With virtual worlds now firmly embedded in popular culture, the virtual landscape may seem like an archipelago with Second Life, There, Active Worlds, Doppelganger, Multiverse, Kaneva, and many more. Sailing between these isolated little islands is possible, but the voyage is daunting.

One of the earliest sailors willing to make the journey was Wells Fargo who, after creating their virtual presence in Second Life, decided to pack up and move to Active Worlds. While I'm not privy to the details of their migration, I can surmise that the textures were transported to Active Worlds by hand while the geometry data was either exported via scripts so that it could be generated from within Active Worlds, or simply re-built from scratch. Long story short, it wasn't an effortless transition.

Well all that may be changing with a recent announcement that Linden Lab and IBM will be working together on standards to bridge the gaps between virtual worlds. The announcement included several areas of focus with the overarching theme that users will one day be able to move freely between virtual worlds including "Universal" Avatars, Security-Rich Transactions, Platform Stability, Integration with existing Web and business processes, and Open standards for interoperability with the current web.