WEB SERVICES:Review: ActiveWorlds offers 3-D interactionOriginally designed as a demo for NASA, this virtual world lets users colonize Mars by Tom Spring(IDG) - As waves slosh gently against the wharf's pilings, a pair of busty beauties mill about looking bored rigid. Suddenly a slightly menacing version of the cartoon character Dilbert appears and breaks into a disturbing rendition of the Macarena. On the horizon, a bloated orange sun hangs low against a deep-blue electronic skyline.This is not my nightmare: My dream world is virtual.The reality is that I'm at my PC linked to ActiveWorlds.com, a three-dimensional environment filled with beaches, music, chat, and dozens of loitering 'avatars.' The word avatar is taken from Hindu mythology and is the name given to a god that has taken a life form on earth. Online, an avatar is a character that represents you.ActiveWorlds offers your avatar nearly a hundred 'worlds' through its downloadable viewer.
The free program lets you travel digital mockups of the planet Mars, Yellowstone National Park, and many more fantasy worlds built by ActiveWorlds' users.' There is another world out there most people don't know about,' says Rick Noll, president and chief executive officer of ActiveWorlds.com. He believes today's rudimentary 3D worlds will proliferate and transform passive entertainment into rich interactive experiences.
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Instead of watching actors on a television soap opera, he says, you could someday be a character in a virtual drama.ActiveWorlds is one of a handful of online universes that let you interact and chat with others via an avatar-a graphical icon that represents a person in a virtual environment. What sets ActiveWorlds apart from competitors such as Blaxunn Interactive and Worlds.com is that users can play God and create worlds of their own, fashioning them to their personal tastes. Virtual Community, Real ChallengesMORE COMPUTING INTELLIGENCE Reviews & in-depth info at IDG.net Let IDG.net's editors help you in 12 languages News Radio Virtual worlds have a checkered history. Ventures by OnLive Traveler and OZ Interactive, among others, have struggled to translate 3D worlds and avatars into profits, analysts say.
Lack of bandwidth and sufficient processing power have posed significant barriers to 3D's growth online. But that's slowly changing.And even with today's limitations, some communities have fared better. Worlds.com has thrived by catering to special interest groups with creations such as David Bowie World, Hanson World, and New York Yankee World.
Devil may cry wallpaper. In each of these, your avatar interacts with those of other fans-and purchases merchandise in virtual stores.Still, 'most of these companies have failed to come up with viable business models,' Noll says.Five-year-old ActiveWorlds currently has 35,000 customers who have coughed up $20 yearly for 'citizenship.' Roughly a million more have signed on as free limited-access members.That's nothing compared to the 100 million-plus souls who rely solely on text-based chat to communicate online. By comparison, at any given time a scant 500 avatars are online at ActiveWorlds, and only about 10 percent are paying customers, Noll says.' Things like instant messaging seem to be pretty compelling,' says Dan O'Brien, analyst with Forrester Research. 'Why people need an avatar is not that apparent.'
Noll retorts that text-based chat is to 3D worlds as the horse and buggy is to a jet airplane.' Our biggest challenge is changing public perceptions,' Noll says.
Consumer interest might be piqued as 3D technology is popularized by Hollywood and a growing number of Web sites.Virtual communities also face built-in technology limitations. Because most people have relatively slow Internet connections, graphically rich environments can sometimes take several minutes to load. ActiveWorlds has addressed some bandwidth issues by developing a proprietary technology that displays only portions of any given world.
Making Real Money From Virtual Reality@mart is a virtual mall with over 100 stores ActiveWorlds makes some additional money by selling virtual real estate to users: For $69 yearly you can own your own world. Abuse of power. But more typically, ActiveWorlds cuts deals with businesses that license the company's software to host and build their own universes.Think: Mall of America in cyberspace.
ActiveWorlds recently inked a deal with an Australian mall management firm, 3D Global, to build the mother of all online malls.