I got a lot of responses to last week's post about Second Life – more than to any other article. People emailed me and twittered me, asking for more information and advice on getting started.

First of all, I have to warn people – there's still a little bit of a VHS-Betamax thing going on, with a variety of technologies battling it out for survival.

If you're a business looking to set up your own virtual world, to use to train employees, to hold conferences, to do simulations for clients, to help the public understand better what you do, then you currently have two main choices.

One is to rent land from Linden Labs, owner and operator of Second Life. In the past, this was very problematic, as Second Life was rife with sex and gambling and role-playing weirdos of all kinds. More than one event has been disrupted by flying penises. Yes, you read that right.

Today though, a business can rent a private island, restrict access to just invited guests, or kick evildoers off their property. Better yet, a company can get the software from Linden Labs to run their own private world, behind their corporate firewalls.

As I mentioned earlier in this blog, I recently attended several training events and conferences in Second Life, and the experience was fantastic – much better than attending a similar event via teleconference. And much cheaper than attending in real life. So all good.

I was able to walk up to presenters and ask questions after their speeches, and meet the other attendees – and have actually stayed in touch with people I met this way.

Second Life gives you plenty of opportunities for the kind of social chit chat that helps cement a relationship. For example, I was able to ask one of the speakers, a developer from IBM, why he was wearing a Star Trek shirt, and whether he wears them in real life as well (he does – it seems that the fabled IBM dress code is no more).

The big downside to Second Life is that it is a closed system. Linden Labs owns the software, sets all the rules – much like AOL and Compuserve did in the days before Netscape came long.

At their conference, the IBMers talked a lot about OpenSim, a public, open-source alternative. You can download the software and run it on your own servers and voila – you are the god of your own virtual reality. Unfortunately, their project was behind IBM's firewall and closed to the public – I thought.

That turned out not to be the case. In fact, there is a version of OpenSim, called OpenSim Grid, that's run out in the public for anyone to enjoy.

While wandering around in there, I met Chris Greenwell. Greenwell runs Toronto-based KoolKam Industries Inc., a video technology company, and has recently branched into OpenSim development projects.

He's got one environment, for example, running on his laptop. He is able to use this laptop to generate four regions – each over 65,000 square meters in size. In normal terms, each region is a square of land about one sixth of a mile by one sixth mile.

In order to keep the region up and running, you have to have your computer always connected to the Internet, of course – or rent space on someone else's server to host it.

I found one service company that currently hosts OpenSim deployments – Sim-OnDemand (at http://sim.ec29.com) – which uses the Amazon S3 server to actually run the environment, and they charge based on how much processing power you need.

It was hard to tell from their prices how much it would actually cost in practice, but I can tell you what Greenwell gets with his laptop. On his almost-one-mile-square land area, he has variable terrain including hills and lakes and streams. There are buildings, and vegetation which sways in the wind.

Disclaimer: he's letting me use half of one of his four regions to play with the building tools in OpenSim. So far this weekend, I've put up a house, planted trees, and put in a business conference venue with a big-screen display for powerpoint charts and seating for twenty.

I don't know if I'll be able to have twenty people come at any one time, however – so far, Greenwell has never had more than ten people at a time in one of his regions.

So, for a laptop-based virtual world, the verdict is: good for small business gatherings, not good for big conferences.

Another downside to OpenSim is that it's a project still very much under development. The payment system is still under development, though there's a work-around solution that takes PayPal payments. Voice chat, which works reasonably well in Second Life, is due any day now.

When I interviewed Greenwell for this article, we talked on the phone, though when he showed me around OpenSim, we talked by typing messages in the virtual platform.

OpenSim has many of the same things you can get in SecondLife – land, buildings, furniture, clothes and avatar shapes. You can pick them up from a store, or you can build your own – the tools are right in the two most popular browsers for it – Linden Lab's Second Life browser, and my favorite, the Hippo browser.

Both work pretty much the same way, with almost identical interfaces.

Since I switch between Second Life and OpenSim, I use my Second Life browser for Second Life, and my Hippo browser for OpenSim.

Although IBM has been successfully able to teleport a person from Second Life to OpenSim, it's not a path that other people can yet follow. When you switch worlds right now, you have a build a new avatar from scratch.

Would you like to visit my house and office in OpenSim?

It will take 15 to 30 minutes for you to set yourself up. You will need a high speed Internet connection, and a computer able to display graphics.

Step One:

Create a free OpenSim account. This part takes a few seconds, and only requires that you have an email address:

http://osgrid.org/index.php?page=create&btn=4

I used my real name for the signup, so you'll know who I am if you meet me here.

Step Two:

Download the OpenSim browser. Again, I recommend Hippo. You can download it here:

http://osgrid.org/index.php?&page=smodul&id=7&btn=7

Step Three:

Run the Hippo browser, and sign in with your name and password.

Then go to Caladan by clicking on the Map button in the lower left, and typing “Caladan” into the search box. The map of the Caladan region will come up – the Trombly Ltd. offices are in the top right hand-corner. Click anywhere in there and hit “Teleport.”

You don't have to teleport – you can also walk or fly from your starting point to my location. That's because when people set up regions in OpenSim, they can place them in an unused space on the map.

You don't have to have a region on a map, however. Your region can float off all by itself, unconnected to anybody else.

Or you could start a brand new map. There are a few of those. They call them grids.

Greenwell promised me that you can teleport between grids as well, using a portal. I imagined something like the StarGate, that takes you between worlds. Unfortunately, the portal he took me to wasn't working. And it didn't look like a StarGate – yet. Greenwell tells me that a new look is in the works.

There's something else in the works, too.

According to Greenwell, there's a project called Modrex that will significantly expand OpenSim's graphical capabilities. Instead of the cartoony graphics we get now, which are based on building shapes out of cubes and spheres, it's based on a mesh framework, like the most recent video games.

The results are hyper-realistic. Greenwell showed me a demo video of what it looks like, and I was blown away.

One application of this is that you and a friend will be able to meet in OpenSim, sit behind a computer together, and use it as you would your desktop in your office. I can already see the implications for training staff on using new software, for editing people's articles while they literally stand there and watch what you do, and for tech support.

With my staff located in China, in India, in the Philippines, and in the US, this could be extremely useful.

Greenwell says that the technology is due out this summer. I'm guessing that it will take a little longer than that to get all the kinks out and get it ready for business use.

Meanwhile, I'll continue experimenting with OpenSim. I know I'll be on the bleeding edge of new technology, but as a young, fast company, that's where we want to be, anyway.

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Maria Korolov Trombly is founder and president of Hong Kong-based Trombly Ltd., which runs editorial news bureaus around Asia. Trombly Ltd.'s BrainTrust Editorial division provides corporate communication services such as press releases and white papers. And the China Speakers Bureau is the largest speakers' agency in Greater China, representing over 300 speakers and experts on topics such as economics and business, culture, and technology.

Earthquake In Italy Pulls Minimum 92 People To Death.

On Monday an earthquake struck at 3:30am for 30seconds the Abruzzo region, Italy. It measured about 6.3 on the Richter scale and costs not less then 150 souls. It happened at night and totally unexpected. People were asleep and couldn’t save themselves. =(

Little Sandra Cantu Found Dead.

A little girl in the age of 8, called Sandra Cantu left her home on March 27th to go out for playing with a friend in Tracy, California. Without a trace she disappeared and never came back home. The latest news was she left her friends place for going to another friend’s one. She was found in a suitcase at a dairy farm and could only be identified by her clothes. A suspect is not identified yet.

Income Rises In Shanghai
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/sp/article/2009/200904/20090409/article_397121.htm

In contrast to greater China the salary in Beijing and Shanghai rose up to 17 percent in the previous year.

HIV/AIDS Death On Rise

While HIV infections are declining in well developed countries, it keeps on rising in China. China’s repressing behavior this disease wouldn’t show up noticeable might be one of the reasons. But also the education is a problem. People are too shy for talking about sexuality and all its side effects. One thing is for sure: Finally they hopefully realized the danger of that disease and change their conservative way of thinking for an open minded and educating one.

According to most predictions – including mine – the next generation of the Internet will be three-dimensional, fully immersive, a multi-media smorgasbord for the senses.

And, according to those same people – and me – we already have a sneak preview of that Internet in the form of massively multiplayer online games like World of Warcraft and virtual reality platforms like Second Life and IBM's OpenSim.

Entrepreneurs always want to get ahead of the new technology. Who doesn't want to be the Yahoo, Google, or Amazon of this new world?

Unfortunately, it's never obvious at the beginning what exactly it is that the new world is going to need, and who is going to be doing it and how. Oh, and whether it will ever make any money.

So far, the two areas of virtual worlds that are making money are gaming and sex – just as was the case with the early Internet.

A few companies have attempted – and mostly failed – to use this platform for e-commerce or for events. We're still missing the Amazons, the Googles. Mostly, that's because we haven't yet had the Netscapes yet. We have separate, isolated little islands of virtual reality – Second Life over here, IBM's OpenSim over there, World of Warcraft way way over there – without any way to move between them.

China is one of the top places for virtual worlds. It has the users used to working in a three-dimensional online environment. It has armies of programmers used to working with life-like physics engines. It has a government mandate to improve the country's technology infrastructure and education.

Is this enough? Can China create the next generation of the Internet? The next World Wide Web – the 3D Web?

So far, China has not had a great deal of success in setting world standards, as the 3G rollout has shown.

Major legal obstacles include a lag in intellectual property laws, restrictions on content, and prohibitions against alternative currencies.

Beyond that, China still has a love-hate relationship with its millionaires.

If I had an idea that had the potential to make me the next Bill Gates, I would want to grow my idea in the United States or another country where my achievement – and wealth – would be celebrated.

I heard a story at a recent business get-together, about someone building a new online company. The laws were vague about whether what the company was doing was strictly legal or not. The company founder happened to be at a conference which Chinese regulators also attended, and he cornered one and asked him directly whether what he was doing was legal. The answer? As long as the company stays below a certain size, there would be no problems.

This story is typical of a lot of activity in China. And it is a reason why some companies prefer to keep intellectual property and headquarters offshore, in Hong Kong, in Europe, in the U.S., and have only limited operations inside China.

The language barrier is another issue. Early tech adopters world wide speak English. An English-language launch of a new platform guarantees the largest possible international audience. A Chinese-language product launch may have an equally large user base – but it wouldn't be international.

So where do I think the next Internet is coming from? Personally, I think it will be build based on the work already done by Linden Labs' Second Life project and by IBM's OpenSim platform. I attended an IBM virtual worlds conference this week in Second Life, and the IBM team has already achieved some limited interoperability between the two platforms, with the ability to move virtual objects and virtual people from one platform to another.

It's not an easy system to learn. Second Life requires a fast computer, fast Internet connection, special software (a free download), and hours of time learning how to move around, how to get dressed, and how to talk to people in the virtual world.

There are already people making money in the new system. According to Second Life, several entrepreneurs are earning at least US$1 million per year from Second Life. Top-grossing companies include firms dealing in virtual real estate, virtual goods such as fashions and furniture, and virtual events.

And these are the pure plays. Other companies make a living in Second Life but get paid outside the system. For example, there are marketing and consulting firms who help businesses outside of Second Life set up their Second Life operations, or help them with marketing events, or conduct research. Since the payments take place outside of Second Life, it is harder to track this part of the Second Life economy.

Interested in getting involved? Go to www.secondlife.com and get the free download. Then follow the instructions to set up your account and create your virtual self. I've found that the best way to get to know what Second Life is about is to attend events. There's a calendar of everything happening in Second Life built into their software.

I'm planning to be holding one such event, a get-together for entrepreneurs in a Second Life cafe, to talk about business issues – both real and virtual. Then after the meeting, we might go and tour some part of Second Life. There are space stations in there, aquariums, zoos, amusement parts, dance clubs and shopping malls, office buildings and rolling landscapes. There are castles full of dragons, and a hobbit village, and virtual copies of some of the world's cities. Every minute, someone is building a new virtual destination in Second Life. And someone else is figuring out a way to make a profit from it.

Or email me if you want to know more about my group, at maria@tromblyltd.com.

Link: http://www.china-speakers-bureau.com/blog/2009/04/global-china-chat-on-tourism-transcript.html

In case you missed it, the Global China Chat on China tourism with Roy Graff is now available online at the China Speakers Bureau’s website:
http://www.china-speakers-bureau.com/blog/2009/04/global-china-chat-on-tourism-transcript.html

http://www.china-speakers-bureau.com/blog/2009/04/global-china-chat-on-tourism-transcript_05.html

Roy Graff is an expert on China travel and founder of ChinaContact, an online resource containing tourism information and services for China. Roy is also a member of the China Speakers Bureau. With a bachelor’s degree in Chinese and Economics from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Roy has successfully bridged China tourism consulting with various travel and hospitality ventures in China, including a flagship forum on tourism in China, “China the Future of Travel,” held annually at the World Travel Market in London.

According to Roy, tourism is a rather new and fragmented sector in China that has not yet matured. Thus, early entrants that are able to establish personal and professional relationships and make long-term business commitments in the tourism industry stand to benefit greatly. China's tourism economy is already having a significant impact on the global tourism industry. Roy predicts that by 2020, China will become the single largest source of international tourism and the number one travel destination, while having the largest domestic tourism market in the world. In 2008 alone, nearly 45 million Chinese traveled abroad. http://www.chinacontact.org/index.html

Outbound Tourism:

In 2008 there were approximately 46 million cross-boarder travels from mainland China. The Chinese government is pushing to increase, and even double, the amount of outbound tourism in the next few years. Nevertheless, the growth rate for China’s outbound tourism market will undoubtedly be affected by the global recession. On the up-side, the growth rate will likely continue to increase, just at a slower pace; it may decrease from say 12-18% down to about 8-10%, Roy predicts. Relative to other countries, China’s outbound tourism market is doing quite well.

Common hindrances to outbound travel are other countries’ visa requirements. It is often difficult for Chinese to acquire visas, particularly to European and North American nations. And, while the Chinese are now free to travel to Western countries, a privilege largely limited to government officials in the past, international travel is still revered as a luxury available to a lucky few.

Regarding business operations, while there is an increasing number of opportunities for foreign firms involved in China’s inbound and outbound travel markets, many regulations still exist. Foreign firms are not allowed to operate outbound travel companies in China. However, this does not necessarily mean that foreign firms need to jump into joint ventures anymore. Other options include representative offices, WOFE as a consulting or technology company, or establishing an inbound travel company and waiting for two years to acquire an outbound travel license.

Inbound Tourism:

In contrast to China’s growing outbound tourism market, inbound tourism, although of a larger volume than China’s outbound travel market, has decreased substantially due to a number of factors such as the Beijing Olympics, the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan, and unrest in Tibet. There has been a particular decrease in tourists from developed countries in the west, who are now traveling less and to destinations closer to home.

Some up-and-coming travel destinations in China include areas in the southwest, such as Yunnan and Sichuan provinces. Travel to Sichuan has slowly begun to recover since the 2008 earthquake, and both these provinces have a lot to offer visitors in terms of minority populations, scenery, and food. For those interested in a glimpse of another side of China—a less developed side—Roy suggests Guizhou and Gansu. Roy also recommends Xinjiang and Tibet, although travel to these destinations is often more difficult and requires assistance from travel agents. China’s major cities, Beijing, Xian and Shanghai, are still the biggest draw for domestic and international tourists.

Link: http://www.china-speakers-bureau.com/blog/2009/04/global-china-chat-on-tourism-transcript.html

Transcripts of the China Speakers Bureau's Global China Chats with Roy Graff on 04/02/09 are now available for online viewing: http://www.china-speakers-bureau.com/blog/2009/04/global-china-chat-on-tourism-transcript.html

Plastic Surgery Rate Rises
Since autumn 2008 more and more people are having a plastic surgery in China. In the time of the world financial crisis many companies not only make their decision for an applicant referring his or her abilities but also dependent on the looks.

Malaysia Got A New Prime Minister

Yesterday Malaysia’s new Prime Minister Najib Razak took the official oat and took the office from his predecessor Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The 55 year old Najib used to be Abdullah’s deputy Prime Minister.

From Online Dating To Apartment Sharing

A new niche was found. Nowadays people are too busy for any real life dating. That’s why online dating platforms were developed. A new idea is creating a platform for people who want to have a try on moving into dating apartments. Which means you sign in on a website, reveal all important background information of your life and the professionals will find an apartment with 7 other matching people (4 men and 4 women in total) coached by a life coach.

Child Sex Scandal In South China: Trial Will Start Next Week

Regarding to the China Youth Daily the trail will start at the Xishui Country Court in Guizhou Province. Eight people are accused of being involved in the latest child sex scandal. More then 10 children under 14 years of different primary and middle schools were forced to prostitution by other pupil, teachers as well as government officials. The defendants are probably sentenced to 15 years in prison.

While sitting at New York Style Pizza last night, a gruff middle-aged American walked in and ordered two slices to go. The gal behind the counter sends the slices upstairs to heat up as always and the American guy stands around impatient as hell.

Meanwhile, another guest at a table requests his leftover slices be packed to go so the waitress picks those up and takes it over to the front counter to pack up. As the counter gal finishes packing them, the gruff American guy at the counter grabs it to go. The counter gal screams and pulls the bag away explaining in Chinese that this was NOT his pizza and that his was coming from the oven upstairs, even pointing upstairs. the gruff American guy gets angry and walks out of the place slamming the sliding doors behind him.

The counter gal then brings the leftover pizza to the guest at the table while another gal brought the heated slices downstairs only to find no customer to accept them.

It was amusing to see the American guy get so wound up. The counter gal's body language clearly indicated he was wrong about something. Given the absolute lack of native language skills he had, I can understand why he must have been flustered, but the enourmous level of class he showed in stomping out the place and slamming the door borders on a level of idiocy reserved for jackass expats that give teh rest of us a bad name...anyhow. Moral of the story, learn Chinese if you want to live here b/c its easier than teaching all of them English.

And oh yeah, New York Style Pizza is quite good. :)