But what about, say, mission-critical operations, like running a network operations or data center? Is virtual-world technology up to the challenge? And are today's often technologically conservative IT departments ready to consider something that makes enterprise use of Facebook-type social networking sound staid by comparison?

The short answers are: Not completely, but getting there—and a growing number say: If it can shave some costs off IT operations and improve IT capabilities, sure, why not?

Virtual Worlds for Real Activities

Like today's webpages, virtual worlds can also include windows to the real world. "The Second Life platform provides a generic way to bring live content into the 3-D virtual world, where you can drive interaction of objects," notes Joe Miller, vice president of platform and technology development at Linden Lab.

"Managing real-world systems, using an immersive 3-D environment is one of the primary-use cases of virtual environments," says Erica Driver, principal at technology advisory consultancy ThinkBalm. But, Driver cautions, "It's still highly experimental."

What does a virtual-world view offer for a data or network operations center?

"The ability to visualize things, and see things that aren't visible in 2-D, like airflow and temperature," says ThinkBalm's Driver. For example, in its virtual-world-based data center, Driver notes, "IBM has thermometers hanging all over the data center, and the picture can portray airflow."

The virtual-world interface also makes it easier to "bring in" other people, such as subject-matter experts to consult on a problem or prospective clients wanting to "tour" a data center hosting area before becoming customers.

While virtual-world technology may not be ready for mission-critical applications, a number of companies have begun using it, and others are exploring it, notably government agencies and Fortune 100s, who have the mix of budget and motivation to pursue better ways to manage their technology infrastructures.

The best-known nonvendor doing this is Implenia , Switzerland's leading construction, civil engineering and services company. Implenia started the Eolus One project exploring how virtual-world technology could be used for to help with CO₂ reduction, energy/facilities management, and other tasks, including data center management, according to Oliver Goh (avatar Eolus McMillan on Second Life), IT specialist at Implenia.

According to Goh, "Eolus One uses back-end systems like IBM Websphere Commerce, Maximo and advanced Building Automation (Energy Management, Preventive Maintenance, Alert Management) to cover the whole supply chain from manufacture to customer delivery."

Subsequently, Implenia worked with IBM on a Second Life-type 3-D interface for its distributed data centers, using IBM's Holographic Enterprise Interface (HEI) virtual-world integration middleware, linked to Implenia's own EOLUS VWCI building automation interface, and running on the