Today we went to Abu Dhabi where we spent several hours in the new-ish Louvre. We liked it! While there we wandered into the souvenir shop where we perused the books. We felt as though we could have bought any of them cheaper in Kiasma, which struck us as somewhat odd.

Because of this I found myself looking for small books and slim volumes. I noticed one shrink-wrapped on a lower shelf and pulled it out. I looked at the front and laughed. It consisted of pieces reprinted from “high quality Wikipedia articles”.

I have noticed recently that the blockchain fad has begun to move out from cryptocurrencies to less obvious areas. I have not followed closely enough to understand whether this constitutes a loss of interest in bitcoin et al, or a widening of interesting that leaves bitcoin as popular as ever.

I first noticed this late last year when I discovered Decentraland had an auction of virtual land and I went to see what this meant exactly. Today I found Tokenized Games, a site that acts as a directory of “new blockchain games” and currently lists more than 150 games in various stages of development.

I shall watch and wait with interest.

In 2002 Arcada began an experiment that aimed to develop a learning laboratory in the form of a virtual culture embodied in an online world. This essay examines how and why this was attempted; the opportunities that it offered; and the reasons why the experiment was ended.

The essay is a (slightly) revised version of a chapter included in Transforming Virtual World Learning, edited by Randy Hinrichs and Charles Wankel. The book was published in 2011 by Emerald: London.