In today’s ever-shifting
media landscape, it can be a complex task to find effective ways to reach your
desired audience. As traditional media such as television continue to lose
audience share, one venue in particular stands out for its ability to attract
highly motivated audiences and for its tremendous growth potential — the 3D
Internet.
Also known as virtual worlds,
the 3D Internet is a powerful new way for you to reach consumers, business
customers, co-workers, partners, and students. It combines the immediacy of
television, the versatile content of the Web, and the relationship-building
strengths of social networking sites like Face book. Yet unlike the passive
experience of television, the 3D Internet is inherently interactive and
engaging. Virtual worlds provide immersive 3D experiences that replicate (and
in some cases exceed) real life.
People who take part
in virtual worlds stay online longer with a heightened level of interest. To
take advantage of that interest, diverse businesses and organizations have
claimed an early stake in this fast-growing market. They include technology
leaders such as IBM, Microsoft, and Cisco, companies such as BMW, Toyota,
Circuit City, Coca Cola, and Calvin Klein, and scores of universities,
including Harvard, Stanford and Penn State.
The most well-known
of the 40-some virtual world platforms today is Second Life. It’s “in-world”
residents’ number in the millions. As residents, they can:
• Remotely attend group meetings, training
sessions, and educational classes
• Engage in corporate or community events
• View and manipulate statistical
information and other data such as biological or chemical processes in three
dimensions
• Try out new products, electronic devices
and gadgets
• Take part in virtual commerce
• Participate in brand experiences that
carry over to the real world.
Indeed, practically
anything than can be done in the real world can be reproduced in the 3D
Internet — with the added benefit being that someone can experience it from the
comfort of their home or office. The possibilities for the 3D Internet are such
that Forrester Research expects that virtual worlds may approach the Web in
popularity in as little as five years, while Gartner forecasts that within ten,
the greatest impact on consumer purchases will come from virtual experiences.
Hence, The results
from this study suggests that the familiarity of a software is important in
achieving better user performance in terms of speed. This is why a 2D environment outperforms a 3D
environment in terms of speed due to widespread use of 2D window environments.
Moreover, the results show that navigation ease is the key point to achieving
better user performance and satisfaction.
Navigation ease is affected by 2
factors. First, the amount of environmental
cues is critical to users performance.
Providing better environmental cues as in 3D would lead users to a
better navigational experience. Second,
familiarity with the navigational tools is equally important as evident in the
2D environment. We therefore would
recommend practitioners to consider merits of both 2D and 3D window
environments and achieve a good balance.
The earlier
hypothesis suggests that the initial viewpoint is that the 2D is generally
better than the 3D. A refinement of this
theory is warranted now that we have a better understanding. Specifically, the impact of window dimensions
on user performance lies in the navigational ease that can be achieved through
different window dimensions.
Combinations of different features might be needed as a result.
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