User Needs and Legally Ruled Collaboration in
Peer-to-Peer Virtual World VirtualLife
Vytautas Čyras, Kristina Lapin
Vilnius University, Lithuania
Intelligent educational systems and technoloy-enhanced learning (INTEL-EDU)
September 7th, 2009, Riga, Latvia
Overview
About ICT FP7 project VirtualLife
objective
novelty
Learning needs of digital natives
features of contemporary students
learning motivation
Learning support in virtual worlds
synchronous communication in virtual world
asynchronous communication in Web 2.0 tools
2
ICT FP7 VirtualLife
Objective
to create a safe, democratitic and legally rules
3D collaborative environment
Novelty
Issues of security and trust
In-world legal framework
Supreme Constitution, a Constitution of Virtual
Nation, a set of contracts
Dispute resolution and voting mechanisms
hybrid peer-to-peer infrastructure
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Legal framework
A “Supreme Constitution”
Code of Conduct
values that the user has to respect, e.g.
avatars integrity, sanctity of property, reputation, etc.
A part of EULA (End User License Agreement)
A “Virtual Nation Constitution”
authentication procedure to become a member of Nation
copyright law (of the Nation)
A set of different sample contracts
sales contract
teacher employement contract
student contract
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Virtual Worlds for education
Sara de Freitas. Serious Virtual
Worlds: scoping study. JISC, 2008.
a review of the learning and
training support
glossary of terms
list of virtual worlds
more than 80
most popular: Second Life, Active
world educational universe, etc.
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/publications/documents/seriousvirtualworldsreport.aspx
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Digital natives
Students of today
active Web 2.0 participants
easy create relationships in social networks
like impressing peers with curious facts
enjoy participating in on-line group activities
function in “multitasking mode”
new phenomenon:
they share the knowledge with unknown people
do not like memorizing information for later use
but they are effective in searching
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Virtual platform analysis
Existing open source platforms
Multiverse, OpenSim, Metaplace
installed on service provider
tutor do not has full controll on content
on user’s Pc
difficult to install and maintain
creation of learning content
time-consuming
advanced scripting skills requred
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Lessons for learning motivation
Learning material
static material
searchable for learner’s
queries in 2D environment
interactive objects
in 3D environment
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Lessons for learning motivation
Learning environment
constantly gratifying
encouraging social
interaction
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Sample scenarios
Web 2.0
information as a content
asynchronous communication
Virtual University
synchronous communication
interaction as a content
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Conclusions
Legally ruled collaboration in a hybrid peer-topeer virtual world is a realistic purpose
Digital natives need a new learning environment
with similar experiences to on-line games
3D virtual worlds add the value of interaction
experience comparing with 2D applications
Provides interaction and feedback
Thank you!
Vytautas Čyras, Kristina Lapin
Vilnius University
[email protected], [email protected]
www.ict-virtuallife.eu