Betterverse: Nonprofits in the Virtual World

Whyville & Dell launch a kid netbook pre-loaded for virtual world learning

Numedeon, the makers of the education-focused virtual world Whyville, announced today a partnership with computer manufacturer Dell to release a special kid-focused netbook pre-loaded to access the Whyville world.  As one of the leading computer manufacturers in the world, this might signal a dramatic increase in the number of kids entering the virtual world for the first time.

More important, from the Betterverse perspective, its may lead to tens of thousands of kids accessing the educational and cultural content that is available on Whyville.  Within Whyville young people can learn about coral reefs and ecology, art, mathematics, nutrition and many more subjects in a fun and engaging online environment shared by 5 million registered "Whyvillians."

Sounds like a great example of a corporate-public good venture that uses virtual world technology.  The full press release follows after the jump...

Find a job in Canada using Second Life

I somewhat randomly found myself in the Ontario Public Service Careers island in Second Life, and was so impressed I decided to come back tonight.  The purpose of the sim is to "expand the notions of traditional ‘employment outreach’ through a online virtual collaborative tool where Second Life users tour government work environments to learn more about the merits of public service work." I spent some time tonight exploring to see how well it accomplishes that mission.

More exploration after the jump...

Nonprofits gathering August 13-16 for Second Life Convention in San Francisco

Keynote Plenary at SLCC 08

From August 13-16 in San Francisco, hundreds of Second Life residents, entrepreneurs, artists, musicians and developers will be converging for the fifth annual Second Life Community Convention. I just found out that there will be a Nonprofit Track for the many organizations and organizers active in Second Life.

Among the wide variety of interesting nonprofit-related workshops being planned:

• "Making Clothes with Missions that Start Action and Stick"
• "Virtual Museums as K through Adult Learning Platforms"
• "The Virtual Helping Hands Team and Max the Virtual Guide Dog Demonstrate Accessibility"
• "Modality and Morality: Fundraising on the Frontier of the Metaverse"

I unfortunately will not be at SLCC this year. But it's a great way for nonprofits to network with other virtual world experts, socialize, and disseminate their work to a very engaged audience. And it's always a lot of fun. Meeting face-to-face does have its advantages!

The full listing of nonprofit-related events at SLCC follows after the jump. Head to the official SLCC website for more information.

Machinima Sunday: "Welcome to the Desert of the Real" (video)

Welcome to the desert of the real from paolo pedercini on Vimeo.

And speaking of the U.S. Army.... Created using the US Army-developed video game "America's Army," digital filmmaker Paolo Pedercini has produced this poetic and simple machinima about post-traumatic stress disorder. Paolo demonstrates perfectly that it doesn't take much to get across an impactful social message using machinima tools.

For more serious issue machinima, see my previous post "Machinima that Matter."

Thanks for the link, Amelie!

U.S. Army launching "Federal Virtual World Challenge"

Amanda Linden reports on the Second Life official blog that Tami Griffith of the U.S. Army Research and Development and Engineering Command (RDECOM) is organizing something called the "Federal Virtual World Challenge." According the Amanda, the Challenge is a competition and showcase to "encourage the global development community to create innovative and interactive training and analysis solutions in virtual worlds."  In other words, to help the U.S. military and federal government writ large do education and data analysis more effectively using these virtual world technologies.

Amanda interviews Ms. Griffith about the Challenge in her blog post, which has some interesting insights from Ms. Griffith about the affordances of virtual worlds for collaboration across distances and institutions.  I really like Ms. Griffith's point about how avatars have a "leveling effect" that can improve communications between people. 

Given the nature of this site, I am particularly keen to know about the civilian and public good applications for the Challenge, despite its military sponsorship. After all, many of the civilian communications technologies that are part of our daily life came to us, in part, from the military, from DARPAnet to GPS.

I'll post here once the Federal Virtual World Challenge goes officially public. Stay tuned.

[IMAGE: "Patriot Island / US Military Veterans Center" in Second Life. Visit at this link]

Postscript on FCC Workshop on e-Gov and Civic Engagement in Second Life

Yesterday morning, about 30 avatars gathered on the MacArthur Island sim in Second Life to view for the first time a live simulcast of a proceeding of the Federal Communications Commission.  Building upon last month's appearance by Beth Noveck, White House deputy CTO, in Second Life, this was actually an official FCC Workshop, part of a larger effort to solicit public input into the "National Broadband Plan".  This particular workshop was focused on the topics of e-Gov and Civic Engagement, so it is very appropriate that it was held both with a live audience in DC and online via Second Life and on a WebEx webinar.

The event was not with technical difficulties, which is not uncommon for first efforts like this.  Apparently people on Macs had problems viewing the live stream on the webinar.  Meanwhile most Second Life participants were not able to view the video feed, but did hear the audio of the proceedings.  But in general, it was a successful demonstration of how a government agency can use multiple communications channels to build public understanding of and engagement in their work.

Kudos to the FCC for their willingness to try and open the doors a bit more to the online public. Hopefully this is just the beginning of these governmental efforts to use virtual worlds to increase transparency and public input into policy-making.

For those that missed the live event, you can view the recorded video at this link and you can continue to submit questions and ideas on their Ideascale page.

First FCC Workshop on E-Gov / Civic Engagement to be Simulcast into Second Life this Thursday, August 6

This Thursday, August 6, at 6:30am PST / 9:30am EST, there will be a Second Life simulcast of an FCC Workshop on the subject of "E-Gov/Civic Engagement." The goal of this workshop is to evaluate how broadband can improve the performance of government specifically in terms of transparency and citizen participation and more generally in terms of effectiveness and efficiency. The workshop will consider various ways all levels of government, as well as governments in other countries, have used broadband to improve its performance in these ways and how those lessons might apply for purposes of developing the national broadband plan. The workshop will also consider the potential benefits of universal broadband in enabling various government operations to move to a digital platform in terms of improved performance, cost savings, and strategic benefits to the communications infrastructure.
 

Hosted on MacArthur Island in Second Life ( click here to teleport ), this video simulcast of the workshop is open to the general public to attend. Key constituents of particular interest to the FCC include service providers, equipment providers, applications providers, community groups, and other groups that have a stake in the future of broadband. Virtual event hosting, moderation and technical support provided by Global Kids.

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NOTE: for those that missed the workshop, please feel free to contribute your questions and ideas to this site: http://fcc-opengov.ideascale.com. 

Teaching about the United Nations in Small Worlds

I just finished creating my first real "mission" in the virtual world of Small Worlds. It's called "Become a UN Ambassador for Peace" and it teaches the basics about the United Nations, its core mission, principal organs, and membership.  I incorporated the UN website, images from Flickr, and YouTube videos into my mission. It took about 90 minutes to finish creating.

From my experience, Small Worlds, with over 1 million registered users, has some unique attributes for educating about a specific cause or social concern.