WOW, big virtual world news today

On the same day that Google announced the beta release of their new virtual world, Lively, Linden Lab (makers of Second Life), announced that in collaboration with IBM, their researchers had transported an avatar from one virtual world to another. This second development is pretty amazing! Quoting from LL's blog:

This is a historic day for Second Life, and for virtual worlds in general. IBM and Linden Lab have announced that research teams from the two companies successfully teleported avatars from the Second Life Preview Grid into a virtual world running on an OpenSim server, marking the first time an avatar has moved from one virtual world to another. It’s an important first step toward enabling avatars to pass freely between virtual worlds, something we’ve been working toward publicly since the formation of the Architecture Working Group in September 2007. These are still early days, however, so amid all the excitement, we thought it would be helpful to clarify exactly what we’ve done — and what still lies ahead.

Watch this video: http://s4.video.blip.tv/1530004098413/Lindenlab-AcrossTheMetaverseFromSecondLifeToOpenSim126.mp4

Read more.

This has me, um, almost choking with excitement. What it really means is that avatars can be in SL, for example, and then go to ANOTHER WORLD (that is, another server, such as at their university) and have a completely different type of experience (perhaps without the adult entertainment component, more focus on learning, mix of age groups like teachers and kids, etc.) and then go back to the other world. This will be MUCH more like the real world, where most of us transport between various "worlds" every day as we carry out the multidimensional lives we lead.

Wow...simply, Wow.