Virtual Bali meeting in Second Life

Peter Taylor, the WDM web officer in London writes...

For those not attending Bali in the real world it is now possible to watch some of the events via the Second Life virtual world. WDM generated a lot of publicity last year, as one of the first UK NGOs to have a presence in Second Life with our giant death clock. However Second Life has a lot of potential as an online meeting venue, which has the added benefit of avoiding all the flying that normally takes place. You can check out Virtual Bali and take part at One World's website - and an account with Second Life is not required if you just want to watch the video.

So as WDM's online 'avatar' in Second Life I thought I'd visit the Bali climate change island and take a look. Islands are areas in Second Life dedicated to a particular meeting or company - since the increase in popularity of Second Life large numbers of organisations and corporations have jumped on the bandwaggon and purchased their own plots of land.

After an initial look round, where I took in the nice views of palm trees, the UK government energy saving trust stand (which featured tips on using energy efficient light bulbs, but sadly nothing on flying less), I settled down to watch a webcast being streamed live from Bali.

Sitting in the auditorium and chatting with the other delegates there I was able to watch video being broadcast live from Bali, and then take part in an interactive question and answer session. It was possible to suggest questions which were then passed onto the representative in Bali, who put them to his interviewee on the live video link. The crossover between the virtual / real world did seem quite strange, but on the whole the system worked quite well . There were other avatars attending from other organisations, and helpers on hand to facilitate the session.

There are a few drawbacks to the Second Life system: the computer hardware requirements are quite high (I was using the only computer here at WDM which was new enough to run the software) and there is a need for a suitably fast broadband connection.

Still it is an interesting experiment, and something which I'm sure will become more mainstream and accessible in the future. If you want to check it out for yourself, head over to the OneWorld website to find out more.