The idea is not new in general, but not yet often discussed regarding the metaverse. While it is a standard in the web, that the pure data is stored in databases or design-independent markup languages like XML, on whose basis this data can be visualized for different kind of devices, connection speeds and also “immersion/entertainment degrees” (for example flash/video vs. html only versions), this approach has not yet reached the hemisphere of virtual worlds.

One of the reasons for that is quite obvious: there are no standards yet, which would enable this separation! Regarding virtual worlds we are still far far away from having a common standard to describe virtual world content, its relations and functions in a platform and design independent way.

But for corporations, which are thinking about usage scenarios for their communication strategies in virtual worlds, this “One Metaverse - Differnt Visual Layers” approach could open not only a lot of doors, which have been closed due to the Second Life anti-hype, but could also offer the benefits of avatar based communication to a greater audience.

How could this work?

The general idea behind this approach is, that for a lot of corporations the sensible usage scenarious you come up with, don’t necessarily need the flexibility, candidness and depth of a platform like Second Life. I am aware of the fact, that there are many different opinions about how to integrate corporations in virtual worlds - and therefore there are also a lot of opinions what exactly the benefits are.

But let us assume for this case that the following thesis is one of many valid approaches:

Virtual Worlds like platforms will be one of many communication channels between corporations and customers. More and more people will make use of avatar based internet platforms and will expect realtime communication and service offers from corporations in the future.

Simple as that - I guess quite a lot of people and corporations believe in this thesis and that this is their motivation to start to invest in virtual worlds prototypes. A lot of these prototypes recently ‘failed’ due to many reasons - but one of the reasons which most of them have in common is the lack of pure reach and participation due to high entrance barriers.

Signing up for a platform, downloading and getting started the client software, relatively high system requirements, not learned user interfaces, the complexity of a three-dimensional room and the pure depth and flexibility of a platform like Second Life, have been to much for a lot of peoples frustration tolerance, patience and time.

I see this proven not only by the discrepancy between registered and active accounts on the platform Second Life, but also by the actual phenomenal growth of platforms, which have much lower entrance barriers than Second Life like solutions.

The question for me, as someone who advises corporations regarding virtual worlds, is:

Is it really necessary to have this rich, deep and flexible virtual world, when I want to offer a new avatar based communication channel, which of course offers unique benefits, other existing channels (web, phone, point-of-sale) can’t offer?

My thesis is: no - not necessarily … a lot of approaches could be also realized in an environment, which:

• doesn’t need a registration
• doesn’t need a client download
• doesn’t has high system-requirements
• doesn’t has a totally new user interface
• doesn’t has this big complexity

One Metaverse - Different Visual Layers

For me it is obvious, that you could be able to realize “virtual world like” projects also in the web - which still have a 2.5D or 3D environment with avatars communicating and interacting with each other - and which still offer you possibilities and benefits, a plain catalog of web pages would never be able to cover as well or even better.

Of course you would be limited in the flexibility and depth of this offer, but on the other hand it would be reachable and manageable by a much bigger audience, which has to handle much lower barriers and whose frustration tolerance, patience and time is not high enough to get comfortable with a complex metaversal platform like Second Life.

Let me try to illustrate this idea:

Imagine a corporation presence in the metaverse which of course on the one hand can be visited with a very immersive and rich client software - which gives you not only access to the corporations presence, but to the whole metaverse - but on the other hand can also can be visited be a very light-weighted and totally reduced web-based or even mobile phone application.

You need a uncomplicated and quick access to a corporations virtual world offer? Just open the web-browser and be there anonymously with one of many standard avatars in a reduced 2.5D environment.

You need to identify yourself, to get a access to personalized content? Identify yourself with your openID! You need more flexibility, more depth and one of your own personas, you have more bandwidth or better immersive visual interfaces? Then do the next logical step and open a special client to get “full-access” to the metaverse.

If there would be standards to describe virtual worlds content, its relations and functions, you could have different visual layers, which have different levels of immersion, media richness, complexity, depth, system requirements and also different levels of requirements to the user in terms of interface usability.

The integration of the web with the metaverse

Such a multi-level / multi-layer approach would be able to change a lot. You can not only make your “virtual world like” and avatar based offer accessible for a greater audience, but you can even more integrate your website much better, with your metaverse presence.

Let me illustrate this again, with a pretty popular example - which originally has been used in the context of the Amazon web-store. But let me generalize this example a bit:

When you look at a website, dozens, hundreds or even much more of others are looking at this page at the same time - but in the web you can’t directly see them.

If you visit a place in the metaverse with your avatar you always see others visiting the same places and you have the possibility to communicate and interact with those people instantly.

Apart from the problem which occurs, if we are talking about high numbers - with an “several visual layers” approach you would be able to get the visitors on a website and the visitors in the metaverse together. You could project them in both directions: form the web to the metaverse and the other way round.

How does that work? Let me give you a tangible example: corporation X has a complex product, which benefits from a presentation in the metaverse, because it is three-dimensional and can be experienced and explained much better in the metaverse, than in the web.

But of course there is still a website, which explains this product. Let’s assume this product website has:

• a text based description of the product
• a picture gallery of the product
• a flash based 3D animation of this product
• a FAQ section, to answer common questions
• a comment sections, where visitors can give feeback, write reviews or ask questions

To create a bridge between the web and the metaverse, you could now project visitors of this website into the metaverse with a bot. And those bots are not zombies just standing around to indicate a visitor - these bots could also mirror the activities on the website.

• If a web visitor is reading the text description, the bot is standing in front of a text-board
• If a web visitor is watching the flash 3D animation he maybe stands in front of the 3D model in-world representation
• If a web visitor is reading the FAQ section, his bot will move to the in-world helpdesk

And so on. But only seeing the web activity is not really a benefit - only if you can start to communicate and interact it gets to an interesting point. To enable this, the web visitor also needs not only an indication that others are doing the same thing as him (web and metaverse), but also an easy web adequate tool to start a real-time communication and interaction with others.

In the moment where he starts to use this application, he starts to control his bot much more directly and this bot will become his presentation in the metaverse. At this point you could also imagine to personalize this bot, in the moment, where somebody is identified on the webpage. (via openID or whatever)

And here again the mulit visual layer approach comes into play. Let us imagine in this scenario there a four different levels:

Level 1: a typical website with a special element to indicate activity of other persons in the web and in the mirrored metaverse location.

Level 2: by clicking on the indication element you get a bigger communication interface, which let’s you see “bridged discussions” (web/metaverse) and enables you to participate in those, while you are still a active website user

Level 3: you decide to leave the typical website environment and start an avatar based “virtual world like” - maybe 2.5D environment - which is still web-based and a light-weighted version of the metaverse location.

Level 4: the last step is to open a special metaverse client and to really visit the mirrored metaverse location of the companies website

Bottom line

Well - for me it’s about bridging the web and the metaverse and about offering different interfaces, for different kind of usage scenarios, different kind of degrees of communication and interaction and with that for different kind of users.

And that is what I have wanted to say in the beginning with “opening doors which have been closed due to the Second Life anti-hype” - as soon we are able to connect metaverse investments much stronger with existing websites and web based application, as sooner companies will again invest in those projects.

As soon we are able to get to above described scenarios, as soon I really believe in a massive growth in this market, because then suddenly also people who are not that virtual world affine, would stumble over “virtual world llike” offers in the web.

They would make the first experiences with this medium in a well known environment, with a limited set of functions, with a limited depth and therefore a limited complexity. If they want more, they just need to make the next step and download a client software … and then they get access to the whole metaverse.