and the last of Michael's project summary

I’m told by the veterans that an institution interested in using SL should take time, get everyone imaginable involved, and of course look at the best examples. We are advised by the instructional technologists to start with the desired learning experience, and build the world that is the best environment for those objectives, and by the seasoned skeptics and evangelists to get the institution decision makers in-world and be patient and prepared for lots of conversation and data collection. Island owners advise that we attend to legal issues as well, insure that we develop the faculty, and contemplate how teaching and learning are integrated into our institutional culture. We must understand in very profound terms how this very large idea might resonate with our long-term plans and missions, our vision for the future.
Residents of SL that use the world for teaching and learning agree that it is an evolutionary step and a cultural experience that may set the standards, if not for educating in virtual worlds, then for an understanding of the cultural complexities that are necessary for creating such a richness of experience. Virtual Worlds and Learning Management Systems will evolve together to create virtual worlds that are designed for specific experiences for specific disciplines. SL represents what educating can be in 3D for the short term, but new virtual platforms will make educating using the 3D web something completely different. The larger metaverse will be one in which people driving avatars will populate a variety of worlds, making and keeping connections that are real relationships, across a myriad of virtual existences. The metaverse of the near future will be one in which open source technology will prompt institutions from around the RL globe to link their own virtual learning environments to form an amazing tapestry of learning environments, one shared by hundreds of millions of teachers and learners with direct and personal access to each other and their resources.