Virtual Worlds as Information Spaces: Supporting Semantic and Social Navigation in a shared 3D Environment

Author

Vosinakis, Spyros ; Papadakis, Ioannis

Author_Institution

Dept. of Product & Syst. Design Eng., Univ. of the Aegean, Hermoupolis, Greece

fYear

2011

fDate

4-6 May 2011

Firstpage

220

Lastpage

227

Abstract

Virtual worlds are a popular medium for communication and collaboration in 3D and they are being used as shared information spaces in various application areas. However, compared to traditional hypermedia and web-based information systems they offer little support for semantic and social navigation. In this paper, a framework for enhancing virtual worlds with metaphors that support improved semantic and social browsing in the 3D environment is proposed, and an integrated architecture for their interface with external information sources through the employment of Linked Data is presented. In order to assess the effectiveness of the proposed approach, a prototype system has been implemented and accordingly evaluated.

Keywords

social aspects of automation; virtual reality; hypermedia systems; information spaces; integrated architecture; shared 3D environment; social navigation; virtual worlds; web-based information systems; Information filters; Navigation; Semantics; Servers; Space exploration; Three dimensional displays; Visualization; Virtual Worlds; information spaces; linked data; metaphors; semantic navigation; social navigation;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Games and Virtual Worlds for Serious Applications (VS-GAMES), 2011 Third International Conference on

Conference_Location

Athens

Print_ISBN

978-1-4577-0316-4

Electronic_ISBN

978-0-7695-4419-9

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/VS-GAMES.2011.41

Filename

5962125