Benchmark of 3D Virtual Environments

Benchmark of 3D virtual environments

The purpose of this report is to provide a benchmark of 3D virtual environments and to clarify their properties in professional use. The report will best serve the purposes of organizations familiarizing 01.05.2011 themselves with different 3D virtual environments or preparing for trial program of a 3D virtual platform.

Our report is based on review of the features and details of 33 virtual environments that can be – in our opinion – applied in professional context in the most common use cases. This report presents four of these use cases and provides some examples of different 3D virtual environments that can be applied in these cases. The 3D virtual environment market is quite volatile and fast paced. For this rea- son, during the rest of our research project we intend to provide regular updates to the benchmark report as major changes in the provided features or in the actors occur in the market. Executive Summary

In a professional setting many virtual environment use cases are collaborative by nature. Virtual worlds are used, for example, for meeting and networking, sharing knowledge, co-creating and visualizing ideas, learning and training. Collaboration experience is enhanced by interacting with others as avatars, although the signifi- cance of an avatar depends on the task at hand. In this report we therefore focus on 3D virtual environments, where users are represented by avatars they can flexibly personalize.

The criteria we use in our report to choose suitable environments are centered on the notion that in a professional environment people are task oriented in their use of the technology. This is why many environments, that are more social in nature, are excluded from this report and why we based our selection criteria for the technology on business questions and common use cases in professional settings. Some of the features, such as the ease of installation or document sharing, may be so essential that without these features the tasks integral to the use case will be hard to complete successfully. Therefore we include in the analysis those features that are most relevant when a virtual environment is applied to use cases presented in this report. Altogether, we looked at about 70 virtual environments, technological platforms and solution providers, and considered them against our criteria about professional use of virtual environments, and selected 33 of them for more detailed review.

In this report: Because the market for the virtual environments is still quite small and fragmented, there are certain difficulties in making straightforward comparisons between the virtual environments. For example, the market is lacking clear standards when it Criteria Used in the Benchmark 2 comes to support for different file types or imported content. This is why we focus on four different use cases of virtual environments and provide some examples of Platform Installation & Produc- 3 virtual environments relevant to these use cases. tivity Tools We end our report with discussion of trends that possibly change these use cases Use Case 1: Small Collaborative 4 and the professional use of virtual environments in general. In this version of the meetings report, these trends are only touched briefly, but during our research project we intend to provide updates to the benchmark report that expand these viewpoints. Use Case 2: Large Events 6 The ProViWo Project

Use Case 3: Learning & 8 The report was done as part of the Professional Collaboration and Productivity in Virtual Worlds (ProViWo) Training project which studies how virtual worlds can be used in professional, work related collaboration. In this research project we are studying the strategic and managerial aspects of using virtual environments at Use Case 4: Product Develop- 10 work as well as investigating different aspects of professional collaboration in virtual environments and ment & Process Simulation how these environments can be utilized to enhance geographically dispersed organizations and teams. In addition the project studies if there is justification to expect productivity gains in the use of virtual environments to support globally distributed teams. Additional Information and 12 Future Directions The project is funded by Tekes' Spaces and Places program and company partners Nokia, KONE, IBM and AAC Global. The project lasts until 6/2012. For more information about the project, please visit www.vmwork.net/proviwo Glossary & Appendix Page 2 Benchmark of 3D virtual environments

Criteria Used in the Benchmark There are two overlapping set of criteria that frame this benchmark and the set of environments that we are looking in it. The viewpoints of our research project, Professional Collaboration and Productivity in Virtual Worlds (ProViWo), sets the stage for work and task oriented virtual environments, where collaboration occurs via avatars. This is why many of the environments, that are more social in nature or resemble too much traditional web based collaboration solutions, are excluded from this report. Altogether, we looked at about 70 virtual environments, technological platforms and solution providers and considered them against our criteria about professional use of virtual environments, and selected 33 of them for more detailed review. The most frequent reasons not to include an environment in this benchmark were their social or game-like nature, lack of avatar, or the language versions of the environments were not applicable in Finnish companies.

These 33 environments are portrayed in the picture below along with few extra environments. Habbo and Entropia Universe are not included in the actual benchmark because their social nature (Habbo) or game-like nature (Entropia Universe), but they are included in the picture to illustrate our criteria. Also Open Qwak is such a new environment that due to timing we couldn’t include it in the first version of the benchmark, but we will try to include it in the next versions of this report. All the environments, also those excluded from this review, are listed as an appendix of this report.

EON Ambient Enterprice OLIVE Coliseum Performance VCS Teleplace Cranial Tap

Avaya Green Overview of the Open Qwak 3DVIA Scenes web.alive Phosphor ProtoSphere environments in 3DXplorer Open Cobalt Edusim VenueGen Assemblive Jibe this benchmark Prototerra Open GeoSim Cities realXtend Wonderland

Unity 3 Alpha stage Open Source OpenSimulator InWorldz Second Life Blue Mars Proprietary Icarus Studios

Open beta BigWorld Productized Twinity ActiveWorlds 3B

ExitReality Nuvera Online Habbo Entropia Social Kaneva Universe

As we reviewed the 33 virtual environments more closely we used another set of criteria which is based on business needs. The business needs were gathered from 44 interviews with virtual world vendors, experts, and managers using professional virtual worlds1, and they were grouped into use cases. These criteria were used for choosing the right environment for the right use case. Some of the features of virtual environments, such as import- Open-source projects have ing 3D content or enabling adequate document sharing, may be so essential for the use been quite common with 3D virtual platforms in case that without these features the tasks integral to the use case will be difficult to com- recent years. plete successfully. There are several In this report we introduce four use cases of professional virtual environments. Instead of platforms with core groups of loyal supporters but no long lists of suitable environments, we have chosen to raise examples of good solutions single platform has used in these virtual environments to illustrate the features that are most relevant when prevailed in the market. the environments are applied to the use cases. While we have pointed out environments by In our benchmark we name — either because they provide good examples of current solutions or of future trends accounted 6 open-source based virtual platform — we acknowledge that other virtual environments of the reviewed 33 could have been projects, whereas there chosen as examples, and many of the environments can be applied to several use cases were 27 proprietary discussed in this report. platforms.

1 Bosch-Sijtsema, P. & Sivunen, A. (In Review Process). Virtual worlds supporting distributed work: Use cases of professional virtual worlds. Journal of the Association for Information Systems. Page 3 Benchmark of 3D virtual environments

Platform Installation and Productivity Tools We have chosen a different approach for covering features of 3D virtual environments as we believe that a full list of environments’ features would not provide enough help for organizations considering or piloting different 3D virtual environments. However, we feel that some summariza- tion of the features of different platforms in our sample could be useful for the reader of this report. The following presents some summarized remarks of different features in our sample.

In our sample most of the platforms have local full clients and they might require administrative rights to install. Installations which require administrative rights might raise issues in corporations as sometimes frequent client updates and new installations would require help from IT- department. Some virtual environment providers have addressed this issue by providing their platforms as lighter clients which do not require administrative rights to update or to install. The- se lighter clients work through various ways, some of them are browser-based plugins while some of them are installed as java applets.

Full Client: Application that needs to be installed on the computer and often requires administrative rights

Browser Plugin: An add-on that in most cases requires administrative rights to install

Light Client: Application that requires installation but not necessarily administrative rights

Java applet: A specific java applet is required to be installed, but usually doesn’t require administrative rights

Light Browser Plugin: An add-on Figure 1. Client types in benchmark. for the browser that requires no administrative rights

In Fig. 2 we have divided our sample based on how “heavy” the client is and thus we can form two equally large groups —one with the full clients and the other group with variants of lighter clients. These two groups can be then compared according to their differences in the support for productivity tools. The figure shows the extent of which each of the client -groups supports different productivity tools at the time of the benchmark. In our opinion, lighter clients and easier access to clients is prominent path of development for professional use. Many of the lighter clients also support productivity tools more readily than full client based solutions. The requirement for easier deployment of the virtual environments in professional context is essential – a factor that is even more important when such new technology is being implemented.

Figure 2. Productivity tools in light and full clients. Page 4

Use case 1: Small collaborative meetings In professional settings a small collaborative meeting is one of the most common use cases of virtual environments. Using a virtual environment for a meeting to share ideas, discuss and collaborate with a globally distributed group of people can have benefits such as enhanced communication and sense of presence supported by the representation of oneself as an avatar, visual cues and sharing the same virtual 3D space. In most cases the minimum requirement for a small collaborative meeting is the ability to present materials to other participants and to collaborate around that material. As most of the material produced in the professional environment comprises of presentations and documents in different formats it is vital that there is adequate support for the most Benchmark of 3D virtual environments commonly used formats. The most important tools for small meetings are the productivity tools, for instance, document integration, brainstorming tools and shared whiteboards. In our benchmark for this use case the communication tools, such as voice and text chat were present as integrated functionalities in all of the environments.

Different virtual environments offer different approaches for the user to access productivity tools in the environment. In some of the environments there is built-in support for either MS Office or Open Office documents. Certain environments even provide the possibility to integrate the users’ document sharing systems, such as MS SharePoint. The vast majority of the environments in our benchmark offer limited support for documents and rely on the user converting the documents to a supported format such as PDFs or images.

Our benchmark includes some environments that do not support presentation screens or sharing documents, and as such, they work best for the cases where the mode of collaboration is not as much concentrated around documents. However, some of the solution providers approach the problem quite differently: presuming that most users already have document management systems in use. The user obviously has the alternative to use, for instance, document management systems to share material while at the same time using the virtual world for collaboration. Nevertheless, it can be debated whether the case for the productive use of virtual environments remains, if the focal point of collaboration moves away from the environment itself to other collaborative tools.

Avaya web.alive Avaya web.alive is a versatile virtual platform with features that enable it to be used in various business cases, for instance meeting, product presentation and training. The platform is easy to access through a browser plugin. The productivity tools for web.alive are extensive and provide the possibility to present documents and videos, use a whiteboard for outlining ideas and share files with others. The platforms supports material presented in universal formats, such as PowerPoint’s, PDFs and common picture formats.

In web.alive avatars can be customized by selecting from readymade avatars and clothing. Further personalization can be done through profile window, in which, users can provide more details about themselves. Avaya also has a development kit for creating 3D content to the environment that makes it possible to create high quality content. More- over, the web.alive product supports content created in other 3D tools, such as Autodesk products and Blender.

Avaya web.alive has been commercially available only for limited time, but already offers different licenses, including an enterprise application that runs behind the enterprise firewall. Page 5

Protoshpere Protosphere is a virtual platform produced with the business user in mind and it focuses on providing solutions for meetings and large events. Many of the Protosphere’s features provide support for forming networks and communities. In the platform there are possibilities to provide information about users’ knowledge profiles, colleagues, projects and team memberships.

Protosphere platform offers productivity tools with extensive support for customers already using Microsoft products, such as MS SharePoint and Active Directory. Material and documents can be imported to the environment in standard business formats, for instance Office documents, PDFs and images. With screen sharing features users can easily share their desktop views to colleagues.

Avatar customization is possible in Protosphere, but environment customization, through importing custom objects or scripts, is not supported in the platform. The premade environment surroundings however provide users with multiple settings, from auditoriums to small meeting rooms.

Teleplace Teleplace offers a unique package by combining built-in support for standard business tools with an easy access to the environment. Many of the major requirements that are essential in corporate level, such as security and verified user accounts, are addressed in Teleplace. Setting and using a workspace is relatively easy for the regular user, while the administrator is still left with options to customize the workspace. Further workspace customization is supported with the ability to import custom 3D content, including objects in the COLLADA format.

The support for different documents in Teleplace, such as PDFs, MS Word and Excel is vast . Many corporate clients benefit from having MS SharePoint by being able to directly import documents from their workspaces. Providing the opportunity of using sticky notes and whiteboards enables more collaborative meetings as well as idea generation workshops.

Teleplace has been built with ease of access in mind and in some regards does not provide as immersive experience as possible with virtual environments. The avatars and their animations are quite simple, but this in turn lowers the requirements for participants’ internet connection.

VenueGen

VenueGen is a browser plugin based virtual platform with extensive features in productivity tools and avatar communication. The VenueGen platform supports many of the standard document formats and has also the option for screen sharing within the environment. However there is no integrated support for document management systems.

In VenueGen there are a wide variety of options to personalize the avatars appearance and also extensive set of readymade gestures in the environment. The personalization of avatars and the variety of gestures improve the sense of presence in the environment, immersion and communication. VenueGen supports the typical communication tools with voice and text chat but it also provides the possibility to participate to the voice chat by phoning in to the environment. Page 6

Use Case 2: Large Events Large events organized with virtual environments usually consist of different types of tradeshows, fairs and large meetings. One of the foremost advantages of organizing large events with virtual environments is the inherent benefit of being able to participate from geographically distributed locations. In addition to the reduction on travel costs, virtual environments can offer time savings and even built-in systems for generating leads.

At present it is quite likely that few people using virtual environments attend large virtual events very frequently, furthermore, many of the participators might be unaccustomed to installing required software components in their computers. Therefore, it is important that the Benchmark of 3D virtual environments access to the environment is as easy as possible and the software, especially the client software, requires low maintenance.

Networking and the opportunity to exchange opinions with other participants are the usual benefits of large events. Certain virtual environments incorporate social networking tools and many of them have the option to add other participants as friends. This integration of communication and social network tools provide quick access to other participants for conversation.

The arguments presented above provide the basis why we looked into communication and social networking features of the virtual environment. In addition - for this particular use case - the virtual environments need to have client/server structures that are easily maintained and support large number of simultaneous users.

Certain virtual environments incorporate social networking tools and many of them have the option to add other participants as friends.

This integration of communication and social network tools provide quick access to other participants for 3Dxplorer conversation.

The 3Dxplorer is an alternative way of looking at virtual platforms for professional use and it relies more on providing a 3D web experience for users. The platform delivers essentially many of same functionalities as other products but through a solution based on java and the environment is structured similar way as web pages. One benefit of this approach is that it runs as a java applet, but still enables uploading content to the environment as well as customizing the environment.

The productivity tools for 3Dxplorer have the same web page based approach and present the material in browser windows. Networking in the platform is enhanced through profile information and the possibility to form user groups. Communication tools in 3Dxplorer offer text chat and VOIP.

For the occasional user of virtual platforms and large events, 3Dxplorer offers an easy option to attend and organize meetings and events. At the same time however, the 3Dxplorer does not necessarily deliver the same quality of graphics as would applications with full-fledged clients. The 3Dxplorer also has an enterprise solution available. Page 7

Assemb’Live The Assemblive platform has extensive productivity tools and support for office document, image and PDF formats as well as video, voice and text chats. The platform is mainly targeted for meetings and conferences and the productivity tools support those functions well. The platform has also online tools for creating and managing the details of the event.

The Assemblive platform is based on Unity 3 engine and the installation requires only a browser plug-in installation. The browser plugin assures easy access to the environment; conse- quently Assemblive fits very well to organizing large events and especially conferences in virtual environments. The platform has no support for social networking tools, at the moment, which can affect the usability of the platform depending on the scenario where it is used. However, the product is in beta stage and new functionalities are added to the product frequently.

Jibe

Jibe is a virtual platform that offers relatively high quality graphics and possibilities to import additional 3D content, but at the moment it lacks productivity tools. Jibe is built on the Unity 3 game development tool and requires only the installation of a browser plugin. The platform has the possibility to import custom 3D content which makes it well suited for trade fairs or cases where the focus is on the visualization of products. Additional material, such as pictures and movies can be uploaded to the environment and presented with a built-in slideshow tool.

The communication tools in Jibe are at the standard level, with VoIP and text chat. In the form of networking tools and properties Jibe provides the users with the possibility to log-in to the environment through third party social media services. Also authenti- cated users can be tracked in the environment which is useful feature especially for large events.

The virtual platform Jibe is a web based solution, but it offers relatively high quality graphics and extensive support for mesh object imports. Jibe claims to support hundreds of simultaneous users, but the scalability of the platform remains to be tested.

Protosphere Protosphere is already introduced in this report within the small team meetings use case, but it includes features that make it fit very well for large events as well. Protosphere supports large number of simultaneous users, which fills the obvious requirement for holding large events.

Primarily, extensive networking features in Protosphere provide the possibility to hold large events and form networks within the environment. Examples of these features include possibilities to provide information about users’ knowledge profiles, colleagues, projects and team memberships.

Protosphere client installation is relatively light and quite enterprise friendly. In communication tools Protosphere provides the standard text and VoIP chat but also supports for MS Lync voice chat services that can benefit customers using MS Lync products. Protosphere also provides the possibility to present any required material in-world, which helps building a pleasant experience around the large meeting. Page 8

Use Case 3: Learning and Training When virtual environments are used for learning and training purposes, the business scenario might vary significantly from case to case. For example, the requirements for the environment can be very different in leadership training compared to training of technical personnel. Leadership training might require more from productivity tools in the environment and the training of technical personnel might require more from the environment’s capabilities in importing custom 3D content. The possibility to customize environment to create scenarios and simulations is important in many types of professional, hands-on training.

Benchmark of 3D virtual environments Successful cases in learning and training rely on the engagement of the participants. Therefore in this use case, the need for the environment to be immersive and the need for the participants to have a sense of presence are even more important than usually. We argue that immersion and sense of presence in virtual environments is something more than just high quality graphics – for example being able to personalize your avatar and to work effortlessly are just as important aspects. In addition environments used for training and learning purposes might need to include programming capabilities to provide interactive elements for the users.

Users in training and learning scenarios often require built-in features that make social networking possible. It can be quite useful, from both the learners’ and instructor’s point of view, to have the ability to form groups and networks from you’re the persons attend- ing the same training.

Cranial Tap Cranial Tap is not a virtual platform in itself but rather an environment and a service provider for businesses and other organizations. They provide off the shelf solutions as well as custom solutions to different use cases, varying from training to data visualization. Primarily our benchmark of Cranial Tap is based on Second Life as Cranial Tap utilizes the Second Life platform and adds custom functionality and features to support requirements of each case.

Second Life platform is quite versatile and fits for many different use cases, but at the same time it requires a full client installation. Built-in social networking tools in the platform make it possible to add friends, form user groups and even more features can be added through programming new functionalities. The quality of graphics within Second Life is quite high and there are possibilities to create and import custom content to match the requirements of each use case.

Olive Olive is a product by SAIC which offers this platform and its services especially for training and meeting use cases. The Olive platform is well suited for training use and has been successfully used for example in first responder training and medical simulations.

The Olive platform supports the customization of the environment through a development kit. The platform supports large numbers of simultaneous users and provides also basic communication tools to support each scenario. Additional useful features for the training scenarios include: links to social networking tools and the ability to record and replay training sessions. The platform has been utilized in different large organizations and offers an enterprise friendly client with single port traffic through a firewall. Page 9

Open Wonderland Open Wonderland is a versatile open source virtual platform that is installed as a java applet. The graphics of the environment are rather simplistic, but other features of the platform are comprehensive. In productivity tools the platform supports PDFs, images and different video formats. Additional useful features include screen sharing and white boards.

Avatar customization can be important for some training cases and Open Wonderland provides the possibility to import custom avatars through an avatar generator called Evolver. There is also a feature for recording the training sessions and saving them for later reference or analysis. Open Wonderland doesn’t support customizing user profiles, but user groups can be formed and managed by users.

Unity3D Unity 3 is a game development tool rather than a virtual platform created for professional business use. We included the Unity 3 in our benchmark because the Unity 3 tools can be used to create suitable training and learning scenarios that can then be accessed through a client or a web based player.

With the Unity 3 development tools it is possible to build extensive training scenarios with high quality of graphics. The features and properties of the training environment depend essentially on the ability to use the development tools to create content and interfaces to web based productivity tools or other web based resources.

This approach offers many possibilities to create engaging learning experiences and customized interfaces, but is very resource intensive when fully functional virtual environments are built.

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Use Case 4: Product Development and Process Simulation Many of the manufactured goods today start their life in the drawing boards of 3D design and engineering software. The content created with 3D design and engineering software provides the possibility to use virtual environments for collaboration around those 3D models. In this use case, it is relevant that importing the 3D content to the virtual environment and appropriate file formats are supported in the environment.

The use case of product development has certain similarities with the use case of small team collaboration. To support collaboration in the environment the platform should have various tools to ease the task. These productivity tools, such as document support Benchmark of 3D virtual environments and white boards, are some of the features to look for in the environment in product development cases. In addition to productivity tools, the platform needs to offer reliable communication tools with voice and text chat to support collaboration.

In process simulation the possibility to replicate real-life physical environments is essential. However, in process simulation there might be need for the environment to have interactive and intelligent elements – therefore the support for programming inside the environment is also essential.

3DVia Dassault Systèmes produces the 3DVIA product family that provides extensive tools for creating 3D content and scenes as well as a viewer to access the environment through a web browser. The content creation tools in 3DVIA family are quite extensive and provide high detail models and also support scripting. Of course, Dassault Systèmes other products such as CATIA and DELMIA are well supported.

Productivity tools in 3DVIA Scenes provide the possibility to view preloaded documents and video in-world, and communication tools incorporate text chat. The viewer is located in the Dassault Systèmes website and all the content accessed with the viewer is required to be uploaded to a personal user account in the website. The user accounts content can be public or private and users can also decide whether they want to privately share the content with different users.

The extensive support for content creation, scripting and the high detail in the content makes 3DVIA a good option for product presentation and simulation use cases.

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Avaya web.alive

Avaya web.alive is a versatile virtual platform with features that enable it to be used in various business cases, for instance meeting, product presentation and training. The productivity tools for web.alive are extensive and provide the possibility to present documents and videos, use a whiteboard for outlining ideas and share files with others. Com- munication tools have VoIP and text chat but networking tools are limited to profile information.

For this use case, Avaya also has a development kit for creating 3D content to the environment that support various features to create high quality content. The support for specific 3D model formats can be very important if the success of the use case relies on previously generated content. The web.alive product supports quite widely used 3D content creation tools, such as Autodesk products and Blender.

The client is a browser plugin and the environment is therefore quite easy to access while still retaining good quality of graphics.

EON Coliseum

EON Coliseum can be utilized to present technical and quality 3D content while also providing the user with mod- erate productivity tools. The content to the environment can be created with EON Studios content creation software and accessed through a client called EON Coliseum.

The platform requires the user to install the EON Coliseum in order to be able to view the content. The managing of the virtual environment can be done through a web based setup screen, where the user selects what 3D models, media or presentations are preloaded to the environment.

Customizing the content for EON Coliseum can take some time and resources, but the abilities of the platform support the use case of product presentation well. Icarus Studios Icarus Studios is a virtual environments solution provider that produces massively – multiplayer online games and serious games for different organizations and corporations. Icarus Studios has produced virtual environments for professional use in many different use cases, including training and tradeshows.

Icarus Studios can provide the customer with either custom built solutions with high quality graphics or it can provide the customer with editor tools in order for the client to produce their own content and manage the users of the virtual environment. Essentially, Icarus Studios represents a different approach, as it can provide a turn-key solution for the customer. So while we didn’t have a chance to test out the platform’s technical capabilities for this version of the report, in our opinion it is important to present these solution providers as a viable alternative to generic virtual environments.

What sets Icarus Studios in our mind apart from many of the solution providers in this category is the inclusion of avatar in their products. While avatar may not be relevant in all the product presentations made for marketing purposes, in collaborative product development projects and process simulation cases the avatar has a definite value and there Icarus Studio’s product can help their customers. Page 12 Additional Information and Future Directions

Our benchmark has focused on user needs that we have packaged into four use cases and especially solutions in these use cases. By doing this we have tried to add new perspective to existing reports in this industry, which are excellent additional reading in their own right:

The Enterprise Immersive Software Decision-Making Guide by ThinkBalm (http://www.thinkbalm.com/)

Future of Virtual Worlds by Daden Limited (http://www.daden.co.uk/pages/knowledge.html)

This technology and the whole industry based on this technology are changing fast – with actors coming and going and new technological breakthroughs possibly changing the rules of the whole industry. This is why we have left some features and future trends to be included in this report later. We will include viewpoints concerning these trends as a new module every four months until the end of our project in June 2012. During these updates we will also recheck and correct the rest of the report’s data according to the changes in the market.

The trends that we see noteworthy in this stage are:

1.) Virtual environments using web browsers as clients / user interface

Some of these environments are portrayed in this report already, but we see this trend strengthening in both in the recreational and professional use of virtual environments. There is a hint of upcoming battle for the de facto standard. In our sample, Unity 3 is the most popular technology to implement what we call “light browser plug-in” – a web browser plug-in that doesn’t require administrative rights to be installed in the chosen web browser. However, there are still many ways to implement a web browser based user interface and the different customer needs will probably decide what solution becomes the de facto standard. Some of these customer needs can be seen as shortcomings of many of the current platforms – such as the ease of updating the client side of the platform, getting access through company firewalls, or integrating other web based services. Some of the decisive features will also open up new opportunities – such as increase the participative decision making, or enable the conversion of existing training material into more immersive environments. Overall we see rapid increase in the available solutions and services as these environments get wider acceptance through the integration into the web browser.

2.) Security viewpoints

This trend is a wider issue than just getting the company sensitive information behind corporate firewalls. However, many of the concerns that current professional users have with virtual environments are related to the need to get the servers behind corporate firewalls. For example, in many use cases there are concerns about reliability – both the servers and also the service provider. Experts in companies are finding it hard to build solid business case for the use of virtual worlds, if the virtual world servers keep crashing or the service provider seizes to exist all together. Also people’s identity may be important, especially in virtual teams and distributed work, where these environments can be of use. These aspects can be addressed better if the technology is behind corporate firewalls and perhaps integrated with HR systems.

In effect, this trend incorporates the open source movement in two different ways: on one hand open source development is a clear counterforce for the closed up corporate world and efforts trying to safeguard all the information. On the other hand, we see the open source platforms in many cases as the needed step towards virtual environment servers safely behind corporate firewalls. The recent news about the Open Qwak project is an example of this trend, although the announcement comes from a company that has also a product that can be used behind corporate firewalls.

3.) The use of existing content

In some sense, this trend incorporates aspects from the previous two. We are anxiously waiting for the de facto standards in many parts of these environments, one being the 3D content creation for these environments. If the web browser integration becomes the main trend, it may dictate many aspects of the content creation also. But at this time there are still many possible paths to improve the use of existing 3D content in virtual environments. The key point in this trend is that any content that adds value should be readily usable in these environments. To put it another way, we believe that there will always be own tools for creating different content and virtual environments need to be able to understand these contents with as little effort as possible. In addition we need connections back to knowledge repositories in companies so that content generated or modified inside these environments can be accessed also outside these environments. As the use cases presented in this report and the connections to other tools are still shaping, this trend is perhaps the most far fetching at this stage, but still it embodies many important principles and deserves its own module in this report. Glossary

Avatar A presentation of the user in the virtual environment, which in our benchmark is required to be in three- dimensional form. Communication tools Tools in the platform that can include voice and text based chat services that allow communication between the avatars in the environment. In-world An action taking place or an object residing within the 3D virtual environment. Networking tools Features included in the environment that assist users to find other participants and form linkages and groups between the participants. Productivity tools Technical solutions that ease the presentation of different material through the environment. These solutions include, but are not limited to: document and video presentation screens, whiteboards, file sharing systems, or the integration of these solutions to existing tools outside the platform. Virtual environment The sum of the different aspects that form the 3D virtual representation of the environment, such as visual, audial and emotional based factors. Virtual platform The technical software solutions that runs the virtual environment.

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Aalto University School of Science Contact information

Postal address: vmWork/BIT Research Centre P.O.Box 15500 FI-00076 AALTO Finland

Visiting address: Otaniementie 17 02015 Espoo

Tel. +358 9 47001 Fax +358 9 4702 3665

More information of the ProViWo project:

www.vmwork.net/proviwo

Authors: Twitter: Sami Ahma-aho: @samjum Teemu Surakka: @tjatwork Johanna Haapamäki: @johannahmaki

Email: [email protected]

Also post and follow our project on Twitter with #ProViWo hashtag.