A new service from British Telecom that allows Second Life residents to send and receive SMS messages from within the virtual world, as well as the ability to make phone calls in game, is in the works according to Cnet.com.
For the most part this is to help promote their new home fiber-optic platform Web21C, but it was also an exercise in forward-thinking. Matthew Brotherton, project manager at the Applied Technology Center in BT's chief technology office, is thinking about the project in the long-term: "Maybe in two or three years time these environments might be even more immersive. You might have gloves or a headset and it might be easier to make a call from in here than on your actual mobile."
Integration with web technologies is certainly proving to be a necessary step for telecom providers. Getting a low-cost Internet connection for one's cellphone and using Skype to call and be available worldwide has been common practice for some time, and wasn't a planned innovation. Having seen this happen and not wanting to be left out of the loop again, BT is designing systems to integrate virtual worlds, cellphones, and the regular telephone network all in the same conference-call. The term "mixed-reality" is already starting to sound like an anachronism.
