I got a demo the other day from a new company called VenuGen who told me I could get into a 3D meeting in under a minute. I have worked with lots of 3D collaboration tools (SecondLife, Qwaq (now called TelePlace. Not only did I have to upgrade my computer to work in these tools (most require at least 512 MB of graphics memory as well as a 2GHz processor). In actuality the hardware specifications suggested by VenueGen are: 2GHz processor, 168 MB of RAM, 800 MB disk space, and a video card with at least 128 MB of memory. These requirements are pretty minimal compared to what is required for some 3D environments.
There is also the learning curve issue. If there is a huge learning curve in 3D tools like Secondlife, why go through all that for a meeting? And what additional value would a meeting in 3D provide me?
I have had this 2D -3D debate for quite a while. When would a meeting be better in 3D if all the content is in 2D? Sometimes meetings are not about content but the interaction of the people in the meeting. VenueGen, has made these interactions (through easy to build avatars) as easy as possible, and enables those in the meeting to get more information than in a 2D event (like WebEx or GoToMeeting). The difference comes from the fact that your avatar can have a picture of your face (which is nothing new) but the lips move when you talk, you have facial expressions (laugh, frown) and can even effect the body language of your avatar (bored, attentive, angry, etc.).
If you think making a 3D meeting simple is easy, think again! Over 600 man-years of development have gone into VenueGen, and they had some very difficult problems to solve: how to represent a person and a complex range of emotions without making it too complex for the user; how to integrate external content
So you get all the advantages of 2D content in an easy to use (VenueGen claims 10 minutes) 3D collaborative space where the interactions are not only more immersive but you can deal with the avatar as a fair representation of the person in the meeting, not just a disembodied voice (like you would hear in a Web Conference).
I usually suggest that if you are going to do a negotiation or something like leadership training that you do it in person. But being in a class, or negotiating in-person is not only expensive but inefficient. My belief is that people will do more meetings like VenueGen, when this environment offers them MORE than they can get in a face-to-face meeting.
VenueGen counts British Petroleum, ACS, Duke Continuing Educationas as early customers and through VoIP (using the Vivox codec) they can offer conference calling at $0.07/minute.
In my book Collaboration 2.0 I showed an augmented meeting environment based on some research by AMI (Europe) in which a transcript of the conversation was displayed as well as dominance (who interrupts the most). The emotional state of each of the people in the meeting (this was a face-to-face meeting and they had temperature sensors in the room that could detect when people were getting hotter or more excited. They also had cameras in the room that could detect pupil dilatation, etc.) was also tracked and displayed (which could be very helpful in a negotiation).
Although the AMI augmented meeting room was an experiment, it did show that in these meeting environments we can give those in the environment additional information and an advantage over face-to-face meetings. I believe only when this happens will these virtual meetings take off in popularity. This could happen as early as this year or could be a few years into the future. The technology adoption curve keeps getting shorter (courtesy of the Web), so I suspect it will be sooner than later.
Interesting.
I had not considered tracking the eyes. I can see how some would want this and others not.
"I have had this 2D -3D debate for quite a while." Same here. I work only in Second Life at this point and from day one that has been my constant question. The reality is, somethings simply are not worth doing in a virtual world. Other things can be done far more effectively in 3D.
Thanks for the review.
I like this pun: An invisible man marries an invisible woman. The kids were nothing to look at either.#pun
How does this one end? An virtual world man man marries a 3D woman. The kids were ...
Comments
Interesting.
I had not considered tracking the eyes. I can see how some would want this and others not.
"I have had this 2D -3D debate for quite a while." Same here. I work only in Second Life at this point and from day one that has been my constant question. The reality is, somethings simply are not worth doing in a virtual world. Other things can be done far more effectively in 3D.
Thanks for the review.
I like this pun: An invisible man marries an invisible woman. The kids were nothing to look at either.#pun
How does this one end? An virtual world man man marries a 3D woman. The kids were ...