Filed under: Research, Trends by Digado

“Within five years, the 3-D Internet will be as important for work as the Web is today. Information and knowledge management professionals should begin to investigate and experiment with virtual worlds.”

‘Find out why by buying our eReport for a measly $279′

If this would be just any website we’d laugh at this ‘obvious scam’. Make a controversial statement, and have people pay to read your argumentation, based on a lot of fluff, ‘best case scenarios’ and nuances like ‘if this happens, this should happen to’. However, as this prediction is made by the internationally recognized technology and market research giant Forrester many will look at this prediction with less skepticism.

Important to understand is: Forrester makes a prediction for one of many Virtual World applications. This makes the claim a little less prestigious as it only talks about working inside a virtual world, not marketing (brands) in Virtual Words, or the growth of Virtual Worlds as a platform for gaming and socializing. Streamlining communication processes, 3d presentations, work applications and business to business relation management are the key values of Virtual Words in this regard.

The eReport ‘Getting Real Work Done In Virtual Worlds’ tells us why Forrester thinks 3D environments will become ‘valuable work tools’. It starts by listing how Communication problems of today remain unsolved, and Virtual Worlds offer a new solution. It continues to tell us Virtual Worlds are real business tools, and the ‘fantastic’ efforts going on ‘In world’ already. The most interesting question ‘Getting Real Work Done In Virtual Worlds‘ claims to answer is: “What’s Holding the Business Use of Virtual Worlds Back?”.

I personally feel its a waiting game - ‘playing chicken’ - watching how other corporations make mistakes, learn, adjust up to the moment some corporation creates a successful formula of business integration. The chance some corporation will successfully integrate a Virtual World and show the clear advantages within 5 years is fairly big. Early adopters have already assessed the value of Virtual Worlds for business workspaces and communication - but software (and hardware) is slow to catch up on this potential.

Posted on: January 9, 2008 | Share on: