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I have to take it in a balanced way. SL is overhyped but the success of SL and WoW are bringing the money people around so drafting on it is smart. Give them credit for their successes and let’s get our own back.
OTOH, Clay has been doing this kind of technology debunking for years and he’s been one of the loudest critics of VRML. The quote that starts the xml.com article I wrote is from him. The best response to him after correcting his poor grasp of technology and history is to build better worlds faster and prove that VRML/X3D already is the HTML of 3D. The critics need to get that. If an amateur like me can do it, anyone can. That is what HTML was all about if one accepts the opinions of the technology market pundits. Meanwhile, Don, Dick, Tony and Alan et al will tighten up the standard, new nodes can be mastered, and we keep wrling.
You are the junkyard dogs of the web. Nothing has ever stopped you from doing what you set out to do and some dammed powerful forces have tried. When The Shirk can show us he has actually built a 3D world and put his reputation where his mouth is, then he has a valuable opinion and might even provide some technical insight. Until then, he’s just another blogger.
Make worlds, not words. ;-)
len
-----Original Message-----
It’s too bad he didn’t stop at anit-hyping SL. But he used that as a launch point to lay into all of Web 3D. Just one sample of that:
“virtual reality is so appealingly simple that its persistent failure to be a good idea, as measured by user adoption, has done little to dampen enthusiasm for the coming day of Keanu Reeves interfaces and Snow Crash interactions.”
There are more.
Tony
From: Rita
Turkowski [mailto:rita.turkowski@web3d.org]
I don't know about that; he just seems to want to provide some anti-hype and says so in his last comment post. Why don't you just ask him if he's anti 3D web?
rita On Dec 14, 2006, at 8:13 PM, Tony Parisi wrote:
I am not joining the chorus of Amens; I think this guy is another 3d-phobe and SL has given him the ammo he was looking for to bash all Web 3D. Too bad… but history will prove him wrong.
Tony
From: Len Bullard [mailto:cbullard@hiwaay.net]
And the beat goes on. Did you see the note from Pesce down in the comments on Clay’s article?
Today, I’m beginning to tackle the avatars. I’m taking apart the Numedia-generated avs. Most instructive. It’s hard to see how anyone does this by hand but I’ve said that before about other bits and then after practice, it’s easy. Talk about a ton of interpolators. This is where libraries would be really nice to have as starter kits, but the editor is actually a good one. The photo mapping is not terribly precise but it’s a good start. You know, a lot of really good tech and companies got sidelined and left some great stuff for the having. The groundhog says “thank you!” Failure, my ass. VRML/X3D is just on a very slow clock.
Yeah yeah yeah… I know old hat to most of you. Give me a break. I had to be unemployed to finally get to learn this stuff and boy, I’ve sure talked more than I’ve walked in quite a while. OTOH, better late than never.
BTW: why did they name the script “Welder”?
len
Well said, Len. Or, as an old mentor of mine was fond of saying: Code talks, bullshit walks.
Tony
From:
owner-x3d-public@web3d.org [mailto:owner-x3d-public@web3d.org]
On Behalf Of Len Bullard
Hi Dick:
Which is a laudable and strategic liaison although one might note the W3C has begun to lose its clout over its member organizations as the shift in focus to the semantic web diluted the web services initiatives. The history of SVG is an example of the kind of focus that the cache of the W3C could bring to one vector graphics technology at the expense of others because the strength of the familial content types was not realized well by the W3C committee members. Had SVG worked with X3D, both would be stronger in the market today in my opinion. Given Adobe’s dominant role, that wasn’t going to happen but it is a lesson for those who need to plan technical strategies some years in advance of their fielding. Instead, the SVG community disse’d the 3D work and claimed they could provide adequate 3D from SVG objects thus diluting the initial promotion of X3D. ISO tends to be wiser about that given a longer history and more reliable process. It is ISO’s long history of slow but sustainable success at this that earns my vote in these matters. Money and ideals may drive some organizations. ISO as the sheik said in LOA, ‘is merely polite’ and that is more reliable.
But the burglary tactic will be a problem. VRML was taken to ECMA originally and that was the punt to bypass opposing forces in the W3C. Put simply, the W3C didn’t care about 3D and it is only now that SL and WoW are getting so much VC attention that anyone does. MS is replicating that tactic, Intel created its own faux standards consortia, and others understand the power of faux standards coupled to massive PR campaigns. IBM is faced with a decision to balance its announced intentions to create standards for the 3D on the web (“an HTML for 3D”) while simultaneously sponsoring more Second Life-based ventures leading some to speculate that SL will be open-sourced.
If the outcome of these selection pressures is to increase the strength of the liaisons and get more convergence between ISO graphics standards and the W3C specifications, that is an excellent outcome. In the emergence of civilization, it was not plenty but scarcity in the environments as the Sahara encroached on the Nile that created the conditions for cities to be created given the need for more cooperation in smaller areas of available resources. The best possible outcome will be if IBM decides that it should work with ISO as well. My intuition is that decision will be greatly influenced by IBM’s habit of acquiring IP assets for its portfolio and whether or not that can be modified for this initiative. One good sign is that IBM is also sponsoring an initiative to work with universities in a more open IP process that requires both the universities and IBM to give up some of these assets as a precondition for cooperation. Since the Birch-Doyle Act was a major cash cow for the universities and businesses, it is anyone’s guess as to the strength of that commitment.
I think it prudent to keep building as much content as we can, to ensure that VRML and X3D are not allowed to be cast as adversaries but as less capable and more capable specifications (we have a lot of VRML97 books and tutorials on the web, a lot of content, and a community of capable authors), and to at every opportunity where SL and the like are being promoted place the X3D/VRML brands and advantages in the same search stream.
Forests are commensual trees that used the wind and seduced predators to spread seeds but didn’t starve each other for light or water.
len
Hi, Len --
There is an agreement in place between the W3C and the Web3D Consortium in which the Web3D Consortium is responsible for 3D on WWW and the W3C is responsible for everything else. Indeed, both organizations are working effectively together (thanks to Don Brutzman).
-- Dick /***************************************************
Rita Turkowski Executive Director Web3D Consortium 325 Sharon Park Drive, Suite 623 Menlo Park, CA 94025
www.web3d.org cell: 650-722-0659 fax: 707 598 0268
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