[Ogoglio-developers] Avatars (forever revisited)

Hi,

It's interesting to investigate the state of VW technology, and at the 
same time get in touch with about 70 typical potential "end-users" of 
next gen virtual worlds, show them existing demos, talk about 
capabilities, ... and get their feedback and recommendations.
We all want open virtual worlds to be successful isn't it ?

Virtual worlds is comprising several areas, most of them under 
development/enhancement these days-- and sometimes in orthogonal 
directions. ;-)

Let's be frank: objects' format, rendering techno/tool, architectural 
networking model, .. are all important considerations, but only ONE 
aspect seems critical to the "end-users": the capability to select, 
customize, modify avatars with a high flexibility.

Today the only really large, rich and flexible avatars management 
systems we have found are only part of proprietary virtual worlds 
platforms !!

Considering the importance of the avatars' dimension to end-users 
(psychology), do we want proprietary platforms to be successful in the 
future instead of open source platforms ?

Are we just ostriches when looking at open virtual worlds, animals that 
put their little heads in the ground moving open virtual worlds the way 
we think this should be done instead of listening to what the 
world-wide-population is expecting ?

Let it be ..

-michel