3D Social Virtual Worlds: Research Issues and Challenges

Hendaoui, Adel; Limayem, Moez; Thompson, Craig W.

doi:10.1109/mic.2008.1

Cited by 151 publications

(74 citation statements)

References 1 publication

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“…A study conducted by Cole et al [9], demonstrates that the social interactions in online gaming are a considerable element in the overall enjoyment of playing. Beyond the entertainment and game-play features, virtual worlds are evolving towards a universe in which social and economic interactions are the main drivers [10]. The use of social 3D environment for learning has also been widely studied.…”

Section: A Social Interaction In 3d Virtual Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Design, development, and usability evaluation of a system for adding and editing social media banners in the immersive street-level 3D virtual city

Badri

Pakanen

Alavesa

et al. 2017

2017 9th International Conference on Virtual Worlds and Games for Serious Applications (VS-Games)

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Abstract-In this paper, we present design and implementation of a system for adding and visualizing social media content in an immersive street-level 3D virtual city environment. The system enables its users to add banners anywhere in the virtual 3D environment, typically on building façades, walls, or on the ground. The banner's owner is then able to edit the banner and select the social media platform to load the content from, thereby creating a social media content banner with a specific ID. The system supports four social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Flickr. Users can also customize banners' position, rotation, and the visual elements such as text, images and colors. To evaluate our system's usability, we conducted an iterative usability evaluation with 12 participants. Each evaluation round with three participants indicated improvements to the system, which were implemented before next evaluation round. Finally, after the last modifications, system was found to be easy to use by average users and only a little help was needed for nonexperienced users. We believe this system could provide added value for the business owners and users by enabling social media content to be add on the 3D virtual city and use it as a marketing platform.

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Section: A Social Interaction In 3d Virtual Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Design, development, and usability evaluation of a system for adding and editing social media banners in the immersive street-level 3D virtual city

Badri

Pakanen

Alavesa

et al. 2017

2017 9th International Conference on Virtual Worlds and Games for Serious Applications (VS-Games)

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“…Recent studies suggest that Virtual Commerce (V-Commerce) should be considered as a totally new and well promising retailing channel [27,28,78]. According to Kzero [41], the revenues in VWs reached $6 billion in 2012 and by 2018, VWs will have been one of the most important business platforms [35].…”

Section: Virtual World Dynamics and Motivation For The Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Store selection criteria and sales prediction in virtual worlds

Krasonikolakis

Vrechopoulos

Pouloudi

2014

Information & Management

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Virtual worlds (VWs) have emerged as a new context for gaming, collaboration, social networking but also commercial activity. This paper focuses on the latter, and investigates how consumers behave in this virtual context when selecting stores they visit or buy from. The paper explores store selection criteria in virtual world stores and extends earlier research in both offline and online commercial environments, taking into account the novel IT capabilities that VWs exploit. Theoretical insights drawn from the marketing and information systems literature have been used to guide the design of a survey conducted in the virtual world Second Life. In addition to identifying the factors influencing store selection, the paper investigates how these differ between shoppers and non-shoppers, and identifies the factors that affect the amount of money spent in virtual world shopping environments. The findings suggest that ''Core Store Features'' and ''Security and Privacy'' constitute the most important store selection factors in virtual environments and that sales in VWs are predicted by the frequency of visiting and the time spent within VWs' stores. Virtual world dynamics and motivation for the studyA Virtual World (VW) is defined as a "computer-simulated three-dimensional (3D) environment" [11, p.525]. Virtual Worlds have been developed since the last decade, exploiting the available information and Internet technology capabilities, attracting increasing numbers of users. Some of these worlds can be accessed through a web browser, while others require downloading and using specialized software. The origin of VWs is considered to be both social networking and gaming [52]. Some VWs started as games and consequently adopted new services, capabilities and even their own virtual currency. The variety of activities and possibilities depends on each VW's orientation (e.g., education, socialization, entertainment, commerce, etc). Several VWs develop and grow dynamically through their inhabitants' (i.e., users') actions.Users in a VW interact [45] with others through their "avatar", "a representation of the user as an animated character in virtual worlds" [47, p.17], and engage in numerous activities such as information sharing, talking with friends or finding new friends, playing games, creating new services, building virtual objects, buying and selling goods, and so on. They can communicate with others through synchronous text messages, voice chat, e-mails, or videoconferencing.Retailing activity also gained momentum in VWs, with users buying and selling virtual or real products [34]. Recent studies suggest that Virtual Commerce (V-Commerce) should be considered as a totally new and well promising retailing channel [27,28,78]. According to Kzero [41], the revenues in VWs reached $6 billion in 2012 and by 2018, VWs will have been one of the most important business platforms [35]. The overall consumer virtual reality market over the five year period of 2014 to 2018 will worth $16.2 bn, with an average compound ann...

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“…SL's population also increased, from 2 million residents in 2006, to more than 36 million residents in 2013. In 2014 there were over 1 million active users in SL, with over 1.2 million transactions each day for virtual items (Hendaoui, Limayem, & Thompson, 2008;Linden Lab, 2013a). Similarly, virtual worlds such as World of Warcraft (WoW) and Entropia Universe (EU) have also experienced a significant growth in the last decade, in terms of both the number of users, and the economy market (Gapper, 2006).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Brief History of Virtual Economy

Nazir¹,

Lui²

2016

JVWR

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The virtual world economy is a multibillion-dollar industry. There is significant evidence for the growth of virtual economies within a variety of virtual worlds. There is an increasing demand from users to buy, sell, and invest in virtual items and services, including virtual properties. However, there is also evidence suggesting that many companies struggle to succeed in the virtual economy platform. In order to facilitate and drive success in virtual business strategies, it is necessary to have a framework for classifying elements of virtual economies. This paper proposes a classification framework of virtual economy elements based upon the characteristics of products and services, the transaction and marketplace, as well as the currency and exchange systems present in these economic environments. In addition, this research highlights the opportunities and challenges presented to both users and companies within the virtual economy platform.

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3D Social Virtual Worlds: Research Issues and Challenges

Cited by 151 publications

References 1 publication

Design, development, and usability evaluation of a system for adding and editing social media banners in the immersive street-level 3D virtual city

Design, development, and usability evaluation of a system for adding and editing social media banners in the immersive street-level 3D virtual city

Store selection criteria and sales prediction in virtual worlds

A Brief History of Virtual Economy

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