1. Centre Daily Times (USA) – Virtual worlds provide real interaction. “When I was a boy, I loved the Tom Swift books. Whether Tom was plumbing the depths of the sea in his Jetmarine or flying into space on his Rocket Ship, technology and quick thinking always managed to save the day. Those books delightfully immersed young readers in exciting worlds of imagination and possibility. Books have long served as “immersion technologies” that transport people to alternate worlds. Today, computer technology takes immersion several steps further.”

2. GigaOM (USA) – Virtual World Marketing That Works: My Top 3 Tips. “So last year, most people decided that marketing real products in virtual worlds like Second Life doesn’t work. Since then, however, I’ve come across some avatar-driven advertising campaigns with very impressive numbers. In Gaia Online, for example, users grabbed over a million virtual copies of a Toyota Scion; in Second Life, a promotion for the IMAX screening of the latest “Harry Potter” movie was credited for boosting the movie’s ticket sales online.”

3. Orange County Register (USA) – UCI tackles ‘World of Warcraft’ mystery. “The National Science Foundation has given UC Irvine $100,000 to figure out why Americans go to greater lengths than the Chinese to modify “World of Warcraft,” the hugely popular multiplayer online game produced by Blizzard Entertainment of Irvine. About 5 million Chinese play “WoW,” which is twice the number of American players. But Americans produce far more modifications, or “mods,” to enrich the gaming experience.”

4. VentureBeat (USA) – Robotgalaxy raises $5M to launch virtual world. “Robotgalaxy, a retailer that lets kids build toy robots, is developing a virtual world where players can take those robots on science fiction adventures. The New York-based company has raised a second funding round of more than $5 million to launch the game, as well as for other expansion.”

5. AsiaOne (Singapore) – Chat, shop and play in virtual S’pore by year-end. “Local Internet users and their life-like 3D digital avatars can soon sip virtual cuppas in virtual Shenton Way cafes. What’s more, they will also be able to chat, work and play in other true-to-life, online 3D cityscapes of Singapore.
This virtual world that looks and feels like Singapore is the brain child of German firm Metaversum. Virtual Singapore, which will be based on a Metaversum platform called Twinity, will be rolled out by year-end, a senior company official told BizIT this week.”

6. The Canberra Times (Australia) – Real interest in Canberrans’ virtual worlds. “Canberra software company Simmersion says its new 3D program Mycosm could rival YouTube with 30million users.
Two years ago chief executive Bob Quodling told his creative team to come up with something that would ”blow the world”. At the Virtual World Expo in Los Angeles two weeks ago, multi-national software companies said his team had done just that. Mycosm, a 3D version of Facebook, allows users to build their own worlds and share them online to play games, exchange media, make money and socialise with friends.”

7. InformationWeek (USA) – Second Life Tries For A Second Act. “I first joined Second Life in January 2007, near the peak of the hype cycle. Second Life was supposedly the next technology megatrend. It would transform the face of the Internet and make present-day technology obsolete. Then the hype cycle burst. Second Life didn’t change the Internet much. Journalists quit the service en masse to follow the next big trend. But I didn’t leave Second Life. I stuck around. I cut back my professional involvement to an article or blog every few months. But I still spend a few hours a week in Second Life, just playing and keeping in touch with friends.”

8. Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) – Exit reality with 3D web browser. “A total internet revolution is here. That’s according to ExitReality founder Danny Stefanic, who launched his 3D web browser software at Melbourne’s Federation Square today. ExitReality purports to be for 3D internet what Google was for web searches, what You Tube was for video and what MySpace and Facebook were for social networking. Available for free at www.exitreality.com as a four megabyte download, ExitReality operates as a plug-in for existing web browsers. The developers say it was designed with the average computer in mind.”

9. Ars Technica (USA) – Hands on: ExitReality, another useless 3D Internet tool. “Yep, it’s that time again kids. Gather round and hear the story of yet another “we’re giving you the Internet—but in 3D!” product. ExitReality (get it?) is a company based in Melbourne, Australia that apparently isn’t very happy with browsing, searching, and socializing on the web in its current state. Thursday, it released a plug-in named after itself that “allows anyone to view every web page in 3D.” Its ExitReality plug-in is built for IE and Firefox on Windows (though you won’t find any of those details on its barren download page), and also offers 3D search, chat with other users, customizable avatars, social networking, and virtual recreations of real-world destinations.”

10. Silicon.com – Naked CIO: Virtual worlds will disappear. “At a recent golfing outing I found myself paired with a software salesman from a company that develops ‘virtual worlds’. I then reviewed silicon.com to find a CIO Jury, which discussed social networking possibilities within the IT field. Not long ago I also read an article about the CIA developing a social networking virtual world program to allow its employees to share intelligence information in a more proactive fashion.”

1. Globe and Mail (Canada) – You’ve got the whole world in your hands. “Best to get the hyperbole out of the way early: Spore, the new computer game from Sims creator Will Wright, rolls the past, present and future of interactive entertainment – not to mention life as we know it – into an absorbing ball of fun and big ideas. No matter what you think of video games, it is something everyone, young and old, should see and experience.”

2. Market Watch (USA) – Motorhead Frontman Lemmy to Launch Own Private Army Inside Virtual World Entropia Universe. “Mindark, developer and operator of Virtual World Entropia Universe, and rock icon Lemmy from Motoerhead, today announced a partnership in which Lemmy and his band will team up with Mindark to create Motoerhead Stadium and Lemmy’s Castle within Entropia Universe. The Stadium and Castle are being built utilizing the award-winning CryENGINE(R)2 graphics engine. This will be the virtual universe’s first major virtual rock arena and castle that will enable fans to hear exclusive music as well as battle Lemmy’s Guardians in hopes of joining his private Virtual Army. ”

3. Science Daily (USA) – Real-world Behavior And Biases Show Up In Virtual World. “Americans are spending increasing amounts of time hanging around virtual worlds in the forms of cartoon-like avatars that change appearances according to users’ wills, fly through floating cities in the clouds and teleport instantly to glowing crystal canyons and starlit desert landscapes. Simply fun and games divorced from reality, right?
Not necessarily so, say two social psychologists from Northwestern University who conducted the first experimental field studies in the virtual world.”

4. Kotaku (USA) – Future Trends for Virtual Worlds. “he Virtual Worlds Expo took place last week in Los Angeles, and there’s been bits and pieces of news from the event floating around — the wrap ups of roundtables and panels are the most interesting. Over at Free To Play, they have put together five big trends in virtual worlds, ranging from ‘the war on geekiness’ (oh, ouch) to one I’m most interested in, the movement from virtual world to real world instead of the other way around.”

5. Market Watch (USA) – Forterra Systems Named Winner of “Innovation in Virtual Worlds for Enterprise” Award. “Forterra Systems, the market and technology leader in enterprise virtual worlds, announced today that it was awarded the prestigious Innovation in Virtual Worlds for Enterprises award at the Virtual World Expo held September 3rd and 4th in Los Angeles. These awards recognize the significant achievements in innovation to companies in five categories: Consumer, Enterprise, Youth, Pioneer, and Overall Innovation.”

6. CNN (USA) – Virtual September 11 memorials bring back memories, emotions. “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 series of September 11 memorial events in Second Life, a virtual world run over the Internet, were created to give visitors the ability to connect with others scattered around the country and world.”

7. CNET (USA) – Multiverse touts extensible virtual-world effort. “The Multiverse Network, a developer of virtual world platform software, announced Wednesday that it was unveiling what it calls Places, two related social elements that tie Multiverse users together. Essentially connective tissue for users of the Multiverse platform, Places has two separate components. The first is a social networks application that automatically connects people using Multiverse virtual worlds together with others who are also friends in social networks like Facebook.”

8. Los Angeles Times (USA) – Six Degrees Games hopes to become a heavy hitter in the virtual world. “Virtual worlds, once a niche market within the video game industry, are heading to the big leagues. Six Degrees Games Inc., a Marina del Rey company, is planning this fall to launch a sports-based virtual world for kids called ActionAllStars.com. Members will be able to create avatars, chat with buddies as well as collect virtual trophies for competing in games based on baseball, basketball and extreme sports.”

9. IT Business (Canada) – Using the virtual world of Second Life to snag young IT talent. “The competition sure is fierce when it comes to landing good young talent these days. Organizations are standing shoulder to shoulder around the global talent pool, trying to hook their share of Gen X and Gen Y keepers. But despite their youth, these new recruits are as wary and tight-lipped as a wily old bass. If you don’t find just the right way to attract them, they won’t give you a nibble.”

10. NT News (Australia) – Telstra plasters Uluru in Second Life. “It has long been the subject of great controversy and debate in the real world, but now the Territory’s most famous landmark is at the centre of a virtual storm. Telstra is under fire after it posted billboards advertising its BigPond internet service in front of Uluru in the online virtual world, Second Life.”