Take a deep breath, find your happy place.....

There was a surpising amount of chatter in the blogosphere about the meeting last week among a number of companies interested in interoperability in the virtual world space, as well as the subsequent IBM/Linden Labs announcement.

To avoid any misconceptions, this was a first meeting of interested parties in this space to discuss what could be done. As with any meeting, there were people missing that would have contributed to the conversation, however, (to paraphrase Lao-Tzu)

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

What was agreed upon was that we would continue the conversation further and iterate on what made sense (and what didn't) with regards to cross-world interoperability, as well as interoperability with the other billion or so people on the Internet not already using virtual worlds.

There were many companies present, as this needs to be an industry-wide initiative, like the MMI, in order to be successful. Press proclamations aside, the parties at the meeting recognized that and this is the reason we are going to continue to move forward as a group.

It was already discussed that the user community was under-represented at the meeting, and the group is working on how to best integrate user feedback into the process. As with any large group of people with often competing interests, the process will not be overnight nor easy, so please bear with us as we get this effort started.

Comments

[Melissa Yeuxdoux]

Thanks. I will watch this with great interest, and hope that the work will take into consideration "non-standard" avatars--in SL, for example, people have done a great deal to overcome the limitations of the SL avatar model, and would be very disappointed if that cross virtual world mobility strips them of the results of all that work when they move from one place to another.

[Wangxiang Tuxing]

Laozi actually wrote : "A journey of a thousand miles begins beneath one's feet". He regarded action as something arising naturally from stillness and did not place emphasis on the "first step".

I like your blog very much.

[Christian]

Wangxiang,

Yes, your translation is the accurate one (which I actually prefer), but I chose to paraphrase to the common English usage so people could understand that we are taking baby steps at the beginning.

Thanks for the comments. - Christian

[Prokofy Neva]

Actually, now I'm reminded of Osip Mandalshtam:

"We are alive but with no sense of a country beneath our feet" in his 1933 "Stalin" poem, describing his compatriots.

I have to ask: If it was a room that was including everybody, why did only two of the major players put out a press release (that had to have been cleared in advance some weeks, surely) without the rest? Why not have all of them sign on to a very basic and generic statement, announcing something more like what you indicated, the Virtual Worlds Interoperability Forum?

Well, despite this somewhat rocky beginning, it's obvious that it will get more inclusive and there will be lots of conversations in various configurations. I do hope you stick to your resolution in the post below and eat the dogfood right in the virtual worlds themselves. I hope you'll sponsor an SL conversation on this topic soon, for example.

[Peter T]

I like the by-line on your blog. So our employers will find what Flickr, librarything and words? I deride swearing on the net I hope I am ok at work.

[Tobin Titus]

Nice post, Christian. I think what was mistaken by those who saw this as a misguided effort was the nature of the meeting. As has been stated by you, as well as countless others, this meeting was intended to be a jumping off point to determine what we didn't know. Individually, anyone could argue that no one person in the room could do the standards by themselves. However, I was suprised with the collective intelligence in the room despite some of the obvious holes that Raph was so quick (and so right) to point out.

I was actually encouraged that we all didn't agree on everything in the meeting. This means that we all have something to give to the conversation. Abraham Lincoln picked people of obvious disagreement to join his cabinet stating that it was rounded out nicely by the disagreement. He felt that a cabinet that was able to agree at once on every matter was as useless as a monarchy.

While the IBM-sponsored summit was far from Lincoln's cabinet, I think the intentions were good. I am interested to see how this turns out.

[Christian]

Everyone, thanks for the comments! To address the questions one by one:

Prokofy, the IBM/Linden press release had been cooking for a while, I suspect, as it's standard process for most vendors to prepare press releases for conferences like this one. The fact that a multilateral effort ensued (due in no small part to IBM's logistical prowess) does not invalidate their press release with Linden nor invalidate the multilateral effort. They are both moving in the same direction, so it's all good news in my opinion.

As for why we didn't all sign a VWIF statement, probably due to corporate politics and public relations. Large firms need to have a lot of signatures before they can go public with pronouncements like this one, and there was scant time between the meeting on Tuesday and the following day's conference. I asked the group if I could name any of them during my keynote section on the VWIF, and only 2-3 were able to ok it on the spot.

Also to Prok, I have already told my daughters that I am staying home with them the rest of the year (after my resolution) so there's no going back. Nothing in the world will make me go back on a promise to my girls. :-)

Peter T- Then I apologize in advance, as I have a tendency to swear like a drunken sailor on shore leave. This is the benefit of a personal blog with a disclaimer vs. a corporate blog. :-)

Tobin- good to hear from you again! I agree with you completely on your statement about diversity of opinion in the room, and I hope we can increase the diversity of inputs. I also agree with your Lincoln's cabinet reference, and I hope we can have the same excellent result he did in the absence of a single leader. Team of Rivals indeed.

[nic mitham]

Hi Christian,

Shame we didn't get a chance to meet in San Jose last week.

Good work on Interoperability. Sure, it's going to be a very long road, but I think that provided the roadmap is carefully and holistically constructed, the end result (the destination) will be a much better place for virtual worlds.

I'm writing about Interoperability too over on my blog...

http://www.kzero.co.uk/blog/?cat=82

Hope to speak soon,

Nic