3pointD.com

Justin Bovington of branding and virtual world services company Rivers Run Red sends news that his firm is presenting a Second Life screening of the Second Lives series of short documentary films produced for the UK’s Channel 4. The four three-minute films will be shown at noon Pacific time on Monday, August 7, in Rivers’ Avalon sim — which makes their showing in SL simultaneous with their airing in the UK. Plus which, the SL screening will feature a Q&A with the filmmakers immediately following. Should make for interesting viewing, and a nice use of the virtual world for media delivery and to add value to traditional media outlets. And according to Bovington, the filmmakers have spent a lot of time on the pieces, and definitely “get it” where SL is concerned.

Steve Rubel jumped the gun on this news so I’ll feel free to blog it too: Starwood Hotels is building out a version of their new Aloft hotel brand in the virtual world of Second Life as a way to attract future customers and presumably get some feedback about the brand’s features before it hits the physical world. (It is not meant to be a functional hotel in SL, I’m told.) The SL project is being constructed by the Electric Sheep Company (sponsors of this blog), who are also blogging the process along with Aloft execs. (more…)

Mall of the Bluffs and cloverleaf interchange near Omaha NE, re-created in Sim City 4

Stefan Geens at the always outstanding Ogle Earth blog links to an emergent gameplay phenomenon I hadn’t heard of before: people using urban simulation/god-game Sim City 4 to build re-creations of real cities in all their mundane beauty, based largely on information from Google Earth and similar sources. Their development is chronicled in forum postings known as City Journals in the lingo of the fanbase. The re-creation of the Omaha NE area Stefan links to is chronicled in this thread on fan forum site Simtropolis, which also provides a place for players to swap assets and mods, and trade advice on developing their virtual urban areas. (more…)