As travel budgets are squeezed and slashed in the recession, companies are increasingly seeking innovative ways of bringing employees together for conferences and meetings remotely.
While China is seriously cracking down on the exchange of virtual currencies for real cash, virtual economies backed by newfound legitimacy elsewhere are quickly gaining ground in the real world.
I was scrolling through family photos on my computer, admiring my two beautiful babies, when I spotted a disturbing trend: My laptop was open in almost all of the pictures. There's my daughter, at 8 months, playing at my feet while I typed away on the couch. There's me and my son, a year later, with the laptop at my side as I held him in my arms.
It's 9 a.m. when Cylindrian Rutabaga takes the microphone at a familiar bar.
At Imperial College London, medical students navigate a full-service hospital where they see patients, order X-rays, consult with colleagues and make diagnoses.
Nina Allam was nervous. She was about to meet someone she had been chatting with online since February.
From YouTube to Flickr, from Facebook to Twitter, images and sentiments from celebrations across the nation flooded into the Internet's media-sharing sites, just moments after Barack Obama clinched the presidential election
There's a whole world of people out there, and boy, are they pissed off.
Residents of Second Life, the online virtual environment, can do all kinds of things they can't in real life: fly, mute other voices, even transport themselves from one location (or "sim") to another.
People around the world who are unable to visit Ground Zero and pay their respects to September 11 victims can still find solace in contacting others through the technological wonders of their home computers. Especially if they're willing to venture into a virtual world.
As travel budgets are squeezed and slashed in the recession, companies are increasingly seeking innovative ways of bringing employees together for conferences and meetings remotely.
While China is seriously cracking down on the exchange of virtual currencies for real cash, virtual economies backed by newfound legitimacy elsewhere are quickly gaining ground in the real world.
I was scrolling through family photos on my computer, admiring my two beautiful babies, when I spotted a disturbing trend: My laptop was open in almost all of the pictures. There's my daughter, at 8 months, playing at my feet while I typed away on the couch. There's me and my son, a year later, with the laptop at my side as I held him in my arms.
It's 9 a.m. when Cylindrian Rutabaga takes the microphone at a familiar bar.
At Imperial College London, medical students navigate a full-service hospital where they see patients, order X-rays, consult with colleagues and make diagnoses.
Nina Allam was nervous. She was about to meet someone she had been chatting with online since February.
From YouTube to Flickr, from Facebook to Twitter, images and sentiments from celebrations across the nation flooded into the Internet's media-sharing sites, just moments after Barack Obama clinched the presidential election
There's a whole world of people out there, and boy, are they pissed off.
Residents of Second Life, the online virtual environment, can do all kinds of things they can't in real life: fly, mute other voices, even transport themselves from one location (or "sim") to another.
People around the world who are unable to visit Ground Zero and pay their respects to September 11 victims can still find solace in contacting others through the technological wonders of their home computers. Especially if they're willing to venture into a virtual world.
A woman is charged with plotting to kidnap in real life a boyfriend she met through the virtual reality Web site "Second Life"
In the second Fantastic Four movie, a character called the Silver Surfer glides effortlessly over the Earth's terrain on a gleaming trans-galactic surfboard.
Sometimes a sign of the times is subtle.
Researchers at Stanford University are finding that the qualities you inhabit online may sneak into your real world
Walk into Naughty Auties, a virtual resource center for those with autism, and you'll find palm trees swaying against a striking ocean sunset. Were it not for the pixelated graphics on the computer screen in front of you, you would swear you were looking at a tropical hideaway.
In our culture of hype, the Second Life virtual world had its day in the sun. Almost a year ago, I contributed to the hubbub with a big story in Fortune about how even IBM CEO Sam Palmisano was calling virtual worlds a major future trend.
So, what exactly is news in a virtual world?
Video games and exercise could work out well together. Consider: While video games might entertain you, they generally fail to burn many calories. And while bicycle machines can improve your cardiovascular health, they're monotonous to ride.
Second Life allows people to lead two lives -- one in the real world and another in the virtual. But in a way, Second Life itself leads two lives.
Late last year the avatar Anshe Chung, a property developer in the virtual world Second Life who is said to have made more than $1 million dollars on virtual real estate deals, was assaulted by flying phalluses in a 'griefer' attack during a live media interview. The attack brought to attention the increasing phenomenon of anti-social behavior on the web.
Gone are the days of browsing through the newspaper in search of houses on the market. Now, most potential buyers look online and and view slide shows. But soon they'll be walking virtually through homes and even sneaking a look at what's in the refrigerator.
It's 2020. You get home from work, kick off your shoes and relax -- on your very own tropical island. That night, your friends teleport over with other glamorous guests, all nipped, tucked and primped to perfection, for a hedonistic cocktail party at your five-star beach house, decked out in expensively understated chrome, crystal and fine Italian furniture.
Pop music icon Elton John complained to a British newspaper this week that the Internet was destroying music.
If you have a new product or service and want to hold a launch party, Simon Stevens is your man. He'll take care of the logistics. He'll provide a DJ and live musicians. He'll take care of the security, too, discouraging obnoxious types from ruining the event.
Online avatars are being given the opportunity to involve themselves in a virtual activity that aims to make an environmental difference in the real world. Second Chance Trees is an innovative project which utilizes Second Life to help reforestation of endangered species of trees all over the planet.(Full story)
In a bizarre week that brought news of one Second Life avatar -- the luridly monikered "Stroker Serpentine" -- filing for copyright infringement against a fellow avatar -- "Volkov Catteneo" -- for allegedly copying the design of a virtual sex bed, it's good to report that in a far away sphere of Second Life, avatars are being given the opportunity to involve themselves in a much more wholesome virtual activity that aims to make an environmental difference in the real world.
Don't bother to pack your bags. Skip the queues at the airport. Forget security and immigration checks. Even leave your passport behind. Sound like a perfect holiday? Just log on to a virtual vacation, whether it be lazing on a beach, a ski trip or climbing archaeological ruins. Or all three -- in the same hour.
British police plan to post pictures of missing British toddler Madeleine McCann in virtual world Second Life, a UK-based child protection law enforcement organization says.
There's more to someone's identity than a social security number, passport photo and set of fingerprints but it's difficult to define exactly what else it is. Is it what the public sees or the inner self? Some would argue that virtual identity is a truer reflection of self than someone's image in the real world.
The United States may keep shedding jobs to foreign countries, but it cranks out new occupations like no one else. Here are just five of the hottest you can get into now.
The music business is a fickle partner, and Michael Penn has seen it at its backslapping best and door-closing worst.
Online worlds like Second Life have made a successful business out of getting people to buy and sell 3-D virtual real estate.
One of the key elements of modern business education is the lengths to which schools will go to connect and communicate with students, whether actual or potential.
As business pitches go, it's certainly unorthodox. Two young women, dressed in what are clearly hastily home-made bridal outfits, stand in a corner of an elevator and talk to a video camera.
Real estate deals may be slowing in the real world, but in the three-dimensional online one of Second Life the market remains hot. Now Coldwell Banker, one of the nation's largest real estate brokerage firms, is entering Second Life, aiming to help bring order to the chaotic world of virtual real estate.
When the smartest businesspeople on the planet - the Google guys, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates - all say the future of their companies is in video, who are we to argue? Google is buying YouTube. Apple is...
First it was trends, but now money is making the leap from virtual worlds into the real world. With the sale of three virtual shopping malls for nearly $200,000 earlier this year in one online game, it seems that the virtual streets are paved with gold. You can even get a bank card that will let you pay for dinner with your virtual dollars.
In case you haven't noticed, Second Life is booming, and its economy has boomed too - putting the virtual reality world in the crosshairs of tax authorities, experts say.
Last November in Beijing, IBM gathered 2,000 employees, with 5,000 more watching on the web, to unveil a series of global initiatives on digital storage, branchless banking, and the like. During th...
I'll reiterate what I said in a feature story I wrote for the current issue of Fortune - Second Life is important not because it resembles a game, or because of how many people are signing up, or the big companies starting to do business inside it. What convinces me it is one of the most significant technology breakthroughs in history is that it is a platform on top of which users can create their own software and content, realize their ideas, and even make money.
YOUR NEW ISSUE OF FORTUNE MAGAZINE: Okay, I'll admit it. It's amazing! Brilliant! Perfect even! Cover story on the how drinking red wine will let you live forever (or close), and the amazing biotech company that's racing to create miracle drugs that extend life from an ingredient in, well, Pinot! Um, that's good...We also have a great lineup of big thinkers and CEOs to tell you all about what's going to go down in 2007. Serious heavy hitters who are a bit undercover like Vinod Khosla, Peter Chernin, Linda Kaplan Thaler, David Rubenstein, Sean McManus. (Funny, as a business magazine, we didn't feel compelled to call up Louise MacBain.) Other terrifc reads: Newt Gingrich's comeback trail bid for the White House by Nina Easton, a coolio story on Second Life by David Kirpatrick, and even an interview with one of Disney's hottest properties: Hannah Montana. ("You get the best of both worlds. Chill out take it slow. Then you go rock the show!") Just don't tell my achy-breaky heart---how many of you get THAT?
In the chaos of today's media and technology brawl - iPod-vs. Zune, Google vs. Yahoo, Windows vs. Linux, Intel vs. AMD - we can declare one unlikely winner.
There's been plenty of hubbub about Second Life and the limitless possibilities offered in a virtual reality where a banker can become a virtual filmmaker, a housewife can be a virtual business tycoon and 46-year-old man can be a virtual 23-year-old vixen. The focus has been on people making real money in an online virtual world, but for those who have heard of eBay, the idea that everyday people can make money on the Internet isn't so revolutionary.
Last November in Beijing, IBM gathered 2,000 employees, with 5,000 more watching on the web, to unveil a series of global initiatives on digital storage, branchless banking, and the like. During the presentation, CEO Sam Palmisano walked up to an onstage PC, logged onto the online three-dimensional virtual world called Second Life, and took command of the cartoon-like "avatar" that represents him there.
There I was, flying high about hilltops and gardens, decked out in a red tunic and black stilettos.
A look at some of the people charting new territory in the worlds of business, entertainment and more. "Innovators" airs weekly on CNN Airport Network.
Aiming to take advantage of its already-impressive momentum, San Francisco's Linden Lab, developer of the Second Life virtual online world, will announce Monday that it is taking the first major step toward opening up its software for the contributions of any interested programmer.
What is likely to happen in 2007, when it comes to tech? Change is now happening so quickly, and technology change is so greatly inducing societal change, that change itself is just about the only constant.
When people ask me what I think is the most important trend in technology today, I always answer the same way. It's not Web 2.0, Open Source software or Google's growing power. The most important trend in technology is how it is boosting economic development around the world.
Consumer electronics retailer Circuit City said Friday it is opening up a virtual store in the three-dimensional online world of Second Life.
If you're angling to become the next business tycoon in the virtual world of Second Life, you're first going to need some Linden dollars.
We asked the brightest minds in business how they do what they do � and how you can cash in on their advice in the coming year.
You've probably never heard of Kevin Michael, a 22-year-old singer who has a soul-drenched falsetto and performs with an acoustic guitarist who makes beat-box sounds with his voice. Yet when he per...
We asked 50 of the brightest minds in business how they do what they do - and how you can cash in on their advice in the year ahead.
General Motors' Pontiac division is spending thousands of dollars to create a make-believe dealership that will sell make-believe cars for as little as a few dollars a piece.
The classroom of the future isn't on a college campus. It's in the virtual world of "Second Life."
Second Life, the three-dimensional virtual world, has been getting tons of press lately. In the software, which anyone can download for free, you travel around as an "avatar" representing yourself (with a different name), through a huge range of spaces - beautiful natural environments, shopping malls, museums, clubs, homes, apartments and cities. So far, it's signed up 1.3 million members.
In an illustrious 155-year history of current affairs reporting, the Reuters agency has filed copy from every imaginable location in the world.
SAN FRANCISCO (Business 2.0 Magazine) - It's Google's world. We just live in it.
I dined in London last week with three friends considerably hipper (and younger) than myself. It was a mind-meld between four guys all convinced the world is changing really fast and that the Internet is the reason.
This month saw the launch of what is apparently the first game to be developed within another game.
To understand the lucrative real estate empire Anshe Chung has created, it helps to spend some time with her "in world." There, she might teleport you to one of her islands, on the continent she's ...
"Paul" and I are seated on a plush couch in the atrium-style living room of his starter mansion north of Dallas. A 71-inch flat-screen HDTV dominates the far wall. His Porsche 911 Carrera and his w...
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