Second Life and Entrepreneurs

Using Virtual Worlds for teaching and learning with small business is a new practice and area of research.  This site shares information about Second Life (SL) research and follows my University of Wyoming dissertation project called: Counseling entrepreneurs in a 3-D multi-user virtual environment.

Site was created by Mark Atkinson, Ed.D candidate at the University of Wyoming.

My research page shows all of the papers I have written about business and SL, and has a bibliography of peer-reviewed journals articles, and books I have read about the same.  When possible, my teaching and learning focus is directed toward business education.

Interactive Virtual Learning Objects

Currently, teaching in Second Life, with some exception, consists replicating real life teaching.  That is, using a classroom for lectures, sharing objects like business forms and print media, and one-on-one teaching like consulting.

While these things must be, there is a higher plane I intend to achieve and that is using interactive objects that will teach business skills and concepts like how to create a balance sheet, how and what to research when taking a new product to market, and why ethics are so important.  Simply reading or hearing about these subjects is not nearly as powerful as learning about them in activity.

Teaching & Being an Entrepreneur in Second Life

As a business consultant and MBA, I am very interested in both using Second Life to teach business education to entrepreneurs, and interested in how businesses are started and sustained in Second Life.

Currently, most businesses in SL sell digital consumer goods like clothing, homes, and an endless array of other objects like scripts.  For the most part, this industry is selling image files, some of which can be interacted with.  Pretty interesting huh?

Microtransactions

Microtransactions is now its own industry so to speak.  A microtransaction, as one may guess, is a very small transaction and the virtual good market on Second Life, as well as other gaming platforms like Farmville on Facebook, as examples.  The transactions range in size anywhere from a few pennies to a few dollars and some companies and truly capitalizing on them.