EL: Since Linden Labs controls the Second Life environment, what kinds of content and or security problems does that present to a company?
JK: That's one of the big problems with Second Life for a company like Xerox. The company firewall will block access to the Linden servers for both security and content reasons. However, many companies are trying to figure out how to provide safe and secure access to their Second Life environment.
The good new is that Linden Labs has announced an Open Source server, which will enable companies to run their own Second Life server behind the company firewall. This will make everyone happy.
EL: What is the competition like for Second Life products?
JK: We're starting to see new competitors every day. For example, Sun Microsystems has announced a platform that will enable companies to build and to host a virtual environment on a server. This platform is based on two of Sun's gaming platforms.
There are other systems and platforms on the horizon. The main difference right now is the ease of use. Some systems require you to be an expert in 3D creation tools. If you want to succeed in the Second Life space, you need to make it easy for users to create 3D content.
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