[Foundation-l] MMORPG and Wikimedia

[Dan Rosenthal]

On May 7, 2010, at 12:21 AM, John Vandenberg wrote:

> On Fri, May 7, 2010 at 1:35 PM, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On May 6, 2010, at 10:24 PM, geni wrote:
>>> 
>>> 3D objects could already be supported as .blend files although we
>>> don't at this point.
>>> 
>>> --
>>> geni
>> 
>> But not the manipulation of them in a fully interactive physics based 3d environment with simultaneous interaction from thousands of other concurrent users.
> 
> That is "virtual reality" for its own sake, rather than for
> instructional benefits.
> And consider those "concurrent users" including children.
> 
> There is a lot of research about the pedagogical and epistemological
> opportunities in VR, but the cases were it is clearly beneficial are
> not numerous and probably only useful on Wikiversity, and I doubt you
> will find anyone advocating for the educational advantages of
> "interaction from .. concurrent [pseudonymous adults and children]".
> 
> --
> John Vandenberg

I strongly disagree. There are clear educational benefits for it, exemplified for instance by the massive amount of spending that the militaries around the world have spent on virtual worlds training systems such as VBS2 as educational devices.

-Dan