Articles By: Maria Korolov

Maria Korolov (formerly Maria Trombly) is editor and publisher of Hypergrid Business. She also runs an editorial content company, Trombly International. She has been a journalist for more than twenty years and has worked for the Chicago Tribune, Reuters, and Computerworld. She has reported from over a dozen countries, including Russia, China, India, Afghanistan and Chechnya. Today, she writes about enterprises uses of virtual worlds and other enterprise technology topics.
We all live in a virtual world

We all live in a virtual world

Mike Treder, the managing director of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, recently asked a loaded question: If you could live in a world that was just the way you wanted it to be, with... 

How can you add joy to your virtual world?

How can you add joy to your virtual world?

A couple of weeks ago, the ever-insightful Seth Godin pointed out that every new activity has a learning curve — and also a joy curve. Unfortunately, it sometimes takes a bit of time before we learn... 

Does your grid need its own currency?

Does your grid need its own currency?

One of the first decisions a new grid owner has to make is whether there will be an in-world economy — and, if so, if they will need to create their own currency. Creating your own currency is expensive.... 

Utherverse launches casino for US customers

Utherverse launches casino for US customers

Utherverse, a proprietary virtual world platform known for its adult content, has launched a virtual casino targeting US customers. While the winnings cannot be converted into cash today, that might change... 

Renting or owning your OpenSim land?

Renting or owning your OpenSim land?

Hosting providers with previous experience in Second Life are bringing some Second Life terminology with them into OpenSim. For example, Coral Estates draws a distinction between “owning” a... 

OpenSim prices drop to $10 per region

OpenSim prices drop to $10 per region

Correction: Coral Estate regions start at $20, not $10. OpenSim hosting prices have fallen to a record-low, with providers like New Voice offering regions for just $10 per month — though the performance... 

Hypergrid

Hypergrid

The hypergrid is like the World Wide Web of 3D worlds. You can create your own world, at your company, school, or government agency, and link it to worlds owned by partners, clients, or information providers. Hypergrid... 

Rooms and regions: pros and cons

Rooms and regions: pros and cons

Business users choosing virtual environments usually focus on particular features — does it support mesh imports? Are there in-world editing tools? How good is the voice? Is the a web viewer? However,... 

OpenSim business roadmap: past, present and future

OpenSim business roadmap: past, present and future

My company is a small, enterprise user of virtual worlds. Over the past year, we’ve used them for meetings with partners, new hires, internal collaboration, and external business networking. There... 

Whisper clear as a bell in OpenSim

Whisper clear as a bell in OpenSim

Tonight’s meeting of the Hypergrid Entrepreneurs Group was an eye-opener for me and several other attendees — well, ear-opener. We got a chance to try out the new Whisper directional voice... 

Second Life discontinues enterprise platform

Second Life discontinues enterprise platform

Update: “As Philip has mentioned, Linden Lab has discontinued the Second Life Enterprise development program,” Adam Nelson, Linden Lab’s Executive Director of Monetization, told Hypergrid Business.... 

Report: Running successful virtual event takes face-to-face contact

Report: Running successful virtual event takes face-to-face contact

Running a successful virtual event takes face-to-face contact on the part of the team running the event, said InXpo product marketing director Dennis Shiao, in a recently-released report about virtual... 

CyberCoinBank’s G$ takes early lead

CyberCoinBank’s G$ takes early lead

CyberCoinBank’s G$ is taking an early lead over the OMC multi-grid currency from Virwox. Although G$ is only accepted on 8 grids, compared to 14 grids for OMC, there is over 63 million G$ (US $210,000)... 

Viewer 2 a net gain for OpenSim

Viewer 2 a net gain for OpenSim

The latest versions of OpenSim support Second Life Viewer 2 and, over the next couple of months, grids and hosting providers will be upgrading their OpenSim server software to make Viewer 2 usable everywhere... 

How to save Second Life’s Teen Grid

How to save Second Life’s Teen Grid

The TeenGrid has low traffic compared to Second Life’s mainland, and its primary renters — educators — pay half of what Second Life’s other customers do for land. It makes sense... 

OpenSim grids resume breakneck growth

OpenSim grids resume breakneck growth

The top 40 public OpenSim grids resumed their breakneck growth pace this month, gaining a total of 1,139 regions and crossing back over the 10,000 mark with a total land area of 10,427 regions. This was... 

Hypergrid economy hits new high

Hypergrid economy hits new high

The hypergrid economy continued its steady growth this past month, with a total of 1,091,000 OMC (US $3,775) spent on the 14 OMC-enabled grids since the multi-grid currency launched in March. This total... 

Rosedale promises meshes; Teen Grid to close

Rosedale promises meshes; Teen Grid to close

Philip Rosedale who recently returned to the helm of Linden Lab, gave his first major speech of his second term as CEO on Saturday with a couple of bold announcements — Second Life was definitely... 

Free Scripts

Free Scripts

Looking to add some jazz to your virtual world? Say, by having doors that swing open when you touch them, fish that swim in your lakes, or cannons that actually fire? Sure, you can buy all this stuff,... 

VastPark not dead, serves top-tier enterprise clients

VastPark not dead, serves top-tier enterprise clients

Despite rumors of its demise, the Australian virtual worlds company VastPark is not dead — in fact, it’s recently seen quite an uptick of interest. In April, the company won a prestigious contract...