Since Second Life tries to mimic the real world, it can offer many real world benefits of collaboration as well as providing the benefits of collaboration that exist in a co-located virtual world.
The biggest benefit that I think Second Life offers in terms of collaboration is the idea that users can be co-located in it's virtual world while being far from each other in real life, the "salience of place" mentioned by both Professor McLeod and Boellstorff. This can allow people to interact and collaborate as they would if they were with each other, because technically, in Second Life's world, they are. As shown in by Professor McLeod's lecture, it is quite easy to "find" other people.
Another benefit to collaboration in Second Life is, as Professor McLeod mentioned, its ability to create and test virtual models. For example, the rendering of CAD models for engineers or a example hotel room for a hotel company. Instead of just describing the idea, Second Life can allow people to actually demonstrate it.
Another benefit to Second Life is the multi-speaker chat capability which overrides the real world problem of having two many people speak at once. Using the text function of Second Life, more than one person can speak at once, and yet all are noted and understood by everyone else
One significant drawback to collaboration in Second Life is the learning curve associated with the application. Even basic tasks can be difficult for the inexperienced user. Another drawback is the high usage of memory. This means in order to use the application to the best of its abilities, one must have a reasonably fast and memory-loaded computer.
Another drawback could be the self-editing that occurs in virtual settings due to the ability to create a virtual self that doesn't have to reflect the real-world self. This means that proper group work may not occur due to this idealization of characters.
The drawback in the idea of "time" as mentioned by both the Professor and Boellstorff is also quite significant since time in the application and real life are very different. l
Like I mentioned before, Second Life can be useful for those who require a visual tool for their project. Say Hilton is having a group work on designing new suites. Group members can actually use Second Life's virtual world to create a test room.
Second Life could be lacking for projects that require senses beyond seeing and hearing. If a project requires the use of smell or touch, Second Life is of no use. Also, is a project requires extremely complex virtual renderings, Second Life may not be equipped to handle it
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Nice post, lots of pros and cons, what do you think are some of the differences in being co-located in Second Life as opposed to real life? How does that affect the interactions and the benefits that you can gain from being face-to-face (or digital face to digital face)
ReplyDeleteI really like your example of Hilton designing new rooms using second life, this seems like a really relevant application!
I like how you present the option of Second Life being used for engineers to actually test how their ideas would look in real life. A 3D rendering on CAD is one thing, but seeing how people would actually drive a car or use a bridge in real life would be very beneficial.
ReplyDeleteAlso, perhaps Second Life will someday feature smell and maybe even touch. Smell could be easily achieved by having hardware that mixes chemicals to release certain smells. Touch may be harder but perhaps we'll see it someday.