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First-Hand Architecture in Second Life (Tech Trends Feature)
October 1, 2007 By: Kenneth WongArchitecture professor uses virtual world as design lab.
Terry Beaubois, director of the Creative Research Lab at Montana State University, had offered to give me a guided architectural tour. One Saturday afternoon, I decided to take him up on it. He was in Bozeman, Montana, doing some work in his lab. I was in San Francisco, California, just finishing lunch. We were 1,100 miles apart, separated by two states (Idaho and Nevada) and one national park (Yellowstone). Yet, one hour later, we were standing next to each other, not in Bozeman or in San Francisco, but in the middle of the Dresden Museum in Germany.
To be precise, we were meeting as two avatars in Second Life, a virtual world spread across a series of anonymous servers (figure 1). My avatar, KennethSF Offcourse, and Beaubois', Tab Scott, strolled into the 3D digital replica of the Dresden Museum, one of more than 6,500 real and imaginary places users can visit in Second Life. In the virtual chapel inside the museum, standing next to a realistically textured piano, staring at the high-resolution portrait of King Augustus III of Poland, I suddenly understood why Beaubois had been holding architecture classes in this virtual environment. It's the next best thing to an expensive field trip to Germany.
 Figure 1. Columnist Kenneth Wong and Terry Beaubois, director of the Creative Research Lab at Montana State University, made a virtual visit to Montana Hall to inspect its outer architecture in Second Life. |
Welcome to the Grid
In late July, Beaubois gave a presentation in Nashville, Tennessee, about how virtual worlds, particularly Second Life, could contribute to the study and practice of architecture. His audience consisted of approximately 200 American Institute of Architects (AIA) members. When he asked those who'd been in Second Life to raise their hands, two timid hands came up.
Beaubois is by no means suggesting this 1:10 ratio accurately reflects the architectural community's awareness of Second Life. "People are sometimes reluctant to hold their hands up in those situations," he said.
However, it did make him realize that he and his students have taken up residence in a universe that still remains largely unexplored by his peers. Perhaps that's not surprising. He's been on the cutting edge before.
In the late 1970s, Beaubois belonged to a committee that was a joint initiative between the California chapter of the AIA and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). At Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, he pored over the tech briefs to find innovative technologies that could be transferred to the building industry.
"[Ames] was one of the first four or five nodes that went live on the Internet," Beaubois recalled. "I was on the Internet when there were only about four or five other places to talk to."
Still the Beginning
Since its birth in 2003, the virtual community in Second Life has grown to a population of more than 8,800,000. (This March, it was roughly 3,380,000.) It has a thriving economy, with an exchange system for converting game currency (LindeX) into real money. On August 9, for example, Linden Lab reported that Second Life residents spent a total of $1,346,459 within the last 24 hours (that's in U.S. currency, not in LindeX).
But Second Life is an emerging technology as well. As such, we should set realistic expectations for its performance. "The fact of the matter is, Second Life is down from time to time. There are times when it isn't working," Beaubois warned.
On August 9, the Grid Update section in the official Second Life blog registered several bugs: "Network Connectivity Problems" at 3:44 A.M., followed by "Service Outage for Several Regions" at 2:16 P.M. The last update at 6:48 P.M. read, "The Operations team is still hard at work on this . . . "
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