Saturday, January 26, 2008

Second Life

Second Life(SL) is a three-dimensional virtual world created by Linden Research Inc aka Linden Lab. Users of SL are known as Resident, and an avatar is created to represent each user. Residents can interact with each other, do business, participate in activities,etc. SL users has been growing since 2003. Real world companies, banks, schools,etc have been set up in SL. The world in SL is the same as the real world. However, the law of gravity is being defied in SL. People in SL can fly or tele-port themselves to different places. Places can be built in mid air. One may think that SL is only an online game, but it is not. SL has give everyone a second chance to live the life they wanted. Furthermore, it allows people fulfill their dreams which they can't in the real world. Businesses use SL as a place to test out new products or services, and to do market researches. Schools have been using SL to teach students.

SL has become a huge social networking place for people. SL has created an impact on the real world. Things that happen in SL are being brought over to this real world. For example, in The Business Times, 24th January 2008, an article states: "Virtual Credit card moves into the real world." This article is on a Singapore company which has design a virtual credit card based on Linden dollar( US$1 to L$265, approximate rate). This credit card can allow people to buy real goods. But in the mean time, cardholders can only use it to purchase items like wallpaper, ring tones and games for the mobile phone. It is similar to a person using a real credit card to do online shopping. Furthermore, this Sinapore company, First Meta, is paying its own employees in Linden dollars.

I believe that SL would become more real in the times to come. SL may one day, influence the real world, and have a greater impact on our lives.


Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life
http://www.usnews.com/articles/education/e-learning/2008/01/10/a-second-life-for-higher-ed_print.htm
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/connected/main.jhtml?xml=/connected/2007/11/11/sv_secondlife.xml
http://www.businesstimes.com.sg/sub/bizit/story/0,4574,265061-1201204740,00.html (access this after 6pm)

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Interenet - history,evoulation

In the past 3-4 decade, Internet has evolved from ARPANET which uses it to exchange information to the World Wide Web which is able to do multiple things, and connect people to different part of the world. Internet was invented by the US Department of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) in the 1962. The early Internet users were computer experts, engineers, scientists, and librarians. In 1989, the World Wide Web was invented using the hypertext. The Internet was controlled by the US government until the 1990s before commercialization of Internet was allowed. The commercialized of Internet has brought about many benefits to people all around the world. The modern day Internet has allowed people to get information, run business, play games, even catch up with friends who are in different countries, etc. All these can be done with just a laptop or a personal computer at the comfort in one's home.
In the past, Internet had limited functions with what people can do. Now, most people cannot live without Internet because it has become the basic communication tool with the world. The invention of Internet has changed people's live, and it is still changing and affecting us. Internet has helped businesses to run 24/7. In addition, it helps many companies to save cost. Many individuals can set up businesses on the Internet without having a need to set up a physical shop. Furthermore, Internet has turned people who are "nobody" into someone well-known. The Internet is a place where many opportunities are created. Have you hop on to this trend?

Thursday, January 17, 2008

First entry

This blog is for COM 125 assignments. I guess it would be interesting to submit school stuff by blogging. By the way, I am Wei Si-the owner of this blog.