Treet TV Update: Treet TV Feedback & Proposed Masterplans

Thanks to everyone who submitted designs during the first round of development on Treet TV’s master plan!  As usual, the Studio Wikitecture team came up with some amazing and creative ideas, and it gave Treet TV a lot to think about!  As with many planning projects, the goals and objectives were not very clear in the beginning – but the Wikitecture process was very effective in helping flesh out a wide variety of different ideas.

Go to the following site for more information on each design: http://www.studiowikitecture.com/Treet/all_designs.php5 (you’ll need to be logged in first)

With these proposals, we were able to gather some invaluable feedback and reactions from Treet TV’s management team, and have included that feedback below.

We will keep design development open until November 17th, at which time we will invite everyone to cast their votes to determine the most popular designs.  We will also meet with Treet TV’s management team again, and based on their feedback and the voting results, we will choose 2 designs that are most promising.

We will then work on refining and combining those top designs for 2 more weeks, ending December 1st.

With a final voting round, we will then have arrived at a final design proposal, and will spend 1 final week polishing that design – finishing the project on December 8th.

We will then hold a final, public presentation of the concept to Treet TV sometime during the 2nd week of December.

If anyone has any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask!  We can be reached at info @ studiowikitecture.com

If you haven’t had a chance to submit any ideas yet – now is the time!  With fresh feedback, and a more clear sense of Treet’s objectives, this is an ideal time to jump in and offer up some ideas!  Anyone is welcome to join and contribute!

Here is the feedback from Treet TV:

When looking at a design, here are some of the questions that are good to ask.   None of these are requirements, but all are the kinds of things that we will look for.

• Where are the common areas?  And where are the areas that are available to be occupied by new tenants and for new uses?
• The areas “available” need to be attractive and inviting so people understand that they are ready to be occupied.  What design elements encourage people to be attracted to areas available to build?
• Where will visitors land for orientation?
• Each island has a telehub.  Will each island have a visitor orientation space?  Or, will each island telehub be a “mini orientation space” that leads them somewhere else?
• Where are areas suitable for the “special purposes” listed below?
• Are there areas of “sacred ground” that people know are never going to be developed, but are public and open so people can gather and enjoy themselves?
• If somebody wants temporary studio space, where is the most likely place?
• If a visitor tour were to be developed, what would be the main attractions?
• Does the design incorporate water in a way that avoids the “four postage stamps in the pond” effect?

Some of the “special purposes” we might need to use land for:

• Merchandising related to shows (perhaps a few shops)
• Cafe space for meetings
• Space for a “Treet Exhibition” to invite people to  meet all show producers.  Nice if the exhibition space were outdoors, flea-market style, and could be used for many purposes, yet doesn’t look bad if it’s empty.
• Concerts
• Parties
• VIP gatherings
• Small “office parks” of two offices MAXIMUM that can be scattered about so that people can have relaxing office space with the flexibility to have offices suit personal taste.

The Community Assessment System: a rough draft

http://www.slideshare.net/theoryshaw/community-assessment-system-studio-wikitecture

In our pursuit of exploring the methods behind an open source approach to architectural practice, we have continually wondered - if a project is truly open and contributions can come from anywhere and anyone, can a system be devised that can pay contributors fairly for their contributions?

Like any open project, contributions vary widely in size and in quality, and are in times hard to quantify and hard to parse out who did what and to what extent.  So, how, in this highly collaborative approach, could contributors get paid fairly for their work?

If, in the end, an open and highly collaborative approach produces a final product that is better, cheaper, and quicker to build then the traditional siloed approach to designing and constructing buildings, it seems logical to seek a system whereby all the parties involved can be assured they will be rewarded fairly for their quality efforts.

This is a tremendously complicated problem to solve, if it can be solved at all.  Although we are far from knowing all the answers, we can at least take a rough stab.

The preceding slideshare, is that rough stab.  As you will see, it’s far from polished, but in the spirit of ‘releasing early and releasing often’, I wanted to share what I have so far and would be grateful for any feedback you might have.

In order to facilitate a more effective way of hearing community feedback around this idea, we have set up an ‘Ideascale’ site…

http://studiowikitecture.ideascale.com/akira/ideafactory.do?discussionID=6519

Please, Please cast your votes in the next 24 hours for the SL6Booth.

Second Life’s 6^th Birthday is getting dangerously close.  We need to have it setup, on the site by Saturday, June 20! We have a lot of good ideas and themes springing to life, but in order to concentrate everyone’s efforts in the next couple days , we could use a concentrated wave of votes from the community!

Whether you submitted a design iteration, or are watching the design unfold, we could use your vote!  You can simply cast your vote on the http://www.studiowikitecture.com/SL6B/.  After logging in, go to http://www.studiowikitecture.com/SL6B/all_designs.php5 to see all the design iterations.  From here you can cast 3 positive and 3 negative votes.

To Register to Vote:

If you do not have a login for http://www.studiowikitecture.com/SL6B/ site, the following steps will get you one.

1. Login to Second Life.
2. Join the ‘Studio Wikitecture’ group, if you haven’t already done so.
3. Teleport to the following link: http://slurl.com/secondlife/architecture/155/43/22/?title=Studio%20Wikitecture%20SL6B%20Project
4. Once there, ‘touch’ the base of the ‘wiki-tree’ interface (which is the image below), to get the password for the website.
5. Your Password will be broadcast to you via the Chat Channel.
6. Now go to the http://www.studiowikitecture.com/SL6B/ site and enter…
   1. login: use your full ‘Second Life’ name. (eg: John Doe)
   2. password: <the password the ‘wiki-tree’ gave you through the chat channel>
7. Now you can go to http://www.studiowikitecture.com/SL6B/all_designs.php5 to cast your votes!  Thank You.

We Won the Linden Prize! Now we need a display booth for SL6B!

We are very excited to announce that Studio Wikitecture won the $10,000 USD  ‘Linden Prize’ for developing an “innovative inworld project that improves the way people work, learn and communicate in their daily lives outside of the virtual world.”

To coincide with Second Life’s birthday celebration this year (SL6B), Tuesday, June 23rd  thru Monday, June 29th,  Studio Wikitecture will have a booth visitors can learn more about process and the community’s last couple projects.

In keeping with the collaborative spirit of Wikitecture, it seems only appropriate to open the design process of the booth itself to the Studio Wikitecture community, so that anyone can contribute and vote on the designs they like most/least.  Since the booth has to be completed by June 23rd, this Wikitecture project will be a quick one!

We have a parcel and a fresh Wiki-tree set up here:  http://slurl.com/secondlife/architecture/155/43/22/?title=Studio%20Wikitecture%20SL6B%20Project

The design challenge is to design a booth that best describes what Studio Wikitecture and the Wiki-Tree is all about.  We have images that could be displayed, such as our final entry in the Open Architecture Challenge, screenshots of past Wikitecture projects, the most recent University of Alabama, and more.  It is up to the community to determine how many images should be displayed, how they should be displayed, and how large those images should be.

The full booth can be no more than 175 prims, and the parcel size is 28 meters by 28 meters.

In addition to this final ‘booth’ installation, we will also have a demonstration version of the Wiki-tree adjacent to the booth at the SL6B parcel so visitors will be able to see how the Wiki-tree works by cycling through designs contributed in the booth design project. In other words, we will work together to design a ‘booth’ for a 28×28m (784 sqm), which will be persistent at the SL6B parcel. We will then place a read-only version of the Wiki-tree next to that parcel to help describe the collaborative process we used to arrive at the final booth design.

To review, here are a few of the basic steps you’ll need to take in order to participate:

1.) Get a Second Life account, by visiting this site: http://secondlife.com/
2.) Download Second Life, http://secondlife.com/support/downloads.php
3.) Open the Second Life application, and enter the username and password you just created

4.) Do the basic tutorial to learn the basics of walking, flying, etc.

5.) When you’re ready, click this link – then click the ‘teleport’ this link will bring up: http://slurl.com/secondlife/architecture/155/43/22/?title=Studio%20Wikitecture%20SL6B%20Project

6.) Find the wiki-tree, and click the very base of that tree. It will give you a password.
7.) Use your full avatar name (first and last), and the password given to you by the tree to log into this site: http://www.studiowikitecture.com/SL6B
8.) You can now review designs that have been submitted so far by either clicking the ‘leaf’ spheres on the Wiki-tree and watching them appear on the site – where you can walk through the ideas. Or, you can review them on the website, along with design descriptions, and discussion, etc.
9.) You can cast a total of 3 positive and 3 negative votes on the designs. Votes can be distributed to several designsn, or all given to 1 design. If you cast more than 3, it replaces the first votes you cast, and so on.
11.) Think of ways you can combine the best of the ideas you’ve shared so far, combined with your own ideas… when you’re reviewing designs at the wiki-tree, you can simply select the designs you like, and ‘Take a Copy’. Then, head to a sandbox to synthesize your contribution!
12.) Remember this is not a competition! Wikitecture is all about collaboration, and sharing ideas. The last thing you should do is work out a final and polished design before submitting it to the tree for others to review. You’ll run the risk of spending too much time on an idea the community might not adopt. The rule of thumb is to share ideas early, and often… this will give the community a chance to provide feedback, and maybe even include your idea in a new hybrid design contribution.
11.) When you’re ready to share your own 3D design idea using the Wiki-tree, just let Keystone Bouchard or Theory Shaw know, and we will walk you through the process. Otherwise, you can review the tutorial here:http://studiowikitecture.wikidot.com/how-to
12.) Once your design is submitted, it will automatically create a new place for it on the website. You can change the leaf description, and add any design descriptions or screenshots that will help others understand your design.
13.) Check the site often to see how your design does in the community! Remember to continuously cast your 3 positive and 3 negative votes regularly, so the community can get a sense of what are the best ideas to carry forward!

This project will not include a cash payout, so your time and contributions will be voluntary, but contributors names and a profile image of everyone who contributes will be on display throughout the SL6B festivities.

As always, contact Keystone Bouchard or Theory Shaw if you have any questions at all!

Good luck!

Congratulations to the Winners & Future Plans for Studio Wikitecture

A Big Congratulations goes out to the following contributors to the University of Alabama’s Virtual Classroom Project.  After two rounds of voting the following spreadsheet illustrates the breakdown down in winnings.  As mentioned earlier, as not to present any conflict of interest, Keystone and Theory bowed out of the winning proceeds.

Community Assessment

We also have some exciting news to share!  As many of you know, the ‘Wiki-Tree’ or 3D-Wiki tool we used during the last 2 Wikitecture projects was designed to serve as a temporary prototype, or proof-of-concept.  It served its purpose well, and gave us a chance to test some ideas, observe what works, and what doesn’t work, and listen to the Wikitecture community’s concerns and ideas for improving this technology.

We have spent the past several months carefully weighing several options for carrying this idea forward, and improving both the technology and the methodology at work behind the Wikitecture concept.  We assembled a long list of improvements we want to make, and have consulted with some key players in the virtual world industry to solicit their input and advice about how best to achieve these goals.

In the end, it was clear that our best chance of successfully improving these tools in the most time and cost-effective manner, was to formalize our partnership with i3D, the team we have been working with since the beginning.  Toward that end, we have entered into a joint development agreement with them, and will be working together in the months ahead to develop ‘version 2′ of the Wiki-Tree.

Not only have we have been working together on this project successfully for almost 2 years now, but each team brings a complimentary skill-set.  Anyone who joined us in these projects knows how central the Wiki-tree is to organizing these collaborative design projects.  Without it, the Wikitecture concept simply would not work.  Since i3D is in the business of developing internet and virtual world based services and products, their skills are exactly what we need in order to successfully implement the next phase of development on the Wiki-tree.

We will keep you posted on our progress in the weeks and months ahead, and look forward to launching our next project!

Final Design Announced: One Week to Polish

Congratulations to the Wikitecture group on another job well done!  Our deadline for contributions and voting has passed (thanks to Daruma for reminding everyone to cast their final votes!).

The design that ended up with the most votes is leaf #1228858370, which we will now refine and polish into the final build we will present to the University of Alabama next week. The original seed concept that led to this design describes the core idea best:

“The idea is to blend some of the best ideas contributed so far into an open air classroom structure (Veeyawn) at the ground level, which builds on the existing neo-classical tradition of the existing campus. Hovering above this more formal structure are 5 platforms that can be moved or added on over time, based on the University’s current needs. Faculty would have several pre-designed platform options to choose from, ranging from interactive classrooms (Azwaldo) to natural and landscaped platforms (Daruma) to structures representing the curriculum outline (Zage). Others might be placed totally empty, leaving it up to the students and faculty to customize based on their class content or curriculum. As new technology emerges, new pre-scripted platform modules can easily be added to the mix. They don’t necessarily have to hover over just this parcel, but could be deployed on any of the University’s islands and by any department, or several can be coupled together and be used for research projects, etc. These platforms can remain very flexible, active and dynamic – shifting and changing, visually representing the current status of the virtual campus as it changes over time – while leaving the ground plane as a more consistent, formal and familiar campus and commons area.”

Since contributing this leaf, several of the core ideas suggested in this design have already been carried forward.  For example, the platform emitter technology has been built through Omei’s recent leaf #1229381709.  Also, the options for platform designs have been carried forward nicely through Daruma’s leaf #1231429167

The remaining task is to polish and refine the architectural shell of the ground-level build, and to do any tweaking or polishing that needs to be done with Azwaldo’s interactive classroom concept.  Remember, your effort in polishing and refining the final design will still factor into the final contribution assessment and subsequent payout based on that assessment.  Since Keystone Bouchard and myself (Theory Shaw) are the organizers of this project, we will not be accepting any payout, and will instead re-distribute our assessed payout evenly based on the rest of the group’s participation percentage.

To help organize our collective effort in polishing the final design, we have started a new category in the Forum, that can be accessed here:

http://studiowikitecture.wikidot.com/forum/c-71102/tasks-for-polishing-the-final-design

This thread will be used to describe the various tasks that will need to be accomplished.  Such tasks include the following:

• incorporating Daruma’s designs, and any other platform modules into Omei’s or Daruma’s emitter system, and finalizing the layout of a generic platform upon which these platform options will rez
• We could really use the help of a seasoned Second Life expert builder that can polish the design, minimize prim usage, and develop quality and professional textures for the build wherever appropriate
• finalizing and polishing Azwaldo’s interactive classroom system
• Develop any presentation graphics we might need to describe the concept to the University
• Any additional tasks can be added to the forum as the need arises

And since, we were a little late getting this email out, the final, final deadline will be Friday, January 23rd.

Please IM Keystone Bouchard or Theory Shaw if you have any questions!  We look forward to wrapping up this project shortly!

3 Schematic Designs Voted to Move on to the Design Development Round

Thank you for voting!  The following top 3 schematic designs have been voted to move on to the next round of design development and refinement.

Although the following 3 schematic designs will provide the kernel of ideas for the final designs, you are not restricted, in any manner, to use and synergize any other ideas that have been presented to the group thus far; i.e. those ideas discussed either on the Studio Wikitecture all designs page or the wikidot.com forum. Everything is still far game.  And also, just for clarification, the next two stages are open to ‘everyone’ who would like to still participate.

We have only put forth these voting rounds to garner the community’s feedback in order to give you some relative decisions on which to base further design refinement.

http://www.studiowikitecture.com/UA/open_up.php5?leaf_id=1227202423

http://www.studiowikitecture.com/UA/open_up.php5?leaf_id=1226768798

http://www.studiowikitecture.com/UA/open_up.php5?leaf_id=1227037400

The next round, which we are calling the Design Development (DD) round, will last from ‘now’ until December 3^rd.  After which, another voting round will take place between the 3^rd and 6^th of December.

After the 6^th we then use the remaining 5 days before the Dec. 11th deadline to refine and polish the final design. Contributors can take the design we’ve chosen as ‘final’ and rebuild or retexture or otherwise polish the final design to make it the highest quality end-product we can collectively achieve.

Again, thanks for voting and have a relaxing Thanksgiving… well, that is, if you celebrate the Turkey Day.

Presenting at Chicago’s Pecha Kucha Event

If you’re in the Chicago area, next Tuesday, December 2nd, stop by the local Pecha Kucha event hosted at Martyr’s Pub where I’ll be presenting the projects and process the Studio Wikitecture group has been working on for the last couple years.  Including, of course, the group’s winning competition entry for the Open Architecture Challenge.  Now, I only have to figure out how to stuff all this into 20 slides at 20 second each!

Hope to see, you there.

Last Day to Cast Your Votes on the 1st Voting Round

Now is your chance to have your voice be heard – but, you have to act fast!  We need EVERYONE in the group to cast their votes on this phase by today! (Monday, the 24th November).  This will help us determine which of the preliminary designs submitted so far we should focus on folding into the next round of design and refinement.

In order to vote, you must be registered (get your password by clicking the base of the wiki-tree at the UA ESPRMC sim with the ‘Studio Wikitecture’ group active) then use your full avatar name and this password to log into this website: http://www.studiowikitecture.com/UA/ We each get a total of 3 positive and 3 negative votes to cast – and we encourage you to use them all up!  You can always re-assign them later.  After Monday, we let everyone know which 3 designs the community has chosen to act as the design seeds for the final round of refinement, and we can all roll up our virtual sleeves and get to work folding these best ideas into a final solution we will present to the University of Alabama!  If you have feedback that can’t be conveyed in a vote or a comment on a particular design, use the Forum – found under the ‘Feedback and FAQ’ button on the website.  As always, direct any questions to Keystone Bouchard or Theory Shaw.  Thanks for voting.

Nov. 24th: 1st Deadline for Voting and Preliminary Designs.

As our December 11th deadline approaches, we need to establish some milestones and are asking that everyone submit any and all preliminary design concepts they may be working on by end of day Saturday, November 22nd.

We will then ask everyone to cast all of their votes by end of day Monday, November 24th.

That will give us a clear picture as to which ideas we should move forward toward further design development in the weeks ahead.

Since the ideas behind Wikitecture are to brainstorm and design with the group, as well as modify and refine each other’s contributions, we would like to let everyone know that the winners of the $1000 (L$250,000) will be restricted to those final designs that incorporate, to some obvious level, the ideas and designs voted forward in the Nov. 24th voting round.

For example, although someone might submit an entirely new design after this first voting round, the design will not be eligible for the $1000 distribution.  We only do this to encourage the community to combine the best ideas, and to riff off each other’s ideas throughout the project’s schedule.  In this way, we are trying to avoid a traditional competition where best ideas found in the running up designs are never incorporated in the final, since only one design is chosen as the winner.

Wikitecture process seeks to improve on that limitation by selecting the best designs early, and allowing the community to combine those into something greater than those individual ideas were on their own.

Other than that, thanks for contributing so far and as always, let us know if you have any questions!