Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Campfire talk.
I quite enjoyed the session around the campfire on Boracay Island last Friday. It took a while to settle down with the inevitable problems of movement, some people finding it hard just to sit down, others including myself needing to quit the program and reload. It took maybe half an hour at least before we could properly relax and converse, but in the end I do feel that it is just about possible that the simulation does really work. It generates an atmospheric stimulus which might get people into the mood, and then exchange more open and speculative ideas. You can do that in a purely text chat as well, if you keep at it for long enough, but the visual and simulated kinesthetic cues from the 3d world perhaps accelerate or at least change the process.
If this is true, then the advantages of using Secondlife for business meetings or education sessions might be that the time wasted in beating about the bush and worrying about appearances and protocol may be reduced, and a deeper level of learning and interaction achieved more quickly. Compared with other forms of distributed multi-way media channels, that is.
I quite enjoyed the session around the campfire on Boracay Island last Friday. It took a while to settle down with the inevitable problems of movement, some people finding it hard just to sit down, others including myself needing to quit the program and reload. It took maybe half an hour at least before we could properly relax and converse, but in the end I do feel that it is just about possible that the simulation does really work. It generates an atmospheric stimulus which might get people into the mood, and then exchange more open and speculative ideas. You can do that in a purely text chat as well, if you keep at it for long enough, but the visual and simulated kinesthetic cues from the 3d world perhaps accelerate or at least change the process.
If this is true, then the advantages of using Secondlife for business meetings or education sessions might be that the time wasted in beating about the bush and worrying about appearances and protocol may be reduced, and a deeper level of learning and interaction achieved more quickly. Compared with other forms of distributed multi-way media channels, that is.
# posted by Andy Roberts @ 9:22 AM 
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I get confused as to which group is which with all these trips, but I would think it a challenge to coordinate an international synchronous meetup from out of a group blog. I'd be happy to try though.
We can try if you like. That trip was just meant to be a different way to experience introductions, not a discussion, as part of an Online Facilitation seminar I am facilitating on SCoPE (which is now nearly over).
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