Features

Tue, Apr 19 2011

OpenSim 103: Securing your grid

Enterprises rolling out new OpenSim grids are often concerned about security issues of running OpenSim, and justifiably so. OpenSim is alpha software and still poses some security challenges. However,...

1 Comment | Read More »

Mon, Apr 18 2011

Designers offer OpenSim goods on Websites

With the recent growth of OpenSim grids, both public and private, and growing demand for both low-end starter items and high-end content, content creators have recently launched several Websites to distribute...

6 Comments | Read More »

Sun, Apr 17 2011

OpenSim 102: Running your own sims

Also in: Getting Started, Resources

There are plenty of reasons to run OpenSim on your own computers. If you’re a content creator, you can have as many regions as you want, for free, and load them up when you need to work on them....

2 Comments | Read More »

Fri, Apr 8 2011

OpenSim 101: Renting land

Also in: Getting Started, Resources

This is a primer for folks considering moving into OpenSim who have never used OpenSim before and who don’t have much of a technical background. Things move fast in the OpenSim universe, so last...

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Sun, Mar 27 2011

Kitely brings Facebook, instant regions to OpenSim

In a major step forward for usability of OpenSim, Israel-based startup Kitely has created a Website that allows any Facebook user to create, load and enter an OpenSim world in less than two minutes. The...

19 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Mar 22 2011

PioneerX offers no-fuss grid management

Back when 3rd Rock Grid first launched in the spring of 2008, it was one of the earliest OpenSim grids and the owners had to figure out everything on their own. The grid’s managers had to learn how...

1 Comment | Read More »

Thu, Mar 17 2011

Design firm builds virtual tours, 3D learning games, university grid

Working in the space of 3D virtual immersive environments (VIE) is a small, but dedicated group of people who are creating some really wonderful and powerful learning. The other day I had a chance to...

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Tue, Mar 15 2011

Avination first with Vivox voice on OpenSim

OpenSim’s largest commercial grid, Avination, announced a major new milestone today — it will be offering in-world Vivox voice at no charge to its residents and region renters, as well as to...

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Fri, Mar 4 2011

Study: People open to avatars at work

Employees willing to interact with a variety of avatars — except for those that are “creepy” Employees prefer to use more formal avatars to represent themselves According to a new study...

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Thu, Feb 24 2011

Brouchoud offers virtual architecture overview

Leading virtual architect Jon Brouchoud has created Virtual Architecture 101, a 3D exhibit on Architecture Island in Second Life — and there are some nice lessons there for anyone looking to build...

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Mon, Feb 21 2011

Expert: Copyright bigger threat than patents to OpenSim

After ReactionGrid announced plans to patent a process for deploying and managing OpenSim earlier this month, the open source community responded with dismay. In comments on the initial announcement, and...

3 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Feb 15 2011

OpenSim grids embrace copyright protection

Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve been surveying the owners of all the public OpenSim grids about what their grids are all about. We asked about hypergrid, currencies, maturity levels —...

1 Comment | Read More »

Fri, Feb 4 2011

VenueGen hopes to be the WebEx of virtual meetings

There are three main ways today to have a 3D virtual business meeting using your browser – VenueGen, Altadyn’s 3DXplorer, and Avaya’s Web.alive. Of the three, VenueGen stands out by actively...

4 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Feb 1 2011

CliniSpace takes virtual medical training to the browser

Colleges and medical institutions have been trying out immersive virtual environments for training and teaching for years, but one new service, CliniSpace, is trying to take ease-of-use a big step forward...

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Mon, Jan 10 2011

VirtualU integrates 2D, 3D conferences

Companies looking to hold virtual conferences first have to decide whether to hold a Web-based conference – normally some combination of streaming video, live chats, slide shows, and social media –...

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Mon, Jan 3 2011

How to pick a virtual platform — revisited

Virtual environments are changing rapidly, and it’s sometimes hard to keep up with everything that’s going on. Here is a quick round up of the best options for the most common uses of virtual...

2 Comments | Read More »

Thu, Dec 30 2010

Most read of 2010

This year was a big one for OpenSim. Lots of growth, lots of technological breakthroughs. But some Hypergrid Business articles got more attention than others — and, thanks to the miracle of Google...

1 Comment | Read More »

Thu, Dec 9 2010

IBM’s principles of virtual design

Here at Hypergrid Business we spend a lot of time touring virtual environments, and we often find them difficult to navigate, inconsistent, and hard to use. But one of the world’s biggest corporate...

3 Comments | Read More »

Fri, Dec 3 2010

Katalabs releases HTML 5 virtual worlds browser

California-based Katalabs has just released a free iPad and iPhone-friendly Web-based virtual world viewer, KataSpace, which works in conjunction with the open source Sirikata virtual world server software. KataSpace...

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Tue, Nov 30 2010

Paper: Social interaction ‘killer app’ of virtual worlds

According to a white paper released today by by U.K.-based virtual worlds solutions provider Daden Limited, virtual worlds are not the next stage of evolution of the World Wide Web — but will be...

1 Comment | Read More »

Wed, Nov 17 2010

OMC, I’z transactions grow on OpenSim

The OpenSim economy continued to grow this month, with both the OMC currency and the I’z currency from InWorldz growing in users and transactions. The OMC, a convertible currency from Austrian virtual...

3 Comments | Read More »

Mon, Nov 15 2010

Virtual investors lost 71% on risky SLCapEx

Investors in virtual companies listed on the Second Life Capital Exchange lost most of their money, according to a new research report. The report, which covered the time period between May 2007 and December...

6 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Nov 2 2010

Bargain region hosting: What you get for $9.90

OpenSim hosting company New Voice offers full OpenSim regions for just $9.90 per month. So what do you actually get for this amount of money? A region in Second Life, after all, costs $300 —...

2 Comments | Read More »

Mon, Oct 25 2010

OpenSim payments 101

Also in: Getting Started, Resources

One of the most confusing parts of moving to OpenSim is figuring out how the commerce system works. Not as confusing, maybe, than than figuring out how to run the server software, learning how to hypergrid,...

2 Comments | Read More »

Thu, Oct 14 2010

TeleXLR8 wants to be the “TED” for virtual worlds

Founders of teleXLR8, a discussion program conducted in the Teleplace virtual environment, are hoping that the project becomes the next TED for virtual worlds. Teleplace, Inc. is one of the leading providers...

2 Comments | Read More »

Wed, Oct 13 2010

An OpenSim grid primer

Also in: Resources

There are a lot of different kinds of OpenSim grids out there — it can get a little confusing. Well, a lot confusing. Here’s a quick primer. Social grids Social grids attempt to replicate the...

1 Comment | Read More »

Sun, Oct 10 2010

Vendors offer Second Life-to-OpenSim migration

Also in: Resources

UPDATE: TalentRaspel has lowered its price for exporting Second Life regions. It now starts at US $273 (200 Euros) per region, and is based on the complexity of the build. Vendors are offering full-region...

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Tue, Oct 5 2010

How to choose an OpenSim hosting company

Also in: Getting Started, Resources

Yes, you can run OpenSim for free on your own computer - you can even run it on a USB stick. But do you want to? Here’s a question — would you run your own Apache Web server for your website,...

9 Comments | Read More »

Thu, Sep 23 2010

There’s something about InWorldz

Last week, InWorldz became the second-largest grid running on the OpenSim platform, after shooting up the charts over the course of just the past three months. Between April and September 15, the grid...

10 Comments | Read More »

Thu, Sep 9 2010

Virtual Events for Business: What are they and how are they different?

When you hear the words “Virtual Events” or “Immersive Environments,” what comes to mind? Geordi from Star Trek? Perhaps a giant question mark since they sound so foreign? Many of us participate...

1 Comment | Read More »

Thu, Sep 9 2010

SpotOn3D focuses on content protection

Many virtual designers are wary of coming to OpenSim because of worries about content protections. One virtual worlds company is bending over backwards to alleviate these concerns and to create a safe...

10 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Aug 31 2010

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...

2 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Aug 31 2010

Does your grid need its own currency?

Update: I still recommend the OMC currency, which has grown substantially since this article was first written and now used on 30 OpenSim grids. The two other currencies I mentioned — V$ and G$ —...

5 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Aug 31 2010

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...

1 Comment | Read More »

Sat, Aug 21 2010

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,...

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Tue, Aug 17 2010

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...

6 Comments | Read More »

Mon, Aug 16 2010

Whisper – New Voice Solution for OpenSim

Today, vComm Solutions of Switzerland released Whisper, a high quality voice solution for OpenSim based on the popular Mumble open source VoIP client. The key feature of this solution is that it enables...

4 Comments | Read More »

Sun, Aug 15 2010

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...

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Fri, Aug 13 2010

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...

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Wed, Aug 11 2010

Why virtual worlds suck for business — and some solutions

Wagner Au and Gwyneth Llewelyn have recently posted thought-provoking pieces about how to make virtual worlds more engaging. Au proposed an achievement system to encourage new users to make friends and...

8 Comments | Read More »

Wed, Aug 11 2010

How to get ripped off in OpenSim

A couple of weeks ago, two OpenSim content designers came to Hypergrid Business with a complaint: they were offered a chance to produce content for a new grid, in return for space on that grid. They did...

1 Comment | Read More »

Sat, Jul 31 2010

How to set up a mini-grid

A mini-grid is a small, standalone OpenSim grid that doesn’t require a separate grid administration server. How small? Small enough so that all its regions can be run on a single computer. For a...

10 Comments | Read More »

Tue, Jul 27 2010

ReactionGrid discontinues $25 region hosting

ReactionGrid no longer offers $25 regions, offering only entire servers starting at $150 a month, with a $500 setup fee. Each server can handle four regions, and there is a discount for educators —...

7 Comments | Read More »

Mon, Jul 19 2010

Media-on-a-prim coming to OpenSim in two months

Earlier this year, Linden Lab released Second Life Viewer 2 which, though it had a large number of usability problems, also offered one huge advantage for business and education users: the ability to put...

2 Comments | Read More »

Sun, Jul 18 2010

Hypergrid upgrade may cause travel hiccups

The OpenSim community is currently in the process of upgrading to Hypergrid 1.5, a more secure version of the hypergrid protocol that allows teleportation between different grids. However, Hypergrid 1.5...

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Thu, Jun 17 2010

3Di OpenSim allows third-party logins

Tokyo-based 3Di Inc., will release the new version of its OpenSim server software on June 25, and the new release will allow the use of separate account registration systems. For example, if a retail company,...

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Fri, May 14 2010

Virtual meetings offer green alternative to business travel

According to virtual events platform provider InXpo, each visitor to a virtual meetings saves – on average – 1,217 pounds of carbon dioxide. It would take 25 trees a whole year to absorb that much...

11 Comments | Read More »

Tue, May 11 2010

Virtual events go social

Virtual events platform provider InXpo rolled out a suite of social networking features last week – including built-in support for Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn – as well as a social gaming platform. InXpo...

7 Comments | Read More »

Sat, Apr 3 2010

Educators save money switching to OpenSim

Educators in primary schools, colleges, and other institutions looking for lower costs, better controls, and no age restrictions are considering switching from Second Life to its open source alternative,...

9 Comments | Read More »

Sun, Mar 28 2010

Where to get content for an OpenSim grid

One of the common complaints enterprises have about OpenSim is that if they set up a private grid, they’ll have to create all the content from scratch. Employees will have to create their own hair,...

5 Comments | Read More »

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