Photos: IBM serves up Wimbledon in Second Life
IBM is recreating the action of the Wimbledon tennis championships in Second Life. The company has been experimenting with tennis in the virtual world for some time — it started last year with a site on a private island, followed with experiments around the Australian Open and the French Open.
Above is the press conference IBM used to launch the initiative, with Ivan Ljubicic, one of the top players on the men's ATP Tour.
Residents can see the last point replayed on the virtual court as soon as the rally has finished in the real world.
Ian Hughes, IBM metaverse evangelist, explained the data it gathers at the championships is used to power the website which keeps tennis fans up to date about the matches — and said moving into Second Life was an obvious step.
He said: "These are incredibly engaging environments. The natural evolution was to take the same data that we collect and use in it in one of these environments so people can look at it together."
The scoreboards will update point by point.
Follow the link to see photos of how last year's real-world Wimbledon technology set-up looked.