Memo 9: Get a life...well, a Second Life!

Never before has virtual reality been experienced more vividly. Human imagination, fantasies and desire for utopia, nearly, have been stretched to its maximum in an effort to capture a digital replica of mortal existence. Second Life is a creative innovation in this direction. It is a dynamic world like the real world, wherein an established presence has the ability to explore a realm of possibilities never considered in reality.

So what did Philip and Cory from Linden Lab, the architects of Second Life have in mind while creating it? I believe they wanted to give creativity a whole new definition and haven't they done that. With a massive conglomeration of server farms that support the simulation of a large number of objects created every moment and then there is a refreshing domino that re-establishes state which appears the same to everyone on the outside. So there is massive activity going on in co-ordination on the server side of the story. This has made Second Life an economy and a geography as big as Monaco. People build objects, own IP for their own creation, market their products and make money.

So is Second Life an auxiliary platform for a mere secondary business opportunity? Yes it is but it is not restricted to that. Huge corporate houses have established Second Life presence. Not only are they evaluating the scope and potential of Second Life but also using it as an experimentation laboratory of their business models and product tests. There are educational and training workshops conducted on Second Life which is really an awesome phenomena. There are universities, colonies resorts, labs, and almost everything that one would need to guage the response of a test in a real life environment. And the fascinating thing is that it is evolving at a very fast rate.

After having signed up in Second Life and downloaded the necessary software, I was ready to venture into a whole new world. At some point of time, I knew I had to buy the Linden dollars, the planet's currency, to get more mileage out of the experience, but initially I was happy to explore the new place. The most refreshing thing, which is only a theoretical possibility now, was teleportation. I had the entire geographic expanse at my disposal to choose from,and get there in no time and with no money. So I skipped the orientation and reached an open fair on the diametrically opposite side of the map. There were people and lots of people. All had weird names and some very funky avatars. I, being a novice, felt that I too needed an image makeover. So I went on to change my avatar, a thing I will not be able to do in reality so quickly. Ready for the social embrace, I interacted with a few people. Some were the residents since quite some time and some very new to the world like me. It has a cool feature that one would desire to have. Before going and approaching an individual, one can research the person's profile and accordingly draft the conversation. After a bit of loitering around and getting a feel of the environment, I decided to get to some serious business.

I went through the orientation or the introductory workshop and got a better understanding of the new world. I planned to back the orientation with some 'real' experience. I signed up for a free workshop on Second Life control tutorial. It was an amazing experience where I learned how to create objects and basic building blocks for bigger structures. This is the first step towards establishing presence in Second Life. From here on I realized that with a creative appetite, one could do wonders. It is like having the power of the creator himself. You can build your own world, your own gadgets, empower them with all th desired features, use them sell them and leverage a plethora of business opportunity. One can build one's own social network with a unimaginable diversity to exploit. I am actually clueless with regards to the possibility, opportunity and the unfathomable scope of this digital mania. The more I talk about it the more am I going to sound shallow and illiterate as Second Life is evolving continually and rapidly, also at this very moment that I am writing.

I personally have not spent much time on Second Life but from what ever little I have done, I am totally in awe of this thing. Getting used to does take a bit of time and patience but it is worth the efforts. I believe enhancing ways to make the interface easier, making instructions more readily available will bring in more and more residents. The concept needs modification and adaptability to the origins of the growing user base. There are un-addressed issues like impersonation sabotage, virtual vandalism and so on. However, I can relate to SLosphere as a land of opportunity and a canvass of human creative exhibition.

Memo 8: Casting Pods....

The Internet continues to articulate human expression with with its ever evolving definition of services. The newest in the basket is podcasting. This novel way of content delivery and access, is a step towards redefining the concept of press. We now have interesting and non-conventional opinionated reviews on every possible topic, by self-acclaimed experts, distributed across the net. People or the potential subscribers, try to build up loyalty towards a particular podcast portal, (Apple iTunes podcasts, Yahoo! podcasts, CNN pods etc.) for a particular subject and access these 'information' bites. So gradually we are seeing an evolving phase where press is becoming not only for the people and of the people but also by the people.

I have now party to this world since past 3 weeks only and feel that its a crazy world out there. Some are really interesting and informative but some podcasts are pathetic to the core. You sometimes get a feeling, that this innovative and a potentially revolutionary exercise can loose its flavor if one allows junk to thrive on the podcasting arena.

The Misses..

I will start with my nightmarish experience as it is always good to end on a nice note. I will not rank the sad podcasts as all of them were equally disheartening.

The first, 'Night Clubbin in Berlin' from Street Fury. This is a video podcast that starts with a man wearing dark glasses and hopping around Berlin's night clubs, talking to people at midnight. He only knew what he could see as the people he met and the questions he asked made no sense. Instead of telling more about Berlin's night life, it seemed like Discovery channel's night vision videos where camera men keep following the beasts.

The second, Horse Riding and Handling through Field by Leslie Desmond. This audio pod was supposed to introduce the audio book, but had nothing that even remotely did so. Throughout, the only thing that one could associate with the topic was neighing of the horse. The author then attempts to talk something about the what horse can be first thought, but it was so muddled and out of context that it seemed that while the pod was being recorded, the horse was riding her rather than she riding the horse. The video then again ends with horse's neighing to remind us that the pod had something to do with the horse.

The third, 'Square Talk ..Three teens talk on Economics'. The impressive title drove me towards the pod. When I started listening, first i could hear only one person. Second, by no way he seemed a teen. Third the only economics that he talked was that he was to get back $10 tax refund from the IRS which he would use to gift a watch to her girlfriend who always turns up late.

These are some of forgettable experiences that I have had with the podcasts. It can sometimes turn out be a place, especially on a bad day, that is bent upon psyching you out.

The Hits...

Lets move to the greener side of the story.

The 'Amateur Traveler Podcast' is one that no travel freak would want to miss. The narrator gives one of the most exciting descriptions of the places that he visits. The impressive thing about the pod is that being just a audio pod, the narrator is actually able to pull up a panoramic visual of the place before the listener. The sounds in the background, interviews with people, his descriptive personal touch all sum to a very lively experience.

Second, 'Money Tree Podcast by Martin Bamford' is a relish as far as financial advise is concerned. He addresses various personal finance issues in a refreshing manner. Especially, for people like engineers who want to know little but enough about finance, this is an apt place. The concepts are presented in the most succinct yet sophisticated manner.

The third, 'GIS and Location Technology', I must say is an excellent pod. Its a technology pod, and talks about one of the most challenging technological ventures taken up by Farallon Geographics. It talks about the dynamics of global location technology. Right from RFID for article location to GPS for people location and associated aspects. It also talks about project's challenges, invites comments and integrates reasoning in description.

These were my opinions on a few of the many pods that I have been exposed to in the past 3 weeks. Podcasting opens up a whole new avenue of unbounded expression. It is for the subscribers to choose their level of exposure to the worst of the bests or the best of the worsts.

My Wikipedia Articles

I have posted 2 articles on Wikipedia:

The first article is an edited version of my article on Chile's Telecom Liberalization. You can see that on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epitome_of_Telecom_Liberalization:_Chile
One can also find this article's link under the 'See Also' section on Chile's main page on Wikipedia.

The second article is on 'Equanimity'. When I searched for 'equanimity' on Wikipedia, I just got the word's meaning. Since I had written a related article, I posted it just to see the response.
I would encourage you to visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equanimity as it talks about a less known concept in the realm of human psychology.

Memo 7: Encyclopedia Redifined

The advent of information age has been marked by plethora of innovative and creative platforms of access. As the evolution continues, it is not the content, but the ease of its availability, authenticity, comprehensibility and most important, the lucidity of its presentation, that takes primary focus. As a result, the source that caters to as many aspects, as mentioned above, becomes more and more popular. This is precisely why we are witnessing a novel encyclopedia experience in the form of Wikipedia.

Wikipedia today boasts of more than 5 million articles in 100 languages covering expanses of discussion over the widest possible canvas of human deliberation. It reflects a collaborative effort of information origination, modification and presentation open to potentially every mortal. The encyclopedia is based on fundamental principles (see Five Pillars of Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Five_pillars/) of consent wherein content derogatory to a subject's image isn't allowed. Also, there is strict adherence to intellectual property rights, laws of copyrighting, and those against plagiarism. There is continuous content management with regard to nature, accuracy, legal aspects and most importantly, temporal relevance. So where does the problem lie?

Wikipedia's credibility problems have been attributed to its openness. The very fact that it is open, makes it vulnerable to each of its assets. Who are the ones that manage content? Who are the ones that contribute? Who are the ones that access it? Wikipedia does explicitly define 'contributor' (one who has successfully edited atleast 10 articles) and 'qualified editor' (one who has authority to edit any article) but it is still an open norm devoid of authoritative legitimacy. So is Wikipedia a credible source?

Mr. Credible
Credibility of a content scales with its usability and acceptance. According to a recent survey by CNET news.com, Wikipedia is the 36th most visited site. Now, if we weed out pornographic sites and popular portals, Wikipedia is certainly up there. Also, it has got much higher hit rates than any other online encyclopedia. Such a large number of information seekers cannot be compromising for incorrect content. What drives people towards Wikipedia, is that it is free to access. If you have not signed up for Britannica (paid membership), most of the articles and subject matter is inaccessible. In today's age, one cannot afford to be paid for information. Secondly, every subject is covered in a lucid, systematic manner right from background, introductory description, special features, pros cons with links for every related word or topic. This means, if a reader gets stuck somewhere in an article over a related but an unknown word, he can click on its link, pull that word's page understand it in the related context and get back to his article. These features actually help someone like an engineer to comprehend the topics on law. As a result, Wikipedia content is used and accepted much more than any other source.

For a simple example, when one types ‘telephone’ in the search box of both Wikipredia and Britannica, here is what you get:

Now, as a user who does not want to pay, Wikipedia certainly is much more appealing. Secondly if one observes, Wikipedia goes about the topic in a very systematic manner right from layman’s version of telephone to IP phones. On the other hand, Britannica (although it’s a preview of the main article) starts with a basic definition, and then makes it complex and jumps to Bell’s patent. Also, it does give an outline of the actual article (that is accessible to only members) so as to try and lure users towards the membership.

Defining Correctness........
Now, talking about content's academic correctness. In a comparative study conducted, by the Nature Journal, on the quality of content between Wikipedia and Britannica articles, it was found that out of the 42 articles compared, four of Wikipedia's articles had minor flaws as against Britannica's three. As far as fundamental errors were concerned, Wikipedia had two as against Britannica's one. This clearly shows that even the so called 'mother of all information sources' is not flawless. Also correctness, to an extent, is determined by the context and purpose. For instance, a math book for grade 2 may use the terms speed and velocity interchangeably whereas a math book for grade 7 will distinguish between speed and velocity as a scalar and a vector quantity respectively. The grade 2 book is correct too, in its context wherein it means rate of motion. Hence in an attempt to articulate explanation in a manner that is universally easy to comprehend, Wikipedia's articles might occasionally be 'inaccurate'. But, given the results of the study, Wikipedia certainly cannot be considered a source that is not at all credible. Certainly one wants to think twice before using it as Wikipedia's articles lack responsibility.
One must give credit to the Wikipedia's loyalists who continuously monitor content so as to try and maintain sanity. As a result, most of the articles are updated. Secondly, every article has a room for improvement as each of them can be openly edited, within the correctness parameters. This, more often than not gives a particular subject a fresh perspective. Encyclopedias like Britannica cannot incorporate this creativity and dynamism as the subject is addressed by scholarly conventionalism. Wikipedia's approach adds color and diverse dimensions which not only broadens the scope of a particular subject, but also enhances its scope of usability, acceptability and hence credibility.

Its not Wikipedia or Britannica....Its Wikipedia and Britannica
Occasionally, mishaps like the Seiganthaler and Curry situations do happen, but I guess, Wikipedia as an effort toward information's dynamism, should be given due chances. There are a lot more positives in the evolution of Wikipedia. What people do not understand is that Wikipedia never said that it be replaced by Britannica. It is people who want to compare the novelty with conventionalism and hence take sadist pleasures of proving the obvious. I believe, Wikipedia is a totally different platform and should not be viewed on the same lines as Britannica. If one is looking for scholarly material at the risk of probable difficulty of understanding it, Britannica is the place but if wants to get a generic idea of a totally new concept, Wikipedia proves much better. It has its unique place in the world of organized information and should be used in the manner its nature demands, so as to conceive its credibility.