3pointD.com

The Capozzi Winery is a new venture that’s been getting some press in places like the Wall Street Journal lately. The winery’s Pinotblogger site is chronicling “the long and painful processes involved in starting and building a family winery in the Russian River Valley.” But attentive readers of the blog will have noticed that a recent entry flags Capozzi’s plans to enter the virtual world of Second Life as well, with a virtual winery that will feature not only a scale model of the real thing, but also an avatar tasting room “where you can buy and drink wine (with entertaining results — though not the kind you might be thinking),” and “a series of kiosks/simulations that will guide visitors through an interactive wine-making process.” (more…)

Virtual Nissan Sentras

160 acres worth of metaversal motor city are being launched in the virtual world of Second Life, including four regions’ worth of Nissan driving action and a ten-region experiment in user-created car culture from General Motors’ Pontiac division. Both projects sound very cool, and though Second Life’s vehicles generally suck for much more than tootling around in (the platform runs on an outdated physics engine that Linden Lab refuses to update), each project is ambitious in its own way, and should add some entertaining features to the landscape of the virtual world. (more…)