The Psychology of Facebook

Dr. BJ Fogg & Daniel Berdichevsky at Stanford University are gathering articles from various authors into a nice book around the psychology of Facebook.

You can read more about it on their blog.

Google Lively – 3D Chat/Virtual World

As if Google wasn’t already trying to be the know-it-all and the have-it-all of the Web, now they also try to compete with 3D chat rooms and virtual worlds in this new release in beta phase:

Lively – “Chat and interact with your friends in rooms you design.”

“Customize your avatar and stream personal photos and video.”

“Invite your friends to chat and help decorate.”

The look an feel resembles virtual worlds such as CyWorld, for instance. Many others are compared on this chart by TechCrunch. The Blue Book published by the Association of Virtual Worlds contains and enormous list of Virtual Worlds…

It might be worth giving it a try. I am just not sure whether we need yet another virtual world combined with a chat room capability… mmmm… All in all, It might be just another move for Google to place their ads all over the Web , this time on the 3D Web…

By the way, no Mac version as of now…

Also, take a look at Karl Kapp’s list of Alternative to Second Life.

Youtube’s New Tools Include Annotation

 

New Youtube video tools make the wesbsite’s ressurces even more useful for learning purposes. Their own words:

 

 

Video Annotations are a new way for you to add interactive commentary to your videos! Use them to:

• Add background information about the video.
• Create stories with multiple possibilities (viewers click to choose the next scene)
• Link to related YouTube videos, channels, or search results from within a video
• All of the above!

Youtube Mobile allows users to upload and watch videos from their mobile devices. 

They’ve also added improved inbox features and a new address book function. Interesting things happening in social media, many services trying to improve their User Interface and user-friendliness in innovative ways with many new features…

 

Association of Virtual Worlds’ Resources

The Association of Virtual Worlds is a new initiative that focuses on Virtual Worlds research and also works like an interest group. They have created a community on Ning to facilitate interaction amongst those who share interest in MUVEs.

They have some very good material about their main object of interest, including these ebooks that are free to download:

The Green Book: A Business Guide to Virtual Worlds
The Blue Book: A Consumer Guide to Virtual Worlds

These can be found in their Publishing Division website and also in their Ning community.

Long lists, so… enjoy the read/navigation…