Google just "quietly" released its own virtual world: Lively. Overall, I found it a rather clumsy experience although part of that could be blamed on my own ramp up with the Lively UI. For those accustomed to other virtual worlds, Lively will seem a bit limiting in functionality and short on graphic presentation. Also, it is PC only at the moment. )-: That said, it is an important moment in the virtual world industry if for nothing else in terms of the name equity attached to any app being put out as a Google product.

What does it mean for learning? It offers a real change in how 3D portals might be integrated into a learning experience. The real weakness of Second Life and other virtual worlds is document management and dynamic management of text, both creation of and readability of, within an experience. The integration of Lively with the browser is perhaps its greatest strength and where we begin to see the realization of a more ubiquitous virtual world experience. One can now see how a current learning experience could be enhanced with chunks of 3D learning content/activities that could support a greater challenge and do so in a way that would not break the user from the greater learning interface or LMS.

I believe other virtual world platforms will need to step up to this or other similar kind of browser integration to continue to compete in the long term.

Want to know more? Check out this World2World discussion on the topic:
http://www.world2worlds.com/media/bliplively.html

Posted by Christopher Keesey at 4:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Opera Software has recently released an exceptional Web Standards Curriculum. The curriculum provides a resource for educators, students, and business' spotlighting best practices for the web. Students may set aside concerns about questionable resources and feel confident in the best practices of HTML, CSS, and Javascript presented in this curriculum. This curriculum provides up to date best practices for todays students and web browsers alike.

This is exciting news for educators that focus on online distributed learning. Educators now have an open reliable reference to point towards regarding standards in web design/development. This curriculum has support from many leaders in the web community such as Yahoo! and the Web Standards Project.

Is it true that once you've seen one web resource you've seen them all?
No. This curriculum is relevant to todays best practices for web professionals. Check it out at: http://www.opera.com/wsc/

This curriculum is free and open to the public domain.

Posted by James Rice at 9:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)