‘Game Over’ – Fast Company article on business simulations

First in a series of posts exploring corporate games and training simulations, virtual and not

RE:  Fast Company article:  Game Over  By: Peter Carbonara Tue Dec 18, 2007 at 5:41 PM

I have been foraging for articles on simulation applications across industries or fields.  I found a good one in Fast Company on business simulations.

Read it here: Game Over

This is a an interesting application (Project Challenge) with lots of possibilities for curriculum and modeling in existing free virtual world platforms.

I see the beginning of this in Second Life within the SL educational community but less so in the business community which has tended to focus on doing business rather than simulating business for education in Second Life.

Companies such as Forio have developed software tools for DIY, contained, non-virtual, business simulations.  The one I looked at apparently takes about 3 hours to complete and is modeled on a business development scenario.  This looks like a great educational tool.   Would love to try this myself.

I will focus on other relevant links over the next few days.  I see great opportunities here.

On the Article: First Responders meet Second Life

Just received this great article in the Medhill Reports – Chicago, from Michelle Miakos (UCSA International) forwarded to her by one of the Linden family:

First responders meet Second Life: Public health enters the virtual world

by Liz Hoffman and Chris Kelly
Feb 04, 2009

This is a great article about how to creatively use virtual worlds, in this case the 3D, immersive virtual world called Second Life owned by Linden Labs, for real life training and scenario simulations.  This is a growing field; a few companies are developing simulations and offering full services to support training and meet this demand.  UCSA International is one of them, offering similar services to other government agencies for training, collaboration and meeting purposes.

Companies, governmental agencies and educational facilities would do well to determine how they might effectively use virtual world simulations to save money, increase training retention, and, above all, create simulated scenarios that will enable employees or trainees to practice real time responses otherwise extremely difficult to pull of without an exorbitant budget and logistics.  The possibilities of this are endless for any type of business.  The field is new, so I look forward to working on many upcoming design projects that involve 3D design of effective serious learning environments, curriculum design and other aspects of this work.

Kudos to the team that developed this.  I was very happy to see this fascinating article.  Follow this link to read the full article.

First Responders meet Second Life

Simology and Ao Kilara

SIMOLOGY

Sim Design and Building

ao_kilara@yahoo.com or
IM Ao Kilara in Second Life (SL)

::Commercial/Residential
::Fantasy/Historical
::Custom detailed work
::Retail prefabs (SL and SL Exchange)

Providing design/build services for businesses entering Second Life, existing SL businesses and SL residents or players.  I design high-quality, creative, immersive 3D virtual environments.

Currently doing contract work for UCSA International’s sim development department and The Eden Project.

Interesting reading on Second Life “culture” and attitudes of participants:

http://slcreativity.org/wiki/index.php?title=Augmentation_vs_Immersion

See also aokilara.wordpress.com

For more images go to www.flickr.com/photos/ao_kilara

Forrester Research analysts on Second Life

Two interesting articles on Virtual Worlds at the end of this post – log into Forrester’s website to get free copies.  Also watch UCSA International for presentations, look for UCSA International on LinkedIn, or contact them in Second Life – search “UCSA International”.)  Gene Leganza of Forrester Research spoke in January ’09 on Enterprise Architecture at UCSA International’s sim in Second Life.  Very interesting.

Should You Be In Second Life? by Jaap Farvier, Vice President / Research Director at Forrester Research
http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,44748,00.html

Case Study: Michelin Uses Second Life for Enterprise Architecture Training by Erica Driver, former Principal Analyst at Forrester Research, co-founder of Thinkbalm
http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/Excerpt/0,7211,46085,00.html

More info on:Thinkbalm