The Big BIG Business Question

-now with voice (or not)-

Do you think any RL business' will become more than just a presence in SL and finally figure out "how to use this new medium of Virtual Worlds" ? How???

I doubt it. I regularly conduct web meetings and online training. If you have more than about 4-5 people what you DONT WANT is voice in both directions. The participants get no visual clues so everyone tries to talk at once.
Most webinar type software allows the instructor to use voice but feedback and questions are via text chat. That way you can answer the questions in order and speak to the people by name.

In its current form, SL Voice is not particularly friendly towards corporate firewalls, which may impact its take up in that sector.

Matthew

RL businesses have access to voice conferencing and webcasting systems that make SL with Voice Chat look like a bunch of kids with a tin can and string telephone. They won't take SL seriously as a place to do voice-based communications. Not in the slightest.

I disagree somewhat, Ceera. It will take time, but Webex etc. are very aware of SL, and will eventually come out with collab services in 3D environments. Right now, there are a bundle of startups developing B2B collaborative toolkits designed to plug-in to 3D MMO environments (with varying degrees of ease). Such toolkits allow for the sort of 'presence' indications that business users require, as well as moderation and website-based billing. Further, I think it will become easy to use a third-party voice/video conferencing server in SL, if it isn't already, bypassing SL's more social-oriented voice chat. IBM seems to be the leader now in actually holding SL-based business meetings. Others will follow.

That said, the primary collaborative tool in business today is a simple audio conference call, followed by document sharing, then video, and then will come 3D. SL will never displace the audio-conference-with-powerpoint that can be thrown together in 10 minutes.

3D immersive experiences will be useful in any endeavor that will benefit from what a recent blog posting on SL collaboration termed a "knowledge petting zoo".
http://www.ericmackonline.com/ICA/blogs/emonline.nsf/dx/using-second-life-for-knowledge-transfer-and-collaboration

I hope they would start their own sims running off their own servers (how the internet works) so they can own their sims fully, this would most likely bring more businesses using SL. But this will only happen if SL is made open source :

/13/0f/199251/1.html

Mmm, interesting - there are discussions on the SL OS list about making the viewer more ameniable to third party plugins (so an end user can add a 3rd party plugin to the official viewer rather than having to download an alternative viewer), and as Torian indicates businesses have more sophisticated VoIP solutions that the current Vivox one, so we may very well end up with businesses using 3rd part VoIP solutions in SL rather than the integrated one!

Matthew

With much RL business in SL, voice conferencing may only be a viable solution, if the security of the VoIP servers and routes to and from, can be maintained. Eaves dropping is big business.

With the inclusion of 'user choice' of VoIP, there is no reason they cannot use their own internal intranet to host such a server.

One of the problems with attitudes towards utilising the internet to do business (voice, emails etc) is the 'informal' approach. Any business worth its salts, will always backup any verbal contract deals/information in hard copy. Difficult when the agenda and content revolves around 'casual' chat. Perhaps a useful addition would be to have the ability to capture a recording of the chat, although under the data Protection Act, you would have to notify each user/listener, that you are doing so.

I forsee the phone, skype and other forms of internet style voice business, blending into a transparent medium. The adoption of VoIP for many companies network infrastructures is the seed of the future, something perhaps phone companies are seeing as the end of an era for their 'pay by the minute' revenues.

Maybe if our lips moved it would be more obvious who was talking

Have you tried the selection of 'voice gestures' that LL gave us all? LOL.... don't bother, in comparison to There.com, it's like a deaf mute going to a conference with the intension of participating.

/me again predicts that PowerPoint-on-a-prim will come to SL.


I think the tense is wrong - I'd be surprised if they weren't already here. Maybe not in big numbers but I'd bet there are some.

Voice in Sl may be able to add more "soul" to your business by giving consumers a bit of the owner's voice behind the avatar. Beyond that, text based chat and instant messaging will be more beneficial towards a company. As of yet, voice has a few flaws.

1. You can't record voice messages in the event that you need to recall whatever (he/she) said
2. ctrl+alt mousers could be eavesdropping on voice based communications

Better use voice in public to attract a crowd. Keep your keyboard for when you get serious.

Your prediction, although somewhat late, is correct.. Powerpoint simulations have been available for quite some time.... The Silver Stream Network supports collaborative tools such as Powerpoint, Blackboard and Whiteboard simulations, including full media support, in SL.