Manchester Digital’s new monthly events programme kicked off at Rain Bar in the city centre last night with a stimulating couple of presentations badged as “No, but really!” Oli Aro from Manchester based Second Places revisited 2006’s platform du jour, Second Life. Had it, he asked, developed as predicted back then? Certainly the exponential growth of Second Life as a platform had slowed down, but more interestingly, a whole range of Second Life clones had developed using OpenSim. For those concerned about building their island in a world without barriers, for instance for those working on education projects or on enterprise projects, OpenSim has provided the answer.
Dave Mee, from Tandot and Manchester Digital Laboratory, then took us through 10 years of Augmented Reality in 20 minutes. AR “markers” were new to me – and it was fascinating to see some of the attempts to find appropriate applications for augemented reality – from a web cam mounted above a pool table helping you make perfect shots every time, to an online packing service where you can check if your items fit in different sizes of boxes.
There were regulars from the Manchester Digital community in attendance alongside some companies and individuals new to these events. In an admittedly packed digital calendar, these third Thursdays aim to cover a variety of topics throughout the year. The next event will provide advice for those wanting to enter this year’s Big Chip Awards.
Dim Sum Digital 
The question now is… are there too many events and too many demands on people’s time?
The promotion of this event was reported as quite poor online. Considering Northern Digitals are meeting next Thursday (two days after SMC) and that they’re running a series of talks (aka ‘Blab’) – perhaps MD could merge this line of events with the successful Northern Digitals line of events?
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