Top grids gain 883 new regions
The top 40 OpenSim grids now have a total of 19,381 regions, a new high — up by 883 regions from a month ago. Meanwhile, total registered users grew to a new record high...
News
Open Wonderland supports drag-and-drop docs
One of the great features of Open Wonderland is its application-sharing facility. And one of the benefits this provides is the ability to use OpenOffice in-world to create and edit documents that are compatible...
Nova drops prices to $5.95 per region
New Voice’s Nova OpenSim hosting company has dropped region prices to a new low today — just $5.95 for a region with up to 80,000 prims. The catch? The region is designed for low-traffic...
AVWorlds tests Bullet physics
AVWorlds is a brand new grid — at just 26 regions, it doesn’t even make our monthly Top 40 list — but it has big ambitions. The grid launched with the highest priced land...
Linda Kellie releases first OAR
Linda Kellie, whose free content has made her website a go-to destination for folks making their move to OpenSim and needing content, has released her first OAR file (free download here). This complete region...
Global Conference on Gifted Education Meets in Second Life
The Global Conference on Gifted Education held its eleventh global virtual meeting in Second Life last week, taking advantage of the platform’s global reach. “Information can be accessed from anywhere in the world,”said Leslie...
Kitely now checks perms when exporting regions
Kitely users will no longer be able to copy and export content that they don’t have copy or transfer permissions for, the company announced today. Previously, users could make full duplicates of entire regions,...
Bots attack OpenSim grids
Two OpenSim grids have been attacked — OpenNeuland and Wilder Westen — and the attackers may be going after others, said Kai Ludwig, director of Germany’s TalentRaspel virtual worlds Ltd. and owner of the two grids. The...
Air Medic Sky One wins serious play award
Press release: Air Medic Sky One, from University Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands, Wins Best of Show at Serious Play Award Competition SEATTLE – Twenty serious games were chosen by a panel of experts, as...
Roleplaying grid for sale
Role Play Worlds, a 43-region grid dedicated to fantasy-themed role playing, will close next month, the grid announced today. Residents will have until September 23 to make backups, export builds, and cancel orders and...
Serious Play finalists named
Press Release: Finalists Named in International Serious Play Award Competition SEATTLE – A panel of experts have selected 20 games as finalists in the 2011 International Serious Play Awards, a recognition program honoring outstanding...
Altadyn’s Darius Lahoutifard wins AVW’s Person of the Year
Press Release: Darius Lahoutifard, Reggie Smith III & Dr. Keysha Gamor top three in Virtual Awards 2011 Jacksonville, FL — The Association of Virtual Worlds announced the winners of its Virtual Excellence Awards 2011 today and Altadyn...
SpotON3D leaves questions unanswered
SpotON3D has two other patents, for the use of augmented reality in a 3D environment, the company revealed on Friday. The information was presented by SpotON3D CEO Stevan Lieberman, who was speaking at a discussion in...
SpotON3D to talk patents in SL forum
SpotON3D will address the patent issue in a discussion on the first day of its Content Creators Expo in Second Life. Philippe Pascal, SpotON3D’s developer program manager, invited Hypergrid Business readers to attend the Expo,...
MetaMeets organizer joins Avination
Press release: Avination hires full-time community manager LONDON, U.K. — Avination Virtual Limited has hired Jolanda Mastenbroek as Community Manager for the grid, the company announced today. Mastenbroek will be known inworld Avination as Joyce...
Kitely delays billing by one month
Kitely users will get at least one more free month of hosting, as the company’s billing system has been delayed. “Due to the time we’d spent improving OpenSim in the last couple of months...
Aurora-Sim offers infinite regions
The Aurora-Sim distribution of OpenSim now supports mega regions of unlimited size, according to an announcement made this weekend. That doesn’t mean that the regions offer endless land to build on — buildable land...
Grids reach new peak with moderate growth
The top 40 OpenSim grids now have a total of 18,498 regions — up by 1,539 regions from a month ago. Meanwhile, total registered users grew by almost 12,000 to 206,098. Avination, InWorldz lose ground Both...
Lindens to launch new product for tablets
At the 2011 Second Life Community Convention (SLCC) in Oakland, California, Linden CEO Rod Humble announced that in the next few months Linden Lab will release a new version of Second Life for the...
SpotON3D has filed five patents, promises more
SpotON3D has actually filed five patents, not just one, SpotON3D CEO Stevan Lieberman, an intellectual property attorney with Greenberg & Lieberman, said at an outreach event Sunday morning. He did not provide any additional information about the patents...
Grants available: free regions, up to 100,000 prims, 1,000 avatars
Press release: Fashion Research Institute Oversees a Third Round of the Science Sim Land Grant Program with Intel Labs NEW YORK — Fashion Research Institute is pleased to announce the third round of OpenSim region...
Scottish museum goes live on Unifier
Press release: Second Places announces the Launch of the first Private Virtual World hosted on the Unifier Platform Cheshire , U.K. — Second Places, a leader in development of virtual worlds, today announced the first private...
SpotON3D forum ends in tears
SpotON3D attempted to address the controversy over its plans to patent technology for putting an OpenSim viewer on a webpage in an outreach event this morning, but some of the company’s toughest critics failed...
SpotON3D responds to patent concerns, will license plugin to other grids
Press Release: Official Statement from SpotON3D’s CEO Stevan Lieberman, regarding our Facebook® plugin The US Constitution established patents to promote commerce in order to permit companies a monopoly on an idea for a limited...
Avination celebrates one-year anniversary with music, dancing, and a raffle
On Thursday, Avination begins its celebration of one year as an established virtual world. Since July 2010, Avination has been paving the way as a unique addition to the already expanding metaverse. In the...
AvWorlds to have Facebook integration this week
AvWorlds has announced that the company will be releasing a Facebook plugin this week, allowing users to quickly create avatars based on their existing Facebook identities. Those without Facebook accounts — or who don’t...
WorldViz releases lower-priced interactive 3D display
Press Release: WorldViz 3D Interaction Walls bring Semi-Immersive Virtual Reality to Mainstream Santa Barbara, CA –WorldViz, the industry leader in interactive virtual reality solutions, has released two turnkey 3D simulation systems based proprietary motion-tracking...
Conference to discuss serious games market
Press release: Plenary Sessions at Serious Play Conference To Tackle Major Challenges of Serious Games SEATTLE – Some of the best minds in serious games are coming together to discuss the major challenges facing the...
Avination in talks with Havok
Avination may deploy the Havok physics engine for its grid. This is the same physics engine used by Second Life. “It is being considered and talks with Havok have started,” Avination grid manager Melanie...
InWorldz, CariNet team up on new joint venture
Press Release: InWorldz, LLC and CariNet Inc. To Power Virtual World Technology and Hosting Through Joint Venture Venture to focus on quality of service, scalability, and core software to promote growth and technical innovation NY...
OSGrid celebrates four years of OpenSim
OSGrid, the largest grid running on the OpenSim software, is celebrating its fourth birthday this weekend with parties, games, tours, and training classes. OSGrid currently has 6,896 regions and more than 63,000 registered users. By...
Aurora-Sim bridges gap to the hypergrid
Aurora-Sim is a hot, fresh, new distribution of OpenSim that promises some nice features for grid managers (see story here) but, until this weekend, its users were cut off from the rest of the...
Daden creates Chatbot Business Case Calculator
Press release: Daden creates Chatbot Business Case Calculator to help companies understand potential savings Birmingham, U.K. – An innovative business case calculator has been created by technology company Daden Limited to help organisations understand the potential...
OpenSim grids break records for regions; users
It’s been a record-breaking months for OpenSim, with the top 40 grids passing 16,000 regions and 200,000 users for the first time in history. The total number of regions on these 40 largest public...
Report: in-person, virtual attendees equally attentive
People pay the same amount of attention at virtual and physical events, says a new report from the Professional Convention Management Association, UBM Studios, and the Virtual Edge Institute, detailing the behaviours of people...
ProtoSphere to support Microsoft Office 365
Press Release: ProtoSphere Lync Edition to support Office 365 and associated online functionality LANSDALE, Pa.–ProtonMedia, a Silver Unified Communications Microsoft partner, today announced its ProtoSphere Lync Edition application will support Microsoft Office 365. This will provide users...
Unifier Web-based 3D platform goes live on Friday
Second Places announces the name of their long anticipated virtual world platform — Unifier. A new web based platform presents opportunities to developers, a more immersive experience to users and a simple easy to...
Kitely speeds up scripts, adds creator names to OARs
Kitely, a company that offers virtual worlds on demand, plans to make virtual worlds more accessible to all, said company CEO Ilan Tochner in an interview last week. The interview was conducted at the...
Intel’s DSG to be part of core OpenSim
Intel’s Distributed Scene Graph — the technology that allows OpenSim to handle thousands of avatars on a single region – is now available for download. In the future, the technology will become part of...
OMC users triple since start of year
The number of OpenSim grids accepting the multi-grid, hypergrid-enabled Open Metaverse Currency (OMC) has continued to grow in the first half of this year, now at an all-time high of 29 grids. Meanwhile, the...
Florida National Guard goes virtual with Cubic
Press Release: Cubic Delivers COMBATREDI Virtual Training System to the Florida National Guard ORLANDO, FL — Cubic Simulations Systems, the virtual training systems business of Cubic Corporation CUB +0.62% , has delivered a cutting-edge...
Virtual library opens in Second Life
Press Release: Virtual Library of Birmingham opens its doors for public exploration Birmingham, U.K. — The Virtual Library of Birmingham, built by Daden Limited, has opened its doors to the public allowing access two...
Science ministry releases 3D iPad tour
Press Release: Virtway creates immersive 3D iPad application for Spain’s Ministry of Science and Innovation Oviedo. SPAIN — Virtway, in collaboration with IECISA, has created a 3D interactive tour of the most representative centers of the...
SLCC seeks business presenters
The Commerce & Marketing Track of the Second Life Community Convention, scheduled for August 12 through 14 in Oakland, California, is looking for presentation proposals from Second Life content and service providers. According to...
New OpenSim market launches with three grids
HGExchange, a new online marketplace for OpenSim goods launched today, with live delivery to OSGrid, MyOpenGrid, and Haven. It is not the first online marketplace to deliver items to multiple OpenSim grids. Cariama delivers products...
Survey: Firms prefer virtual training
Press release: ON24 Survey Shows Growing Corporate Preference; Sodexo Use Case Illustrates Benefits SAN FRANCISCO, CA — ON24, the global leader in webcasting and virtual event solutions, today announced survey results illustrating the growing acceptance...
OpenSim devs launch foundation, put OpenSim on solid legal footing
OpenSim’s volunteer developers have launched a foundation, the non-profit Overte Foundation, which expected to solve the licensing problems that keep OpenSim server developers from talking to viewer developers. “One of the main reasons for...
ProtoSphere wins Microsoft Life Sciences Innovation Award
Press Release: PPD and ProtonMedia Win 2011 Microsoft Life Sciences Innovation Award Microsoft recognizes ProtonMedia for the second consecutive year for its innovation in life sciences with its ProtoSphere virtual collaboration technology LANSDALE, Pa. — Microsoft...
TEDxBoston goes hybrid with Web.alive
Press Release: TEDxBoston Expands Reach With Avaya web.alive Global Online Auditorium — Avaya web.alive Immersive Web Conferencing Enables Attendees to View Event From Comfort of Their Desktops — TEDxBoston Speakers Live Streamed From Event...
New Learning System for Virtual World Educators Released
Press release: New Learning System for Virtual World Educators Released The creators of Texas State Technical Colleges’ virtual presence in Second Life®, vTSTC, have released a new learning management system created specifically for educators...
ProtonMedia raises $4.5 million to improve virtual learning environment
Press release: ProtonMedia Raises $4.5 Million in Series B Financing Led by Kaplan Ventures LANSDALE, Pa.—ProtonMedia today announced the successful completion of a $4.5 million Series B venture financing led by Kaplan Ventures. ProtonMedia...
Educator pens OpenSim guide
An educator has released a free, 160-page “quick start” guide this week. The guide is a complete instruction manual for schools — or other institutions — looking to set up OpenSim-based environments from scratch....
OpenSim cleans out old regions; new grids emerge
The top 40 OpenSim grids lost a net total of 475 regions since mid May, for a new total of 15,290 regions, but all of that decline — and then some — is accounted...
SpotOn3D seeks gambling partners
Washington, D.C.-based grid SpotOn3D is looking for developers to work on gambling-related projects, now that online gambling has been legalized in the nation’s capital. “This opens up many opportunities for metaverse developers,” Philippe Pascal,...
Study: virtual work force a competitive advantage
Press release: Brandman University Research Study Shows Companies Can Better Embrace Virtual Work Force as a Competitive Advantage Managers eager for workers to understand collaboration tools, but still rely on face-to-face contact for building...
Kitely adds viewer choice, OAR exports
Kitely, a popular cloud-based OpenSim hosting provider, rolled out two frequently requested features today — the ability to export regions, and the ability to choose viewers. These two changes should make it much easier...
1,000 avatars soon coming to a region near you
Intel will release the code for its Distributed Scene Graph 3-D — which allows thousands of avatars on a single OpenSim regions — at the end of June, the company told Hypergrid Business today. The...
VastPark launches open source avatar kit
Press release: VastPark Launches OpenAvatar for Virtual Worlds and Games Washington, DC & Melbourne, Australia — VastPark, an industry leader in virtual worlds, launches OpenAvatar to create an open source standard generator for avatar development...
Utherverse to host virtual business convention
Press release: UtherConvention Trade Show Will Showcase Best of 3D Web and Demonstrate Breakthrough Convention Concept Convention highlights: Session with attorney Greg Piccionelli about intellectual property rights in virtual worlds Educational sessions on PhotoShop, running...
Intel increases OpenSim avatar capacity 20-fold
Press release: Intel Announces New Research and Partnership Efforts at Annual R&D Event Will release open source packages: To increase avatar capacity on an OpenSim region 20 times, allowing thousands of simultaneous visitors To...
InteSolv, On24 partner for virtual events in government, high tech
Press release: InteSolv Announces Virtual Show Partnership with ON24 InteSolv will deliver ON24’s Virtual Show and Virtual Briefing Center products into several key markets, including government, manufacturing, high tech, healthcare and multi-level marketing organizations,...
Hypergrid inventor calls for mass grid migration
Hypergrid inventor Crista Lopes, professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine called today on big public grids to begin a mass migration to lower regions. The reason is that Second Life-compatible viewers...
Study: Virtual health club delivers real weight loss
Press release: ACSM: Weight loss success in a 3-D virtual world Bloomington, Indiana — Participants in two weight-loss programs — one involving traditional health club sessions and the other delivered online in a 3D...
VenueGen execs to discuss e-learning
Press release: Immersive Virtual Classrooms Boost Engagement and ROI for Instructor-Led Training: VenueGen Execs to Discuss at eLearning DEVCON and ICELW VenueGen CEO David Gardner and President Jeff Crown will explore the potential of...
Study: Age no obstacle to entrepreneurship
People who remember the last dot-com boom, and are thinking of launching a virtual worlds business so that they can take part in the next one, need not worry that their memories of the...
Air Force to build virtual training lab on OpenSim
Press Release: Designing Digitally, Inc. Wins 2011 Air Force Research Lab Virtual World Contract FRANKLIN, OH– Teaching students how to build airplanes, robots and simulations is serious business, but Designing Digitally, Inc. plans to make it...
Survey: Virtual events promote in-person attendance
Press release: Virtual Edge Institute and ROI of Engagement’s Multi-Year Study Reveals Effectiveness of Hybrid Events Survey Reveals Different Motivations for Attending Events In Person or Online Virtual Extends Attendance: If no virtual option...
Aurora devs building bridge to OpenSim
Developers of the Aurora Sim version of OpenSim are building a hypergrid bridge to mainline OpenSim, said Enrico Ranucci, head of New Voice, d.i., an Italian technology company that’s been in business since 2005. Aurora...
AvWorlds abandons high-price strategy
The closed, commercial social grid AvWorlds has abandoned its high price strategy — at least for now. When the grid was launched earlier this spring, a single region was priced at $145 a month....
TalentRaspel offers grid management
Customers looking for a high-end grid management service for their OpenSim worlds similar to that offered by PioneerX Estates now have another hosting option — Germany’s TalentRaspel virtual worlds Ltd. has licensed the RCI...
Utherverse takes on 2012 election
Press Release: Virtual Obama, Palin & Trump Set Stage for Most Entertaining Political Season Yet Utherverse Re-Creates Popular Political Figures As 3D Characters For Fun & Free Speech On Virtual Wide Web Vancouver, BC – If...
Avatar meets Superman at Miami Science Museum
Press Release: Avatar Meets Superman At Miami Science Museum NASA Astronaut Leland D. Melvin to lead presentation in Miami Science Museum’s NASA funded Youth EXPO Virtual World Island Sat., May 21st at 10 a.m....
Daden creates world selection tool
Press Release: Daden creates World Finder, a virtual world selection tool Birmingham, U.K. — A simple virtual world selection tool, World Finder, has been created by virtual world specialist’s Daden Limited to help businesses and...
OpenSim grids reach record high
The top 40 OpenSim grids gained a total of 1,199 new regions over the past month, for a new record total of 15,765 regions. The biggest growth was on OSGrid, the non-profit grid which...
HuzuTech releases social virtual worlds platform
Press Release: Huzutech’s Paperworld Takes Social Gaming To New Virtual Worlds HuzuVirtual is a new technology which takes social gaming and community into whole new virtual worlds. GLASGOW — HuzuVirtual is a brand new...
Paper: Students need clear goals in virtual worlds
Virtual worlds like Second Life can successful be used for creative learning activities but only if the students understand the purpose of their activities in the virtual world, and aren’t overwhelmed by the learning...
Survey seeks work users of virtual tech
Press Release: Virtual Edge Institute Launches Extensive Survey about Work-Related Uses of Virtual Technologies Giving away two free iPads to participants Pleasanton, CA – The Virtual Edge Institute (VEI) announced today that it is launching...
SAIC to demo OLIVE at ITEC 2011
Press Release: SAIC Showcases On-Line Interactive Virtual Environment Software Platform at ITEC 2011 Company to demonstrate virtual world technology for collaboration, simulation and training Cologne, Germany — Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) [NYSE: SAI]...
Virtway puts 3D worlds on iPads
Blue Mars has an iPhone client that allows users to change their clothes. There’s an app for Second Life and OpenSim that allows users to chat with other users. VenueGen is working on an...
Researcher tracks virtual movement
A researcher at the University of California in San Diego is seeking participants for a large-scale study of avatar movement in Second Life and OpenSim. The study involves both online questionnaires and in-world movement...
Teleplace Connect to have web viewer
One thing that might keep Teleplace customers from scampering away to its newly open-sourced, free OpenQwaq alternative is the promise of Teleplace Connect — a new version of the Teleplace software with better Sharepoint...
ProtonMedia, Sify partner for virtual training
Press release: ProtonMedia and Sify Sign Technology and Services Agreement Partnership to deliver next-gen virtual learning and training solutions to global life sciences companies LANSDALE, Pa.-ProtonMedia and Sify Software Limited today announced a new...
Teleplace open sources OpenQwaq
Press Release: Teleplace Announces the OpenQwaq Open Source Project for Virtual Workspaces REDWOOD CITY, Calif.– Teleplace, the leading provider of virtual workspaces, today announced a new open source project called OpenQwaq. The OpenQwaq project will...
Survey: Virtual events now the norm
Press Release: Annual Unisfair Survey Shows Virtual and Hybrid Events are the New Normal in Marketing, Training and Collaboration 550 Marketers Weigh in on Why and How They Use Virtual Environments Key findings: 60%...
VastPark teams with Lockbox for virtual security
Press Release: Lockbox and VastPark Announce Strategic Alliance SAN JOSE, CA — Lockbox and VastPark today announced the formation of a strategic partnership that would use each company’s complementary strengths and expertise to create the...
Utherverse hosts virtual Royal Wedding
Press Release: Utherverse Hosts and Provides a Once-in-a-Lifetime Chance to Virtually Participate in and Attend the Royal Wedding Over its 50,000 Site Virtual World Web (VWW) Network Open Event Provides PC and Mac Users...
Meta7 to shut down, citing trademark issues
Magne Metaverse Research LLC, the parent company behind the Meta7 grid, announced on Thursday that it will be shutting down by the end of the month as a result of trandmark-related legal issues. Today,...
Outage underscores the need for backups
Ten Kitely users lost 13 regions this week because of a bug in the company’s software. The bug has been fixed, users compensated for their losses, and a new automated backup system is in...
NSF grants $297,929 to virtual worlds researchers
Press Release: IU shares $297,929 NSF grant to study use of 3D virtual worlds by business and education enterprises BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — The National Science Foundation has awarded $297,929 to a multi-disciplinary team from...
New UK grid offers gambling, $20 sims
A new U.K.-based grid, Tescos, is marketing itself as a gambling destination, with an added bonus of low-cost regions. It’s not the first grid to have gambling in-world — Avination has a number of...
Utherverse launches virtual learning platform
Press Release: UtherAcademy Now Recruiting Instructors & Students for 3D Web Classes Revolutionary Virtual Learning Center Lets World Be Your Classroom Vancouver, BC – Imagine being in your kitchen with your laptop, learning how...
Blue Mars names new CEO
Press Release: Henk Rogers named CEO of Avatar Reality, Inc. Entrepreneur and Interactive Entertainment Visionary Expands Role at 3D Virtual World Company HONOLULU, HI — Avatar Reality, developers of the Blue Mars 3D virtual world and...
Clouds help propel OpenSim growth
The top 40 public OpenSim grids gained more than a 1,000 new regions since this time last month, propelled partly by low-cost cloud-based regions from a new hosting provider, Kitely. There are now a...
HP rolls out virtual banking with Avaya’s Web.alive
Press Release: HP and Avaya Address Banks’ Need to Place Customers at the Center of Service Innovation Virtual Branch and Contact Centers Increase Effectiveness with Enhanced Channel and New Assisted Self-Service Technology NEW YORK...
Digitell Releases New Hybrid Meeting Tool Kit
Press Release: Digitell Releases New Hybrid Meeting Tool Kit Jamestown, NY — Virtual conference vendor Digitell has just released a free hybrid meeting tool kit to assist those organizations in deciding whether to turn their...
UCF students learn accounting virtually
Press Release: The University of Central Florida Deploys Virtual Training for Accountancy Tools Birmingham, UK — The University of Central Florida (UCF), commissioned Daden Limited (Daden) to develop several accountancy orientation exercises in Second Life on UCF’s...
UBM Studios add mobile support
UBM Studios Offers Mobile Support on iOS and Android-Based Tablets for Virtual Events Chicago, IL – Today, UBM Studios announced it now offers support on iOS and Android-based tablet devices including: Video delivery through...
US Air Force Academy launches virtual campus tour
Press Release: Designing Digitally, Inc. Partners with the United States Air Force Academy to Develop a Browser Based 3D Virtual Campus Tour Based on Unity Virtual world developer Designing Digitally, Inc. used the Unity...
InXpo’s VX takes virtual events mobile
Press release: VX Platform Combines Industry Leading Scalability, Reliability and Security with new User Interface, Making Virtual Event Production Easier than Ever CHICAGO — INXPO announces the General Availability of INXPO VX Platform. The...
ProtonMedia to develop virtual clinical trial training
Press Release: ProtonMedia and PPD to Introduce New Virtual Clinical Trial Training Solution LANSDALE, Pa., and WILMINGTON, N.C.—ProtonMedia and PPD, Inc. today announced they have entered into an agreement to jointly develop a new...
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