Following on from the watercooler post last week on Second Life running on a Samsung phone it is interesting how in the last month we have virtual worlds appearing on mobile devices at every turn - iPhone etc: below. Will May 08 be known as the month Web 3.0 (the real time, social virtual world web) merged with the mobile web. I also went to Mobile Monday’s here in Sydney last night on the topic of Mobile Social Nets and the wonderful Laurel Papworth made the point that these two worlds are ideally suited, both being synchronous (real time and dynamic) but also that the millions of dollars per day being spent on micro transactions (pixel products, virtual goods) in existing pc based worlds introduce a brand new revenue stream to the mobile.

So this round up starts with good ole iPhone (just imported another 16GB one btw!) - running Second Life. Some tech info about this here. This is based on the WiFi link - so little more than using the iPhone as a handheld computer with remote links back to the PC mothership - but works well albeit very laggy.

Then we have Vollee which is using traditional 3G connection, so true mobility vs being locked to WiFi zones. NWN originally picked this up and did point out that you don’t need a computer running nearby for this to work. A very impressive demo and their site allows you to sign up for the beta program using a range of 3G carriers.

Hat tip to Laurel for also pointing out another player called Vyond who also (according to VW News) are not relying on remote computers streaming Second Life but using “Java and we’re developing BREW and Flash clients as well.” The company’s material says the application can be distributed through carrier portals, SMS/MMS, WAP website, PC download, and memory cards.” The YouTube videos on VW News have strangely been removed from YouTube for some reason - but they did look impressive

We are really starting to see fascinating mash-ups between form and platform (not really utilising the best of mobile yet for virtual worlds, just streaming the pc version to the phone - my cross-media level 1) but the gate is now opening as the power of mobile devices like iPhone become able to run rich 3D, real time apps. Then there is the other mash-ups starting of several twitter clients coming out of Second Life - but that’s another post. Here is a little video I put together with my colleague Ben which suggests our heads are already pretty well down this particular rabbit hole.