The assignment for class this week was to explore the VR application Second Life for use as a new doctor-patient medium. Although I can see this as a *futuristic* medium for this, or for use in specialized cases, it does not yet seem to have caught up with the masses.
When I look at new technologies to add to my personal repertoire, there are a few things that I generally look for:
* am I actually going to use it?
* does it do what I want it to do?
* what do I have to buy, including peripherals?
* how much time does it take to set it up the first time?
* how much time does it take to get it running every time I use it?
* does it work with other stuff I already have?
Past technologies that I have starting using, for comparison, include:
* the iphone, which won out over a blackberry, a palm trio (from a while ago) and other non-smartphones
* the ipad
* Macs (vs PCs, for home use and personal apps)
* PCs (for work and productivity apps)
* Google
* Gmail, for email and IM
All of my chosen technologies seem to work for one reason or another. They all (usually) play well together when I need them to, and together give me the tools that I need. I am sure my doppelganger has a different set of tools that also work, but the characteristics would often be the same.
When I first tried to jump into Second Life, I ran into roadblock after roadblock. There seem to be two very key requirements for the program to run: A decently powerful computer (Mac, PC or Linux) and high-speed broadband. See http://secondlife.com/support/system-requirements/ and look only at the "Recommended" column.
As it turns out, my home network, though appropriate for almost everything I do, including all work applications, is not quite up to par with what SL recommends (though it works). My work network seems to have blocked a necessary port for SL. A 3G connection is not even close. Starbucks wi-fi works... sometime. Delta's Go-go inflight wifi, well, don't even think about that one.
As for the computer, no, ipads don't work. There is an IM app that you can get (Metaverse I think) but doesn't do the VR part of SL. My mac is ill and at the doc so that didn't work. My work computer was really my only option. Even this computer is a 2.X Core 2 Duo, and again great for almost everything work related including video streaming, was struggling with SL.
It took a couple of weeks to figure out which network and computer combinations this would work on, but once it was running, I could move around and explore. There was supposed to be an hour-long briefing to go through which I couldn't seem to find. I later learned that it was the Orientation Island walk through, which only took me 5 minutes. I even took some time to kill some zombies and rabid dogs in a warehouse somewhere (hey, it's almost Halloween).
To compare this to applications that gain traction would be difficult. It takes a specific configuration to get it to work. To talk effectively, you need a headset (additional cost). It could take a significant amount of time to set up if you don't happen to guess the configuration correctly the first time. For those of us who travel, it doesn't work on the road (3G) or in the sky or with a convenient tablet.
So, as the question from class asks, how would this work for a doctor-patient relationship? My answer would be that this is not going to be a mainstream application in the near future for this use. It just takes too much time and too much equipment to make it work simply enough. It also wouldn't work for the nearly 40% of people in the US who don't have broadband access. This type of relationship really needs to be a special case. The docs need to have the time and patience to help set up a system for the patients.
I can see this type of application growing in popularity in the future, somewhat. Equipment and network issues will be lessened, which would have helped me out significantly. Unfortunately, I think this will be a while, and we will have to see what level of adoption that drives. Until then, I think my alter-ego Sherpa Goldshark won't get much VR facetime.
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