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Second Life Viewer 2.0

Second Life Viewer 2.0

Could this be the next step for Virtual Worlds?

By Megan Rutherford

Edited by: Jani Pirkola

Thursday, April 08, 2010

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Although it is prettier than the prior releases, it doesn’t really take a giant step for Linden Labs, nor virtual worlds for that matter. A little more intuitive, perhaps a little bit better of a user experience.

Back in February Linden Labs released a new Second Life 2.0 Beta Viewer. With all of the talk about the recent Second Life Viewer 2.0 Beta release, I figured I would give it a whirl. After I download and install the viewer upgrade, I am in. Well my experience was that I was now a bald avatar... no auburn color hair to blow in the wind. Not to mention just random talking and music at the location I entered at with some vulgar language mixed in.

Those not familiar with virtual worlds and not knowing that SL actually has much more to offer may be tempted to exit the new Beta viewer. I on the other hand decide to stay and give SL the benefit of the doubt. Some type of annoying rock music is playing in the background- so I decide the fastest way is to fly in order to get out of the current environment and go explore wherever I was teleported into.

Now you've got to remember that when I test out virtual worlds I want to approach the experience as a complete newbie to the virtual world- the less I know about all the new bells and whistles of the Second Life Viewer 2.0 Beta the better. I want to see if I really notice a difference, and be surprised by the cool things I might find rather than looking back at the SL blog or any other of the publicity that the Beta viewer had ramped up.

Oh now I just ran into the yellow tape asking for age verification- my mind already feels tainted for the party I walked into when entering Second Life so I decide not to even go there. So my quick observations of my 20 minute test drive of the new Second Life Viewer are as follows:

Ability to share (web content)
Cleaner and more user friendly navigation menu
A viewer as 3D browser for the user interface
Movement away from strictly Linden scripting language (i.e. Flash, PHP, etc.)

In my opinion these changes won't lead to a stampede of people signing up for Second Life. For regular SL users the new bells and whistles probably don't even impress all that much, kind of like getting a newer version of your web browser- not too many noticeable changes although may now be happening behind the scenes. However, I can see more potential with the new viewer for companies and educational outlets to utilize SL.

Although it is prettier than the prior releases, it doesn't really take a giant step for Linden Labs, nor virtual worlds for that matter. A little more intuitive, perhaps a little bit better of a user experience. Improvement of overall work applications and use in SL. Who knows what the future holds with Linden Lab's recent purchase of the social network, Avatars United (http://www.avatarsunited.com/), is the next step to go more social?

photos by Zonja Capalini

edited by snowcrashme

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