Voice in SL
One of the early attractions of SL as a facilitator back in 2004 was the unique environment it provided for people to rediscover their true voice. A desire to find ones true voice has been one of the driving forces behind much of the early adoption of weblogs, wikis and other social media tools.
As Malcolm Gladwell pointed out in his last book Blink people tend to immediately form an opinion at the outset of making contact in RL. Within SL this does not happen as both parties have to engage in a 3D immersive environment before learning more about each other. It is one the most powerful neutralizing techniques I’ve experienced over the years.
So when I read Daniel Terdiman’s interview with Linden Lab CEO Philip Rosedale which discussed voice back in October I knew the countdown had begun. Adding voice to text will help SL become more mainstream and accessible. Vivox were first to provide a SL integrated VOIP service. Centric’s launch of SecondTalk today gives a flavor of whats to come.
Given current instability issues with SL I will not be recommending use of an integrated SL offering anytime soon but will continue to use third party solutions such as Skype, Gizmo, TeamSpeak and Jajah for now. Tools still relatively unknown to much of the mainstream public.
An example of how SL is currently integrating with other social media tools to enable people find their voice? 100 participants have registered for this years TESOL Electronic Village Online from around the globe. Over the next 6 weeks they will use VOIP, Yahoo Groups, Wikispaces and SL to enrich the experience for everyone concerned without ever having to leave their home locations. And that is a very good thing.