rapid prototyping

I attended Bob Ketner's presentation at the Second Life Community Convention in San Francisco in August 2009. Bob is the Virtual Community Manager at The Tech Museum in San Jose, California. The Tech currently has three sims in Second Life: The Tech which is a "museum" with finished works, The Tech 2 which is a "workshop" with prototypes, and in Teen Second Life, The TechTG, a "workshop" with prototypes created by teens. At SLCC09, Bob talked about how The Tech was using Second Life to do rapid prototyping of real world exhibits. SL to RL? I was intrigued. I finally caught up with him for an interview.

Claudia: Thanks for giving me a tour of The Tech Virtual project today. I was really intrigued by your presentation at the Second Life Community Convention last summer. You mentioned that you were prototyping museum exhibits for the real world using Second Life and I wanted to find out more about it. How did the idea for this initiative originate?

Bob: As you can probably imagine, museums are challenged to develop very complex installations that not only have to be informative but interactive as well. This especially applies to science and technology museums that rely less on unique artifacts and more on interactivity. So the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation funded this idea in 2007 (that's Gordon Moore as in Moore's Law).  Basically they asked,  what if you could use Second Life to prototype exhibits with simultaneous input from experts and casual visitors as well?  It opens up the creative process to a much wider talent base, and means that you can preview ideas before you ever even order any materials. It's the open source method of development, applied to exhibits.

Claudia: I understand that you have some teen interns doing some prototypes...can you tell us what teens are up to?

Bob: Over the summer of 2009 our intern Kyle Walker built a Second Life model of a specific section of The Tech Museum. The purpose of this was to be able to do a complete "before and after" visualization of  a renovation.  It's not hard to imagine, if we can prototype exhibits individually, why not an entire room or gallery? We have other teens who are partnering to build and script exhibits such as the recent work done by Christopher Organiser and Mikeza Obolensky on an exhibit called The Macrochip. They do very detailed and high quality work and I'm hoping that this work can support their art and design portfolios.You'll find a preview here.  Wally Oyen and Riden Blaisdale have done an amazing remodel which we'll be using as an example when they're all done.

Claudia: Now that this project has been running over a year and a half, and was even a Linden Prize finalist, what's new with The Tech Virtual?

Bob: We are really excited to be partnering with 3 new museums in 2010.  Starting first will be Citilab Cornella in Barcelona which has opened an adventurous project called Expolab.  Basically they want to experiment with the whole concept of museum interactions and exhibitions and open up the design of the interactions to a worldwide community.  Second Life is obviously the perfect place to do this! Science Center Singapore will be working on all aspects of "water"- from its physical properties to art pieces. See that preview here. Sometime before summer Lemelson Center at The Smithsonian will be joining us with a topic they'll announce soon. The opportunities for Second Life users to show their talent and ingenuity to this professional audience are really growing. Want to see your work in these awesome places? This is the way to make that happen!

Claudia: Where can people see the exhibits in Second Life?

Bob: Our "virtual museum" is "The Tech" sim.  You can see some of the prototype exhibits from completed design rounds at http://www.tinyurl.com/ParksideHall, and there's an entire museum there as well to explore.  The prototyping sim is "The Tech 2" and you'll find the newest work there at http://tinyurl.com/TheTech2sim

Claudia: How long will these initiatives run?

Bob: The Citilab project will be developed and installed by June 2010 so they're on the fastest turnaround. The "water" exhibits will likely be realized in early 2011 and the others are on longer time frames. It's good for aspiring exhibit designers to start early, because we can help refine the idea and approach and make it more likely that your exhibit can actually be fabricated in the real world.

Claudia: How can someone get involved?

Bob: It starts with creating a profile. Then, just look at the topic list and think about an exhibit on a topic that interests you. Then, click on "Create a Project".  You'll be prompted to sign up and describe your project. We'll contact you to assign a space where you can build your prototype in Second Life!