Teemu Surakka

Virtual Worlds Supporting Collaborative Creativity

In this chapter, we discuss virtual worlds’ potential to act as a platform for team-level creative collaboration. The proliferation of geographically distributed teams striving towards innovative results calls for technologies that nourish team creativity. 3D3C worlds represent such emergent tools. Using our previous studies as a foundation, we outline seven virtual world affordances that foster team creativity. (1) The use of 3D avatars allow team members to express themselves and their insights to others. The perceived feeling of (2) co-presence and (3) immersion engage users in collaborative activities. These activities can occur in a context of (4) simulated reality, which can be modified to change (5) the users’ frame of reference. Finally, (6) multimodal communication channels and (7) rich visual information enhance users’ abilities to creatively collaborate. The essence of affordances is discussed in a reflection on a case study experiment. We also present avenues for further research efforts and insights for practitioners engaged in virtual world collaboration.

Knowledge intensive value creation in virtual worlds

Virtual worlds and the electronic economy in general bring along new forms of IT-enabled intermediation, virtual supply chains, rapidly changing electronic commerce technologies, increasing knowledge intensity, and increased sensitivity for time-to-market by customers. These demanding environments present new challenges and opportunities for enterprises, and the ones that will survive will need to continuously innovate and invent new ways of creating value. This paper identifies some of the new value configuration that address these problems and opportunities of the digital economy. With the research design presented in this paper, we hope to test the validity of these theoretical models and also leave room for totally new ways of creating value for customers in virtual worlds. This research is intended to offer new analysing methods for knowledge intensive businesses, but equally important outcomes of this research are guidelines for entering new markers with knowledge intensive products - after all, virtual worlds are new markets for most of us.