IBM has been one of the more forward-thinking companies when it comes to virtual worlds for some time now, and its latest deal supplies more proof. It's becoming the first company to host private Second Life areas on its own servers, with a project that's due to go live in the coming weeks.
It’s all about the privacy, really: the private areas will be hosted behind IBM’s corporate firewall, allowing employees to talk about sensitive company business without having to worry about the security of Linden Lab’s servers. According to Reuters, more than 6,000 of IBM’s employees have created Second Life avatars, so it should have a decent userbase from day one. Employees will be able to travel between the private areas and the public parts of Second Life, too.
IBM’s vice president for digital convergence, Colin Parris, explains:
“We see a need for an enterprise-ready solution that offers the same content creation capabilities but adds new levels of security and scalability...We’re doing this internally and we’re building the right kind of enterprise grade solution.”
The deal is part of a new focus on corporate clients from Linden Lab, so it’ll be interesting to see if some of the other blue-chip companies that have been active in the world choose to set up their own private islands. Cisco next, maybe?
(via Reuters)
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