to adoption of 3D environments that could be circumvented with a simpler, more familiar user interface and streamlined deployment options. Browser technology minimizes installation issues, firewall port issues, and a number of other practical problems. On top of that, browser-based immersive technology fits in with the way people are already working; business applications are increasingly web-based, as are collaboration tools and office productivity software.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
Video tour of ThinkBalm’s Distillery — an immersive technology selection experience
by Erica Driver and Sam Driver.
In January, we published a ThinkBalm Immersive Internet analyst report, The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide. This report is a use case-based guide designed to aid business decision makers in the enterprise immersive software selection process. In February, we launched “the Distillery,” an immersive technology selection experience built around the concepts in the report. Our intention with the Distillery is to replace the boring ole’ webinar with an engaging, interactive activity, and create an unforgettable immersive learning experience.
Here is a 9-minute mini video tour of the Distillery lead by ThinkBalm analyst Erica Driver. Note that you can also visit the Distillery yourself first-hand; here is the Second Life URL (SLURL).
To develop The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide, we held structured briefings with nineteen enterprise immersive software vendors (list here) and conducted interviews with fifteen early adopters who were involved in the technology selection process in their organizations. In the report, we present “if/then” scenarios and highlight good-fit vendors for common situations, with a focus on the most prevalent use cases: meetings, conferences, and learning and training.
While grain mash is processed and distilled to make whiskey, ThinkBalm’s technology selection process helps business and technology decision makers winnow their vendor options from dozens down to just a few.
- Stop 1 on the tour is the Options Vat, where we discuss core business questions.
- Stop 2 is the Requirements Room, where we lead participants through a discussion about the features and functions needed to satisfy the most common use cases: small meetings, large meetings and conferences, and learning and training.
- Stop 3 is the Filter Tower, where we discuss important limiting factors like security concerns, system integration requirements, scalability requirements, and technology prerequisites.
- The final stop is the Recommendations Room.
Enjoy the video tour! And do let us know if you have any questions or could use a hand with the immersive technology selection process in your organization.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
Linden Lab’s Second Life Viewer 2 Beta – what does it mean for business users?
By Sam Driver.
On February 23, 2010, Linden Lab announced the release of their Second Life Viewer 2 Beta program. The viewer is a downloaded application that creates the connection between your computer and the public virtual world of Second Life. The changes built into this new viewer improve the user interface (UI), making it easier to navigate and communicate in the environment, and to add some critical functionality (Shared Media).
As one of the most well known tools for immersive work, Second Life is where most business users first experienced a virtual world. The technology evolved from a recreational virtual world into a cosmopolitan environment that serves many types of users. From a business perspective, the DIY capabilities for building and animating 3D content have been a great boon for experiments and pilots performed by technology enthusiasts. As early adopters tried to bring this technology to a broader audience at work, they ran into a few hurdles: the UI was very complex, and the dizzying world around a new user could be overwhelming. (For more information see the Sept. 23, 2009 ThinkBalm report, Crossing the Chasm, One Implementation at a Time.)
The success of early experiments at work has led to a large collection of other technology vendors (list here) that design immersive technology application and content for work. This design gap represents a challenge for Linden Lab to remain competitive in a small and crowded market. The release of this new viewer is an important step toward making Second Life a modern and streamlined business tool.
Pressure on all of the vendors in this space is toward a simpler user experience, to appeal to the broadest array of potential users. We’ve defined some of the factors that are important to consider when you select an appropriate technology for your use case (See the January 19th, 2010 ThinkBalm report, The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide). Resolving two of these factors, ease of use and core functionality, can often be difficult because they run counter to each other: if you want a lot of functionality, you’ll need controls, and more controls means more complexity. Finding the balance between these two is like trying to hit a moving target. As more capabilities become available, the market wants them, but in many cases, development won’t be backward compatible, so we see major version changes that can disrupt content or investments in earlier versions.
Our take: We see the release of Viewer 2 Beta and the Shared Media capability as fundamental improvements for work-related use of Second Life. Co-browsing the web and web-embedded media have been standard features of many tools for a year. There are still some features missing, and some web collaboration may be difficult due to synchronization issues. However, this is a typical approach for Linden Lab: they often build core content and rely on partners to develop additional content, applications and other assets. We expect that common document formats will be supported over time, either in the core product, or through third party developers. Feedback during the Beta period will drive a lot of this development.
- Many people will find Viewer 2 easier to use than previous versions. Personally, we find that Viewer 2 is a much easier UI than previous versions. The context for controls is more modern and in keeping with web style. The visual separation of public communication from private is a great addition as well. Fewer buttons at first glance make adoption by new users less intimidating, but all of the capabilities for power users are there, and in many cases, are more streamlined or easy to use.
- New Shared Media feature is a step forward. Shared Media and drag-and-drop web addresses on objects in Second Life is a tremendous upgrade from third-party tools or the dreaded image file upload process. There are still some steps to get content up on the web and in a format that will work in Second Life, but from there, drag-and-drop works. This is a stumbling block for many business users who don’t know how to upload content properly, or are prevented by corporate security restrictions. While application development is already underway by partners in the Second Life ecosystem, the prospect of managing third-party IP and assets has implications from purchasing policies to help desk support: large-scale deployments will have to factor in costs associated with these issues.
- You can still do everything you could do before — which is both good and bad. Viewer 2 Beta and Shared Media haven’t changed the nature of Second Life. As one of the few environments that allows end-user object creation within the environment, there is a layer of complexity that will complicate the UI. Use case and business needs will drive this decision: if you need user-generated content, you’ll have to accept a more complex tool. For those use cases where user-created content is an important consideration, the streamlined viewer and new web media capabilities are a great addition. The business model that supports Second Life results in a complex ecosystem of content developers that charge for their IP in many different ways, and the resulting permission system designed to protect these assets can be a major problem for end users.
Overall, we see this announcement as a healthy sign that the technology vendors are continuing to refine their products to suit user demand and incorporate rapidly advancing technology. For example, we saw a major upgrades to Teleplace (V3.0) and 3DXplorer (V5) in the second half of 2009, and the introduction of Forterra Meeting Labs prior to the acquisition of Forterra by SAIC. We expect further technology improvement announcements from Linden Lab and others in 2010.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
Without financial backing, Project Wonderland’s future is in question
by Erica Driver and Sam Driver.
At the end of January, Project Wonderland development lead Nicole Yankelovich broke the news that Oracle would no longer be applying development resources to the Project Wonderland enterprise immersive software platform. (For more information about Project Wonderland see the January 19, 2010 ThinkBalm report, The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide.) Oracle laid off most if not all of the Project Wonderland team, which was part of Sun Labs.
In the last few weeks, we spoke with Nicole Yankelovich as well as executives from three small companies Yankelovich cited as third-party software vendors or service providers that offer software products or custom solutions based on Wonderland: Amphisocial, Green Phosphor, and Indusgeeks. Yankelovich is currently working with the open source community to establish a non-profit organization and is pursuing a vision of creating a vibrant ecosystem where third parties can create Wonderland content and contribute to the platform — where people can even distribute entire virtual worlds. But many aspects of Project Wonderland’s future are up in the air.
Our take:
- Oracle’s move to cut Wonderland funding wasn’t altogether surprising . . . Oracle uses immersive software for some internal and customer-facing events – the company has held conferences like Oracle Developer Day and Oracle Enterprise 2.0 online using virtual event platform Unisfair. But the company does not have immersive technology in its product portfolio and has not been a part of the Immersive Internet discourse to date. And in general, we don’t think of Oracle as a company that has a strong history in developing experimental new technology in-house. Instead, Oracle tends to make acquisitions to flesh out its product portfolio.
- . . . Though a role exists for immersive technology in Oracle’s portfolio. With Oracle’s focus on enterprise applications, middleware, and now hardware (with the Sun acquisition), opportunities exist to incorporate immersive technology into the company’s portfolio, thereby massively differentiating Oracle products in the market and helping customers decrease their costs and increase user engagement. Some of Oracle’s opportunities include incorporating immersive technology into Oracle Business Intelligence Applications, for 3D data visualization, and into products like Oracle Beehive or Oracle Communications Converged Application Server, for next-generation unified communications solutions.
- This action does not shed much light on Oracle’s perspective on immersive technology. Oracle may have made the decision to cut funding for Project Wonderland for a variety of reasons. Project Wonderland was an open source project, not a revenue-generating software product; no model was in place for deriving revenue from it. Perhaps Wonderland didn’t have traction in the markets Oracle most wants to pursue — though Wonderland had achieved its greatest traction in the education sector, which is one of the industries Oracle serves. Or it could be that immersive technology is simply too early-stage to pique the interest of the strategists at Oracle.
- Unless Project Wonderland finds another major backer, it will not remain competitive. The core Wonderland project team is working to secure new backing. If the team can pull together a funded organization, then Wonderland may have a bright future. If, however, the core team move on to new full-time positions, then the outlook for Wonderland is grim. Without development resources devoted to the project, Wonderland will be slow to add new core features and functionality. It will be up to third-party software developers, like Amphisocial, to add new features through Wonderland’s module layer. Without backing for Wonderland’s core development team, the project’s competitors — both open source and commercial — will catch up in areas where Wonderland is currently strong, like security features, platform independence, Java support, and audio/video capabilities.
- Loss of major backing has eroded confidence in the Wonderland platform. While Yankelovich said that Wonderland supporters — particularly in the education sector — have stepped up to donate hardware and other resources to the project, these donations aren’t enough to fund substantial new development, marketing, and project coordination. Sid Banerjee of Indusgeeks summed it up this way: “While no big company is backing Wonderland, it would be difficult for Wonderland to compete as an enterprise grade platform. Though we still believe it can thrive as an open source platform for the education sector.”
- Further consolidation is inevitable in this emerging technology market. At the beginning of February, SAIC announced that it had acquired Forterra OLIVE (see ThinkBalm’s posts about it here and here). The market is filling with an increasing number of enterprise immersive software products — we are covering nearly two dozen. We sized the enterprise immersive software market at $50M USD in 2009 — too small to support such a large number of vendors.[1] The business decision maker’s job is hard enough when adopting new technology. Consolidation in the market is inevitable and necessary. There are simply too many vendors in this space for business decision makers to easily choose appropriate technologies.
For Java shops that want to engage in low-cost experimentation, Project Wonderland continues to remain a solid enterprise immersive platform. But given Project Wonderland’s current state of upheaval, we recommend that business and technology decision makers looking for software for a pilot or production approach Project Wonderland with caution unless and until Project Wonderland receives substantial backing.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
[1] This conservative number includes only revenue from software licenses and maintenance fees, appliance sales, and subscription fees collected from customers who were using the software for work (as opposed to recreational uses). We did not include revenue from professional services (e.g., custom development projects and implementation services). For more information, see the January 19, 2010 ThinkBalm report, The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide.
ThinkBalm’s “Distillery” — an immersive technology selection experience
by Erica Driver and Sam Driver.
What do whiskey and enterprise immersive software have in common? Not much, unless you’re on ThinkBalm Island in Second Life (or, shortly, the ThinkBalm region of ReactionGrid). We are excited to announce that construction on The Distillery is complete!
About the Distillery
In January, we published a ThinkBalm Immersive Internet analyst report titled The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide, a use case-based guide designed to aid business decision makers in the enterprise immersive software selection process. This report was sponsored by Linden Lab, ProtonMedia, Teleplace, and Virtual Italian Parks. To develop this report, ThinkBalm analysts held structured briefings with nineteen enterprise immersive software vendors and conducted interviews with fifteen early adopters who were involved in the technology selection process. In the report, we present “if/then” scenarios and highlight good-fit vendors for common situations, with a focus on the most prevalent use cases: meetings, conferences, and learning and training.
The report offers guidance on how to: 1) ask core business questions to frame the discussion, 2) choose a research-and-demo, do-it-yourself, or combination approach, 3) identify requirements based on your use case, and 4) filter your options based on important limiters. The Distillery is an immersive experience built around these concepts. Our intentions are to replace the boring ole’ webinar with an engaging, interactive activity, and create an unforgettable immersive learning experience.
Instead of grain mash being processed and distilled to make whiskey, ThinkBalm’s technology selection process helps business and technology decision makers winnow their vendor options from dozens down to just a few. Stop 1 on the tour is the Options Vat, where we discuss core business questions. Stop 2 is the Requirements Room, where we lead participants through a discussion about the features and functions needed to satisfy the most common use cases: small meetings, large meetings and conferences, and learning and training. Stop 3 is the Filter tower, where we discuss important limiting factors like security concerns, system integration requirements, scalability requirements, and technology prerequisites. The final stop is the Recommendations Room.
Preliminary tour schedule
ThinkBalm will be offering public tours of The Distillery in Second Life at the following times. All times are Second Life time, which is the same as Pacific time. Here is the Time Zone Converter, should you need it.
- Tuesday, March 2, 8-9AM Second Life time (morning)
- Wednesday, March 3, 6-7AM Second Life time (morning)
- Monday, March 8, 5-6PM Second Life time (evening)
We will publish additional tour dates as they are scheduled. We also offer private and semi-private tours for members of the ThinkBalm Innovation Community and for ThinkBalm clients. Let us know if you’re interested.
© 2010 ThinkBalm. All rights reserved.
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