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http://mannea.blip.tv/#673654

Podcast Description

This video is basically a tour of some of the many ecological projects taking place within the virtual environment platform known as Second Life. Along the way, it serves as an excellent overview of Second Life, and indeed social virtual worlds in general, for those who have never experienced one. It is also good for those who adamantly refuse to ever try such.

The video opens out on its gentle introduction, showing several similar scenes, as well as a range of environments.

When the second presenter takes over, the topic switches to discussing the project 'Eolus one', a debate forum for companies seeking to marry up physical world ecological management with the capabilities of current collaborative virtual reality. It primarilly concerns itself with energy management, reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and personal healthcare provision.

A secondary example, also by the same group, includes a complete building management system for a real, physical building, where the computers are controlled via interacting with a virtual reality replica of the building. Open the window in your office in the construct, and the physical window responds. Very handy if you are not in your office at the time.

Switching back to the first presenter, we turn to Scilands, a group of 35 virtual islands dedicated to scientific research and technological development via VR. Space exploration and nanotechnology are amoung the subjects experimented with in the safety of a full physics recreation in a virtual environment.

After a thorough tpur of Scilands, and some of the international collaboration projests underway, the second presenter takes over, to discuss the green islands project. It is set up dedicated to allowing second life denizens and simulations to offet their energy costs, and carbon dioxide production.

Switching again back to the firstpresenter, the island of Utopia takes focus. It is basically a three dimensional virtual blueprint of a modern, fully functional eco-village, showing how each of the technologies involved work with others, andhow to build these settlements.

Switching again, to Second Chance Trees, a project set up to allow in-world currency to be donated to plant physical trees, becomes the next focal point for the eco tour.

The Avatar Action Centre, a purely educational project, appears next. It is dedicated to teaching about sustainability, and how to take eco-action in the physical world.

Real Life government in Second Life, a group dedicated to bringing as many government agentcies into Second Life as possible, and teaching them how to use the capabilities to aid their organisations, is the final stop on this tour. The video cuts short, a few seconds early, and one of the interviewees is still speaking, however, it gets across its point before the slighly abrupt ending

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