Table of Contents
About Pfeiffer
Title Page
Copyright Page
Foreword
Preface
Getting Started
The Best Way to Read This Book
Continuing the Discussion
Acknowledgements
Part One - Exploring the Possibilities
Chapter 1 - Here Comes the Immersive Internet!
The Invisibly Pervasive Web
Welcome to the Webvolution
Social Production Comes of Age
The Immersive Internet Singularity
Business Unusual
Chapter 2 - Learning to Change
Challenging Classroom Captivation
A Preoccupation with Productivity
Seven Scary Problems with the Status Quo
Compounded Marginalization
Networked Learning
Learning to Change
Chapter 3 - Escaping Flatland
A Brave New Learning World
From Interactivity to Engagement
The Seven Sensibilities of VIEs
Synthesizing the Sensibilities
Implications for Trainers and Educators
Part Two - Building a Blueprint
Chapter 4 - Architecting Learning Experiences
Avoiding the Buggy-Whip Experience
3D Learning Experience Design Principles
Synthesizing the Principles
From Principles to Macrostructures
From Macrostructures to Archetypes and Sensibilities
Achieving Architectural Alignment
Implications for Learning Professionals
Chapter 5 - Designing by Archetype
Introduction
Creation of the Archetypes
Defining the Archetypes
Instructional Goals
Implications for Learning Professionals
Chapter 6 - Learning from Experience
Follow the Leaders
Case Study Format and Questions
Case 1: Diversity and Inclusion with Virtual Worlds
Case 2: Experiencing an Inventory Observation
Case 3: Witnessing History in Virtual Worlds: Kristallnacht—The November 1938 Pogroms
Case 4: Virtual First-Responder Learning Experience
Case 5: Virtual Border Service Officer Training
Case 6: Teaching Rhetoric in a Virtual Environment
Case 7: Environmental Science in a Virtual Green Home
Case 8: Creating a Virtual Challenge for Global Graduates
Case 9: Hosting Virtual Academy of Technology Events
Part Three - BreakingNewGround
Chapter 7 - Overcoming Being Addled by Addie
Avoiding the Virtual Ghost Town
Development Team
Design Points for Virtual Learning Worlds
Leveraging the ADDIE Model
Step-by-Step Designing Process
Working with a Third-Party Virtual World Vendor
Implications for Trainers and Educators
Chapter 8 - Steps to Successful Enterprise Adoption
Introduction
Diffusion of Innovations
Crafting the Business or Education Case for VIEs
Implementation Considerations
Implications for Learning Professionals
Chapter 9 - Rules from Revolutionaries
Meet the Revolutionaries
Essay Format and Questions
Essay 1
Essay 2
Essay 3
Essay 4
Rules from Revolutionaries
Part Four - Just Beyond the Horizon
Chapter 10 - Back to the Future
Introduction
Moving from 2D to 3D
3D Learning Maturity Model
Conclusion
Appendix - Defining Learning in a 3D Virtual Space
Glossary
Notes
Index
About the Authors
About the Contributors
About Pfeiffer
Pfeiffer serves the professional development and hands-on resource needs of training and human resource practitioners and gives them products to do their jobs better. We deliver proven ideas and solutions from experts in HR development and HR management, and we offer effective and customizable tools to improve workplace performance. From novice to seasoned professional, Pfeiffer is the source you can trust to make yourself and your organization more successful.
Essential Knowledge Pfeiffer produces insightful, practical, and comprehensive materials on topics that matter the most to training and HR professionals. Our Essential Knowledge resources translate the expertise of seasoned professionals into practical, how-to guidance on critical workplace issues and problems. These resources are supported by case studies, worksheets, and job aids and are frequently supplemented with CD-ROMs, websites, and other means of making the content easier to read, understand, and use.
Essential Tools Pfeiffer’s Essential Tools resources save time and expense by offering proven, ready-to-use materials-including exercises, activities, games, instruments, and assessments—for use during a training or-team-learning event. These resources are frequently offered in looseleaf or CD-ROM format to facilitate copying and customization of the material.
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Essential resources for training and HR professionals
Instructors are invited to download a FREE Instructor’s Manual with tools and information
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www.wiley.com/college/kapp to download your copy.
Foreword
CONTENT HAS ALWAYS BEEN the center of the human-computer interface. We have lived now for decades with the “desktop” and the “filing cabinet” being the primary metaphor for the human—computer interaction. In learning, we spent years implementing learning management systems that are essentially prisons for learning content. We had to be sure the data about our students was properly tracked and scored—we missed the point about learning. We had a focus on content that reflected the hierarchy of our organizations and of our learning models that were available at that time. Now with the emergence of live avatar-based virtual environments, we have the opportunity to move beyond content, beyond rigid hierarchies, beyond the desktop, to a learning environment focused on the context of learning. Now learning in context will become the most empowering component for learning and collaboration for humans and the human—computer interface will be more naturalistic.
Why do business and learning professionals need to consider virtual immersive environments seriously for learning and collaboration? Why is a new computer—human interface important? Consider the following:
• Recently, scientists, using the most advanced instrumentation, have informed us that the universe is 13.73 billion years old, give or take 120 million years.
• The generally accepted age for the Earth, and the rest of the solar system, is about 4.55 billion years.
• Biological life has been flourishing on our pale blue planet for a significant portion of that 4.55 billion years, with relatively intelligent mammalian bipeds showing up only a few hundred thousand years ago.
• I’ve only been able to buy cool used guitars online for the past ten years or so.
It’s time to move forward in the learning and development field. To this point, the book you are about to read paints a straight arrow of truth toward that future. You will read a grand sweeping vision of how social production and distributed learning will change culture and business as we know it. You will also see iteration points along this early timeline in the form of specific examples and case studies. Throughout, you will witness the convergence of collaboration and learning to create the new immersive Internet. I believe this new Internet will have an important impact on the enterprise as we know it. Modern work life, as we experience it today, is like drinking from a giant fire hose of data. An avalanche of content rains down on our inbox, mobile device, and browser, but data does not give us meaning.
Human interaction is what gives us meaning. And as the consumer social networking and gaming worlds have shown us, our children have already evolved their fathers’ Internet from a digital billboard to a PLACE where people go to end their personal isolation. A place they go to find meaning. This powerful new context will be a foundation upon which we will build a new economy, one in which rapidly iterated context shapes the information and data flows of our lives into contextual meaning.
This will not be a nice-to-have option in the “post-depression” economy. The only competitive advantage any organization can hope to leverage in this brave new world is the efficiency (speed) and efficacy (retention/focus) of knowledge transfer, and the 3D Internet aids both.“ Knowledge transfer is the ultimate currency of the future. It will flow most effectively when collaboration and learning move beyond time-bound “events” where data is downloaded. To a new contextual “always on” sphere of connectivity, where content and context flow like the signals between neurons in a massive and highly adaptive communal brain.
Learning has been and always will be the mechanism of adaptation for us. It is the means by which knowledge is transferred. But now in these most difficult times, organizations must do it very quickly, or be obliterated by Darwinistic market forces. We must now learn top down, bottom up, and side to side, breaking down traditional hierarchies and organizational boundaries. Collaboration and learning will merge to create a powerful “knowledge network” effect, obsolescing traditional organizational hierarchies and functional silos. Learning professionals have an opportunity to leverage this shift to gain a more strategic seat at the executive table.
The two men who have collaborated to write this book, Dr. Tony O’Driscoll, Professor of the Practice at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business, and Dr. Karl M. Kapp, Professor of Instructional Technology at Bloomsburg University, are two of the most dynamic minds I have ever met. If you ever earn the honor of a meal with the two of them together, you will instantly feel as if some invisible force has increased your IQ. They have put together a text here that I think will increase the collective IQ for this entire emerging space. As such, I invite you to stay connected with Tony and Karl and this evolving work by joining and contributing to their wiki book and collaborative space at www.learningin3d.info.
The ancient mystics have long taught us that the key to enlightenment is to put some “space” between our thoughts—to be present in the moment to the flow of our ideas, so that we might understand them before we react to them. Had the fallen titans of Wall Street had a similar mechanism for their large and deeply dysfunctional organizations, perhaps the economic crisis we have experienced in recent times may not have happened. Let us use this opportunity in time to create more self-aware organizations, in which we never let blind content rule entire social and financial organizations.
The emerging Immersive Internet holds the promise of a more human net, a more effective way of communicating—one where we can learn to live and work together in new and more sustainable ways.
Ron Burns
CEO
ProtonMedia
Preface
ANYONE WHO HAS EXPERIENCED the process of building a house has learned first-hand that there is a core set of steps that are absolutely essential for ensuring that the finished product does not disappoint. We believe steps for building an immersive three-dimensional (3D) learning experience are not much different.
The first step in building a house involves active exploration of the possibility space to iteratively determine what is “in” and what is “out” based on criteria such as preferred style, the shape of the land, and the available budget. This step usually culminates with a rough idea of the desirable design elements to be included in the house.
The next step involves working with an architect to craft an integrated blueprint that outlines in great detail how all of the design elements identified in step one converge into a cohesive whole. This step also cycles through a number of iterations based on tradeoffs between preferred layout and architectural constraints.
Once the architectural blueprint is finalized, the final step begins with breaking ground and culminates with a move-in. Whether the experience between these two events is positive or negative is largely a function of how well the plan to move from “blueprint to building” is managed and executed. In any building project, there are always unanticipated circumstances and obstacles that require changes. Without a solid planning process that can accommodate these unanticipated changes, the likelihood of a negative outcome dramatically increases.
This purpose of this book is to describe how to avoid a negative outcome as you work to build engaging 3D learning experiences. As such, the primary steps associated with building a house outlined above provide a good framework to structure the first three parts of this book.
This book contains a great deal of information, tools, models, and advice from the authors and others within this nascent field. The goal of the book is to provide you with a breadth of knowledge so that you begin the process of creating a virtual immersive environment by applying the models and tools provided.
Getting Started
If you are familiar with virtual worlds and avatars, you can jump right in at Chapter 1. If you are a little less familiar, you might want to review the Appendix and get acquainted with the convergence of e-learning technologies and virtual world technologies into the three-dimensional learning worlds available today. This preface lays the groundwork for understanding terminology and the context in which virtual worlds have begun to be used for learning purposes.
Part I: Exploring the Possibilities
The first part of this book revolves around three words: Progress, Problems, and Possibilities.
Chapter 1, Here Comes the Immersive Internet, answers the following questions: What is the Immersive Internet, and how is it impacting the businesses that the learning function serves? It describes how Immersive Internet technology has progressed to a point at which it is beginning to redefine both society and industry. This chapter also examines how business-as-usual is becoming “business unusual” as a result of the convergence of four technology vectors that are driving the business environment toward the creation of new economic platforms based on social production.
Chapter 2, Learning to Change, answers the following questions: What is wrong with the learning function’s current approach to addressing business unusual, and why must it change? It describes the problems that a modern-day organization faces due to its inability to adapt and change as rapidly as the environment within which it operates. This chapter also highlights the growing disconnect between the learning needs of the modern-day enterprise and the ability of the traditional learning function to address them.
Chapter 3, Escaping Flatland, answers the following questions: What is 3D learning, and why is it better suited to meet the needs of business unusual? It explores the possibilities of a new learning paradigm that is enabled by the same Immersive Internet technologies that are revolutionizing business. This chapter also introduces two vignettes that compare a “Flatland” 2D learning experience to an immersive and engaging 3D learning experience.
As was the case in building a house, once the possibility space has been explored, the next step focuses on architecture.
Part II: Building a Blueprint
The second part of this book revolves around three words: Principles, Archetypes, and Examples.
Chapter 4, Architecting Learning Experiences, answers the following questions: What are the 3D learning design principles, and how are they applied to create a 3D learning experience blueprint? It describes the key design principles required to build engaging 3D learning experiences. This chapter also presents a comprehensive 3D learning architecture that can be applied to create a blueprint that ensures alignment and balance in the design of compelling 3D learning experiences.
Chapter 5, Designing by Archetype, answers the following question: How can learning archetypes be applied as building blocks in the design of engaging 3D learning experiences? It describes eleven learning archetypes that form the basic building blocks for creating 3D learning experiences. This chapter also presents comprehensive definitions of each archetype and provides examples of how the building blocks can be applied to create compelling 3D learning experiences.
Chapter 6, Learning from Experience, answers the following questions: Who has successfully designed 3D learning experiences, and what can be learned from their experience? It describes nine case studies of successful 3D learning experience designs and maps these designs back to the archetypes that were used to create them.
As was the case in building a house, once the blueprint has been created, the next step focuses on execution.
Part III: Breaking New Ground
The third part of this book revolves around three words: Process, Adoption, and Rules.
Chapter 7, Overcoming Being Addled byADDIE, answers the following question: How does the traditionalADDIEprocesschange when it is applied to create 3D learning experiences? It describes how the existing ADDIE process must be augmented to address the nuances associated with analyzing, designing, developing, implementing and evaluating 3D learning experiences.
Chapter 8, Steps to Successful Enterprise Adoption, answers the following question: What key steps are required to drive adoption of3D learning experiences within the enterprise? It describes the steps required to drive adoption of 3D learning experiences by mapping them to the diffusion of innovation attractiveness criteria: Relative Advantage, Compatibility, Complexity, Trialability, and Observability.
Chapter 9, Rules from Revolutionaries, answers the following questions: Who else has successfully driven 3D learning adoption, and what can be learned from their experience?It presents four essays from front-line revolutionaries who share their insights on how they changed the rules and convinced their organizations to adopt 3D learning.
The final part of this book explores what lies ahead for 3D learning.
Part IV: Just Beyond the Horizon
The final part of this book revolves around one word: Future.
Chapter 10, Back to the Future, answers the following questions: What’s next for 3D learning, and what will things look like in 2020? It describes a maturity model that argues that immersive technologies will evolve from learning to eventually encompassing all work activity and how you can move your organization toward that eventuality. It also presents two essays that envision the future of 3D learning from two of the industry’s leading visionaries.
In short, the ten chapters in this book can be summarized in ten simple words: Progress, Problems, Possibilities, Principles, Archetypes, Examples, Processes, Adoption, Rules, and Future.
The Best Way to Read This Book
In the spirit of learning from experience, this book is designed to strike a balance between description and prescription. It can be used as a primer or introductory text to introduce the topic of 3D learning, but it is also designed as a practical field-book to help teams that are actually in the midst of designing 3D learning experiences within their workplaces.
If you are reading this book as a primer, it makes the most sense to read the chapters in chronological order. Pause after each part to ensure you understand the key arguments and positions in each chapter and then move on to the next part.
Another approach to consider might be to cover the contents of the book as a team or group. Divide your team, department, or faculty into reading clubs and read a chapter each week. Then, once a week, the group could get together and discuss the salient and thought-provoking points. How can you help the organization design meaningful learning in 3D worlds? What guidelines should we establish for someone teaching in a 3D virtual world? Can we sell 3D virtual worlds to our leadership? How do we implement these ideas?
This group approach will spark discussion, provide insightful solutions, and guide you to develop your own methods of applying the ideas and concepts in this book to your own organization or classroom. It will also begin discussions about the future of learning within your organization that may not have occurred otherwise. These conversations, even when slightly off-topic, will be valuable in strengthening your organization in terms of maximizing the use of virtual immersive environments.
If you are in the midst of designing a 3DLE, we encourage you to become intimately familiar with Part II of the book. Work with your peers on the design team to ensure that you all understand each level of the architecture and test each other to ensure that you have applied the architecture in a way that ensures alignment and balance in the design of instruction.
Graduate and undergraduate students in particular will find this book of interest, as the need to create, interact, and learn within these 3D environments will continue to grow as the generations that have grown up with video games demand interfaces that are just as rich and vibrant in corporate and academic settings. The first part of the book will be of particular interest, as it describes why the change to 3D learning is not cosmetic, but deep and fundamental.
We wish you all the best in your quest to bring a new dimension to learning within your workplace or academic environment!
Continuing the Discussion
A topic like this does not remain static; it is constantly moving as technology and our understandings of the power of these environments to foster learning and collaboration continue to grow. In an effort to continue the dialogue in real time and to make real progress in helping others understand virtual worlds, we are creating a website (www.learningin3d.info), which contains a space for you to respond to blogs on the subject, a wiki for you to update terms and definitions, and video and podcasts on the topic. You will also find lists of resources and white papers to help you implement and manage 3D learning events. Additionally, you will find the ability to enter into a virtual immersive environment (VIE) and check it out for yourself. You will meet virtual renderings of the authors and interact with others within the space as we have in-world book launches and educational sessions. Most importantly, with these web tools, you will find room to contribute your knowledge, thoughts, and wisdom on the subject. Please visit and share your knowledge and experience of how 3D virtual worlds are impacting you and your organization.
This book provides a list of recommendations and techniques for conducting learning in a 3D virtual learning world. These new and sometimes radical ideas push the knowledge and innovation envelope and sometimes even personal comfort levels. Academic, corporate, and non-profit organizations that adopt 3D virtual worlds for learning will partake in a new and exciting venture that will move online learning far ahead of where it is today.
Acknowledgments
WE OFTEN TEND TO think of the creative endeavor as a solitary one. The next Einstein, we posit, is holed up in a dark office somewhere just on the cusp of a Eureka moment that will change the world.
My own experience suggests something different. The creative endeavor you hold in your hands is the work of many people. Their respective contributions came together in record time and almost magically found their way into a constantly evolving outline that ebbed and flowed the more we learned in talking to each other and with others. In fact, this book is probably more aptly described as a collective experience, as opposed to a creative endeavor.
However we ultimately describe it, one thing is sure, this book would never have come into existence without:
• My parents, who decided to have a child. Thank you Mum and Dad!
• The countless educators who patiently guided me along the long and winding path to completing my doctoral work. Thanks to all of you.
• My incredibly patient wife and family. Thank you Theresa, Aidan, and Liam.
• A world-class university and a stellar group of administrators at the
Fuqua School of Business who supported me in this effort. Thanks Blair, Bill, Jennifer, and Wendy.
• A co-author patient enough to put up with me. Thank you Karl.
• An editor who was willing to allow us the space and time to write the book we wanted to. Thank you Matt.
• A group of selfless Immersive Internet pioneers who willingly shared their insights and wisdom to make this book the best it can be. Thanks to you all.
Tony O’Driscoll
Raleigh, North Carolina
September 1, 2009
Writing is such a rollercoaster experience, the lows of deadlines, writer’s block and searching for that darn missing reference and the highs of new knowledge acquired through the collaborative writing process, understandings gained from questioning my assumptions, and new insights developed through shared vision. Writing this book with all the great contributors and my great co-author has been fun. This book is truly a “mash up” of wonderful minds all contributing to the final product.
So I’d like to acknowledge:
• The eLearning Guild for bringing Tony and me together for the essay that started this whole thing.
• My mother for her continued and unfailing belief in me over the years.
• My late father for his sense of patience, thoughtfulness, and dry humor.
• My awesome family. Nancy, Nate, and Nick are simply the best! Special thanks to Nancy.
• All the wonderful students, who question, prod, and push my thinking in continually new directions. You give me such energy.
• Teachers, faculty members, and other educators who have continued to inspire me.
• Bloomsburg University’s Department of Instructional Technology. I couldn’t ask to work with better faculty and staff at any university. A special thanks to Alexandra Varias, who helped with a variety of last-minute organizational tasks, and to Karen Swartz, who is always helpful.
• Kaplan-EduNeering and Performance Development Group—two clients who continue to provide me with opportunities to apply theory, design, and concepts to solve organizational learning problems.
• Tony, writing this book has been a lot of fun. Really enjoyed sharing ideas, late nights, and impromptu Skype calls. Thanks Tony!
• Thanks to Matthew Davis for our little extension. Always appreciated. And thanks for his vision and forward thinking to bring this book to life.
• And to echo Tony’s sentiment: Thanks to a group of selfless Immersive Internet pioneers who willingly shared their insights and wisdom to make this book the best it can be.
Karl M. Kapp
Bloomsburg, PA
September 1, 2009.
Part One
Exploring the Possibilities
1
Here Comes the Immersive Internet!
“OMG, I AM SO BUSTED! ... Mom found the bottle of vodka Tyler got us in the trunk of the car.... She is going to tell dad when he gets home.... NEED HELP! ... 17 and my life is already over ... All hands on deck.... Get everyone on FB right NOW. . . . Dad home in 45 minutes.... I CAN’T get grounded next weekend..... I am so PSYCHED about going to the dance with Mark. ”
Instantly, Jessica’s network comes to life. Those not on Facebook are notified via text message. Just to be sure no one is missed, Jessica sends out a tweet: “Need help right now .... mom found vodka ....dad home in 45 mins .... meet on FB right NOW!”
Within a minute Jessica’s friends are convened. “When I got busted I worked on my mom to make sure dad didn’t ground me for too long,” says Ashley. “Yeah but Jessica’s mom is not as much of a pushover as your mom, ” says Matt. “When I got busted I owned up to making a mistake with my dad and that worked better. ” “But wait, can’t we work Tyler into the picture here?” says Samantha. “After all, he is Jessica’s older brother.” “I know, ” says Brittany, “let’s get Tyler to say he got the Vodka for someone else and left it in the car by mistake.... Is he online? ... Let’s get him in here now. ”
And so it goes on: Each of Jessica’s friends bringing his or her respective experience and insights to solve her pressing issue. In twenty short minutes they converge on a story and a set of arguments to maximize the potential that Jessica gets to go on that all-important date with Mark!
Meanwhile, dad pulls into the driveway. Tired from a long day’s work and frustrated from the traffic jam on the way home, he asks himself, “I wonder if there is any way I could slip out to the patio and read the paper in peace for a half-hour before dinner?”
Little does he know what is waiting for him inside!
The Invisibly Pervasive Web
On April 22, 1993, the Mosaic web browser was introduced to the world. And, for the past sixteen years, we have collectively surfed the digital domain of the web to a point where it has become so ubiquitous we take it for granted.1 Just like the air we breathe to stay alive, we only notice the real impact the web has on our lives in its absence.
Skeptical? Pause to consider how many times you access the web each day. Or think about how many e-Vites, Linkedln, or Facebook invitations you receive weekly. Add to that the number of text messages or tweets you write or receive on a monthly basis and the pervasiveness of how much the web is permeating your life becomes more clear.
The next time the web is “down” at your place of work, closely examine the behavior of your co-workers. Most likely, you will observe groups of people aimlessly wandering the halls behaving as if they have suffered some strange form of collective amnesia as to their roles in the organization and how they add value. Observe today’s college students working to complete a research project. If the web went down, these digital natives would have no clue how to navigate the real stacks in an actual library. To them, research means searching on EBSC02 and downloading the PDF of the paper to their laptop in a wireless café.
Today, the web has permeated what we do socially, professionally, and educationally to such an extent that we have become oblivious to the profound changes it has brought to how we connect, communicate, coordinate, collaborate, and take collective action. Recognizing that browser software is younger than Jessica in the vignette above, it is daunting to consider just how rapidly the World Wide Web has transformed how we interact socially and collaborate professionally.
As the Internet continues to pervade society, the scarcity paradigm that undergirds most modern economic theory is being challenged. Unlike currency, information is non-appropriable, which essentially means that it can be shared without being given away. Today, information no longer moves in one direction, from the top of the enterprise to the bottom or from teacher to student. Instead, it has a social life all its own.3 Information travels from place to place based on individuals’ desire to interact with it, because they want to make more effective decisions or develop keener insights about a particular situation, or because someone is motivated to learn about a certain topic or how to complete a given task.
We are witnessing the acceleration of the co-evolution of society and technology. In a socio-technical system like the one we are in, information is the currency, individuals are the transport mechanism, interaction is the transfer mechanism, and insight is the value-added outcome. Given this context, we can begin to conceive of the web’s own evolution as a pervasive and expanding ecosystem whose central purpose is to facilitate collective action, learning, and growth. In this evolutionary process, it is natural that the three-dimensional web will be a large part of society’s increasingly digital future. The societal, professional, and educational consequences of this emerging learning ecosystem are beginning to take shape on a large scale.
Mark Zukerberg, CEO of Facebook, suggests that communication should not be viewed as a way for people to get information. Instead, he proposes that information is a mechanism to foster better communication between people.4 While the mission of Google is to organize the world’s information, it appears that Zukerberg is more focused on leveraging information to organize better interactions between people. It is this subtle yet significant reframing of the relationship between information, communication, and people that allowed Jessica to leverage the Facebook platform to connect with her friends, communicate her pressing issue, collaborate with others at a distance to develop a solution, and take action to ensure that she still got to go on that date with Mark. Poor old dad never had a chance!
To understand the convergence of communication, collaboration, and the inevitable trajectory of the web toward a 3D interface, it is important to understand the transformation of the web and track its maturation as a communication, learning, and collaboration medium. In less than two decades, the commercial web had experienced two full evolutionary waves and is now at the beginning of a powerful third wave that will bring the web into the third dimension.
Welcome to the Webvolution
“This could not be more perfect.” Jessica thought to herself as she slow danced to her favorite song with Mark. She looked toward Ashley and Brittany, and they both smiled and gave her a thumbs-up. “I wish this song would never end. ” Jessica thought to herself.
When it did, Mark asked if she wanted to go out to the patio for a chat. As they walked under the stars, she could see Matt, Ashley, and Brittany pointing, giggling, and high-fiving each other out of the corner of her eye. It was clear that they had pulled this off and she was so thankful. She was not sure that their grand plan would work, but she was so desperate to see Mark again that she had been willing to try anything. Now she was very glad she did.
Unfortunately, two nights before the dance, Tyler, Jessica’s older brother, blew her cover after they got into a fight. So she and her friends were grounded by their parents and could not attend the dance. As luck would have it, Mark couldn’t go to the dance either, as his family had to unexpectedly visit their grandmother, who had broken her hip.
During another Facebook jam session to deal with this turn of events, Matt suggested they set up a virtual dance in the 3D virtual space of Second Life so all the kids who were grounded could attend the event virtually. The friends worked together for a whole day getting the invite list out to all the grounded kids (and Mark), building the virtual dance hall, and figuring out how to pipe the DJ’s audio from the actual dance into their online 3D dance hall.
While all the folks were hanging out in “meatspace” at the school gymnasium, Mark and Jessica, while distant from each other physically, could not have felt more together as they chatted on the virtual patio via VolP. “I’d really like to see you again when I get home, Jessica. Would you like to go see a movie with me next weekend?” Jessica smiled, and without trying to sound too eager, replied with a cool, “Yeah, that might be fun. She then muted her audio and let out a huge yell “Yahooooooo!” while simultaneously jumping up and down on her bed and Twittering that she got a movie date with Mark!
Dad, still on a mission to read his newspaper in peace, came scurrying up the stairs and pounded on her door “What are you doing in there? Don’t you know you are grounded? Keep it down will you. If you keep this up you will never get to go to a dance again. ”
Mark, Jessica and their friends are participating in the third wave of the World Wide Web. They are interacting, communicating, and collaborating within the web. This ability to interact within the web is a hallmark of the third wave of the webvolution. To date, the web has experienced three evolutionary waves:
• Web 1.0 was focused on connecting “TO” the web;
• Web 2.0 is focused on connecting “THROUGH” the web; and
• Web 3.0, which is happening now, is focused on connecting “WITHIN” the web.
The next sections of this chapter explore each wave of the webvolution (see Figure 1.1) and illustrate how we have arrived at this evolutionary convergence of technology, communication, and collaboration.
Web 1.0: Access and Find
With the arrival of the browser in 1993, Web 1.0 provided society with the opportunity to access more information than ever before. The early “read only” web provided basic text, graphics, and information to anyone who could access it via a browser. As couch potatoes turned into mouse potatoes, firms in the financial services, banking, and travel industries seized the opportunity to provide their customers with web-based access to information that drove more transactions and generated additional revenues. Information technology (IT) infrastructure and telecommunications companies rode the Web 1.0 wave by building the technical platform that provided web-access to more and more customers. New Internet service provider (ISP) companies such as AOL and Prodigy emerged to provide support and service as an on-ramp to this new medium for a rapidly growing customer base.
Figure 1.1. The Three Webvolution Waves
As the amount of available content grew exponentially, the need to effectively and efficiently find information on the web became paramount. Initially, search engines with names like Lycos and WebCrawler became popular. Eventually, Yahoo garnered significant traction in meeting the need to quickly find information in the vast repositories of the web. It accomplished its goal by cataloging and organizing web content. By the end of 1994, Yahoo had received over one-million hits.5
In the fast-changing world of the web, Yahoo was eventually overthrown by Google. In a few short years, Google became the dominant player in addressing the “Find” value proposition based on Sergey Brin and Larry Page’s patented PageRank search algorithm.6 Thus began Google’s ascendancy to the Internet powerhouse it is today. By identifying and addressing an unmet need that emerged from the first wave of the webvolution—the need to “find” information on the web—Google secured its place in business history.
Amazon’s Jeff Bezos saw another way to leverage Web 1.0 for economic gain. In so doing, he successfully took on the largest brick-and-mortar bookstores in the world. His idea was that, while most large retail bookstores could offer as many as 200,000 titles, an online bookstore could ultimately offer many more.7 The lower cost structure of not having to maintain brick-and-mortar retail outlets could be applied toward optimizing the supply chain. In many ways the now familiar concept of long-tail economics, popularized by Chris Anderson at Wired, was at the core of Bezos’ vision.8 More importantly, since the virtual storefront aggregated access for consumers, Amazon’s popular book rating and referral system—often cited as a differentiator for Amazon over traditional retail outlets—allowed the company to offer targeted book referrals, driving additional revenues.
If we examine closely the underpinnings of what made both Google and Amazon’s value propositions compelling to nascent web users, or “netizens” as they came to be called, it becomes evident that they both leveraged the aggregated behavior of many users to differentiate their respective offerings. Google’s page rank system assigns a weight to a web page based on the number of pages that link to it. The more a page is linked to, the higher its relative importance. By aggregating this data as a mechanism for prioritizing search returns, Google provides customers with more effective search results. Similarly, by aggregating the buying patterns of customers, Amazon can make referrals to customers with similar buying patterns that are likely to result in more book purchases.
In both cases, it appears that Bezos, Brin, and Page had, knowingly or not, presaged the next webvolution wave: Web 2.0—The participatory “read-write” web.
Web 2.0: Share, Participate, Collaborate
During the Web 2.0 wave, the focus shifted from connecting people “to” the web to enabling people to connect “through” the web to share, participate, and collaborate. As outlined in Figure 1.1, file sharing software like Napster serves as a bridge between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0.
In 1999, Shawn Fanning launched Napster, an online music file sharing service.9 In so doing, he disrupted the existing value chain of the music industry at its core. Suddenly, instead of traveling to a record store to buy a physical piece of media (a CD or cassette), people instantly downloaded an MP3 music file from the web. The key point here is not that people could access music files on the web, but how those music files were made available in the first place. In essence, people took advantage of the all-but-unenforceable illegality of Fanning’s peer-to-peer file-sharing technology to share music collections for free. Much has been written on how Napster created a technological discontinuity that fundamentally disrupted the music industry. The Web 2.0 “share” value proposition that was leveraged by people using the Napster platform is what ultimately created this disruption.
Moving from sharing music to sharing video is a logical next step. The music and movie industries have very similar business models and value chain dynamics. One obvious difference is that movies and video programming have a larger digital payload than music files. In the early days of the web there were many skeptics in the movie and broadcast media industry. One of the most notable among them was Stephen Weiswasser, then senior vice president of ABC, who confidently proclaimed, “You are not going to turn passive consumers into trollers on the Internet.”10
Those of you who have teenagers know all too well that Weiswasser’s proclamation was errant. Today’s net generation is anything but passive. They want to interact and collaborate on an ongoing basis with their peer networks. They want to be engaged in the creative process rather than just be a consumer of it. They refuse to sit passively digesting broadcast media. Instead, like Jessica and her friends in the earlier vignette, they literally live on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, where they share, create, participate, and collaborate on an ongoing basis.
In September of 2008, Nielsen reported that MySpace had fifty-nine million users and Facebook had thirty-nine million.11 Less than one year later MySpace has ballooned to 300 million users and Facebook is not far behind with 276 million.12 To put this in context, if MySpace and Facebook were viewed as virtual countries where netizens reside, MySpace would be the fifth largest country in the world and Facebook would be the sixth.13
One of the things that these netizens do in their virtual social habitat is share media. Pictures and videos are instantly uploaded from the cell-phone to the online photo site of Flickr and into the video site, YouTube. These media then begin a social life all their own as they are tagged and commented on by others as they traverse the Web 2.0 landscape at the speed of light.
YouTube, founded in 2005, is a video sharing website that allows users to upload, view, and share video clips.14 Each day about nine thousand hours of video content is uploaded to YouTube. To put this in context, aggregating all the programming from the three primary networks (ABC, NBC, CBS) for the past sixty years would result in a total of 1.5 million hours of video programming. Those 1.5 million hours are equivalent to less than six months worth of video content submitted to YouTube.15
YouTube is a platform that has provided a user-generated alternative to the enterprise studio and broadcast approaches for media access and distribution. In short, with the arrival of Web 2.0 technologies that enable netizens to share, participate, and collaborate, we are witnessing a redefinition of how the media and entertainment industry develops and distributes content. This shift brings with it the need for a redefinition in the industry’s enterprise structure and business model to address the threat of the user-generated content.
For those of you who may have an old collection of physical media (vinyl albums, eight-track tapes, or Betamax movies) that are taking up space in your basement or attic, there is still hope! In 1995, eBay founder, Pierre Omidyar’s vision was to provide a web-based platform that allowed people to buy and sell goods via an online auction site. Ten short years later, eBay was conducting approximately ten billion web services transactions a year,16 and more than 700,000 Americans reported that eBay was their primary or secondary source of income.17 Through eBay, netizens now have the ability to participate in a digital world-wide yard sale, turning their trash into someone else’s treasure. Instead of working for eBay, eBay works for them.
As we move into the next wave of the webvolution, we observe a continuing trend in the creation of economic platforms that cultivate new forms of innovative co-creation leading to different forms of wealth creation for those netizens who choose to participate.
If Napster was the bridge from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0, Wikipedia is the bridge from Web 2.0 to the Immersive Internet. In founding Wikipedia in 2002, Jimmy Wales’ vision was that every single person on the planet should be given free access to the sum of all human knowledge.18 Leveraging the ability that Web 2.0 tools brought to allow people to connect “through” the web, Wikipedia derives its value from enabling collaborative action through “crowdsourcing.”19 Crowdsourcing is defined as “the act of taking a task traditionally performed by an employee or contractor and outsourcing it to an undefined, generally large group of people, in the form of an open call.”20
In the case of Wikipedia, the task that was outsourced to netizens at large was the creation of the world’s largest encyclopedia. In the past seven years Wikipedia has grown to twelve million articles written collaboratively by volunteers around the world.21 This same crowdsourcing phenomenon has been successfully leveraged in the development of open source software such as the Linux operating system. Both Wikipedia and Linux activate the “collaboration” and “co-creation” value propositions of the web—in one case for the development of the world’s largest digital encyclopedia and in the other for the creation of an operating system that is gaining significant traction against offerings from traditional IT enterprises such as Microsoft. Thus the application of virtual co-creation is firmly established as a pattern at the edge of Web 2.0 as the third wave approaches.
The Immersive Internet: Collaborate and Co-Create
Today, the web is in the midst of a migration from the traditional two-dimensional web browser interface to a three-dimensional one. Just as the introduction of the Mosaic browser changed society and business, the impending transformation of the Internet from a static, one-way conduit of information into a three-dimensional virtual environment in which people—as avatars—live, work, and play will have an equally significant transformational impact.
The 3D Internet that was once the dominion of hard-core gamers is rapidly becoming mainstream. To explore how the Immersive Internet is beginning to pervade society and impact the economy, we begin by exploring World of Warcraft, one of the world’s most popular massively multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPG).
First released in 1994 by Blizzard Entertainment, World of Warcraft (WoW) has grown steadily to more than 11.5 million subscribers.22 As with most MMORPGs, players form teams known as guilds that work together to move through a series of challenges that have increasing levels of difficulty. As game players work together to move through the levels in the game, they gain skills and acquire currency that is tied to their digital personas, or avatars. Players who choose to quit the game have the ability to cash out their currency and even sell their avatars online. This cashing out process is not insignificant. The highest World of Warcraft avatar account trade to date was valued at $9,000.23
World of Warcraft is essentially a game-based economic platform where avatars work through gameplay activities within a virtual economy to develop reputational capital that can then be exchanged for real currency. MMORPG platforms like World of Warcraft and EverQuest have spawned a new “gold farming” industry in China. In 2007, gold farmers employed more than 100,000 workers. These workers play games in twelve-hour shifts. For each hundred coins gathered, the worker earns approximately $1.25. Their boss sells this virtual loot to an online broker for approximately $3. The online broker ultimately sells the virtual currency coins to an American or European customer for as much as $20 in real currency.24
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