Search results

To review Peter Plantec's book Virtual Humans: A Build it Yourself Kit.

This book is meant to be read by one willing to actively engage with the technologies that Plantec introduces. While the technology that enables virtual agents is stable, many agents are annoyingly non‐humanlike in their interactions. Plantec encourages his readers to enter the world of virtual humans by providing the resources and coaching necessary to create a digital agent. He challenges the reader to throw off the notion that she is creating a technical implementation, a piece of software, and instead persuades her to approach the task as a scriptwriter would in creating a character.

Only through the application of artifice can developers hope to create deeply engaging virtual humans with recognizable, engaging personalities. But once people start to believe in their virtual companions, where might it lead them as a society?

Provides information about virtual humans.

Looks at the possible evolution of virtual teachers. They could be designed to teach any subject, while automatically adapting their teaching style to a student's learning style. Use of “plug‐ins” would make it easy to change personalities, language, student profiles as well as updating courseware. Virtual teachers would be a progression of remote course management, or virtual‐learning systems currently being used on traditional campuses to augment classroom teaching. A new breed of human teacher with new skills in designing and managing V‐teaching environments will evolve. They will be experts in designing programs that clearly indicate precise direction to the student as he progresses. What the virtual human will do is make complexity transparent. They will keep up with all the technical stuff, while the others negotiate with them for the things of life that they want to know about.

The purpose of this article is to analyze the educational and more specifically, the library and information opportunities afforded through virtual worlds such as Second Life.

The article provides an analysis of virtual world opportunities through a review of relevant literature as well as actual applications of virtual world platforms.

Virtual worlds have the potential to provide a rich learning and information environment. Despite what many see as limitations, virtual worlds can enhance the learning experience if problematic issues are addressed and if expectations are realistic. For libraries, a unique set of limitations are identified.

The limited availability of library presences in virtual worlds prohibits a full scale analysis of the success or otherwise of such projects. Future analyses of virtual worlds, in particular Second Life, will be useful if their pervasiveness increases.

Library managers are alerted to issues and problems surrounding an investment in virtual worlds.

This paper will prove useful to educators and librarians considering investing time and other resources in developing content in virtual worlds.