The midden

Amongst the many barriers to access to Second Life, the two main ones have always been the need to download the SL client onto your machine and the need for a hefty video/graphics card.

In the last week there has been much interest in the news that a 15 year-old girl, Katharine Berry, has developed a prototype browser-based SL viewer. What’s even more remarkable is that Katherine has done this in her spare time while also studying for her GCSEs.

At the moment, the main features of her viewer include:

* Basic map
* Teleports
* Accepting/declining teleport offers
* Local chat, instant messages
* Inventory received notifications
* Friend on/offline notifications
* Balance change notifications, etc.

Katharine’s blog makes interesting reading as she explains why she started on this project and where she is up to with it.

There is also an interview with Katharine on the Reuter’s SL blog.