The end of the office in virtual meetings world

This is a quote from a computer world interview with Xerox and one of two interesting pieces this week that foretell the future of online meetings and virtual meetings..

"How will the office be different five to 10 years from now? Just the notion of having an office might not exist in the future. Everything will be connected, so it doesn't matter if you are physically in an office or around the world. It will be easy to communicate and collaborate and connect to the right experts and the right partners."

Yes, Xerox are deeply into Second Life exploring what the virtual office means for their document business.

And this is from statesman.com reporting a talk given at SWSX by Jane McGonigal a researcher at the Institute for the Future..

"McGonigal showed a game designed to motivate and reward people to do ordinary household chores. Another, called "Seriosity," is designed to make work more like a game. It involves using virtual currency to motivate employees to do certain tasks. So if you're someone who hates meetings, you would demand a certain amount of this virtual currency before attending a meeting. I started to see the logic behind designing life more like a game."

Both these pieces point up the fact that as online and virtual meetings become more a part of the mainstream we may have to rethink moral systems and reward systems. The latter particularly alerts us to the fact that many people are growing up with a world-view forged by gaming and their reward systems - the workforce of the future will inevitably be influenced by that. What we curently lack is a knowledge of how to plan that into HR systems.

Beam Your Screen

This found its way into the world yesterday courtesy of PR Web. We haven't had a chance yet to trial the software but it is indicative of where the market is going. Virtual meeting spaces are virtually free and give high quality interaction. How long can remote collaboration solutions survive this competition? The answer is: for as long as it takes Second Life to get its act together.

"Award winning web collaboration company, BeamYourScreen announces its new Internet solution Mikogo (http://www.mikogo.com), the free online meeting tool for users to share their desktop with no associated costs involved."

Co- founder Mr. Mark Zondler, announced, “We created Mikogo due to the direct demand for a free BeamYourScreen product. With the technology ready at hand, we decided to launch Mikogo as a free online meeting tool for personal use. Now many private users can benefit at no cost from online meeting technology for small personal needs, such as PC assistance, sharing recent photos, or live online collaboration”.

Collaboration Tools

This comes courtesy of Robin Good's masternewmedia. Robin has reviewed 8 wiki-type tools eaech of which promise collaborataive productivity. These are the ones he reviews:

1. Yuuguu: Free downloadable software lets you share your desktop and remote control PCs
2. ScribbleWiki: Online collaboration service allows you to create wikis for you and your team
3. Wikidot: Create free wikis for unlimited people with 100MB of storage space
4. Nexdo: Free service allows teams to create pages, exchange links and share files
5. Jagbox: Upload any file, set the expiration time and share the link with anyone
6. Retroshare: Open-source P2P software enables you to chat and share files with your friends
7. IMhaha Access all of your IM accounts from one place, right from your browser
8. Coccinella: Connect to major instant messaging services from any operating system

To access his analysis go here.

Voxwire vs Webex and Placeware

I attend an online meeting at least once a week - I find I can do it pretty well in Second Life with a headset and because I know the avatars around me. Leave that to one side. Although SL is growing in popularity as an online meeting space (driven by the likes of IBM) it's the regular, PC-PC, phone-to-phone market that represents the core of the market.

Voxwire is making a pitch as the logical, reasonably priced contender in this market providing its customers with an integrated package.

People report positive experiences with Webex, the market leader in online meeting services but my own experience with them has been patchy. I've even had to reschedule when New York interviewees have been unable to connect with me just on a one-to-one (so why use Webex? - For them to show me their website's beta). I mention it solely to underline the benefits of integration.

When online meetings start to go wrong - when I can't access a secure area, when I can't see that beta site, everybody begins to look and feel a little stupid.

The problem with online meeting software is they can be highly functional but dependent on chance. I've rarely found it to work well though other people report total satisfaction. My instinct is that Voxwire would improve its position if it migrated some of its offer to a virtual environment.

Strange though it may seem, when I can see the avatar of the people I am meeting, I at least know they are there and that they are attentive. There is reduced uncertainty.

For now Voxwire's offer is web based and at under $6 per person for a three person room, under $4 for a 10 person room. I can think how to beat those prices for anyone with an SL Island but for me dealing with NY, unless I want to go Skype these are very good prices. Be interested in other viewpoints on this.