Virtual Social Clubs: Meeting Places for the Internet Community

Internet technology has extended the notion of community to global dimensions. Virtual communities of users sharing common interests can interact ion chat rooms, meeting places and virtual towns, or join an Internet Mbone conference. These communities, however, tend to be mainly comprised of strangers. This project introduces the concept of virtual clubs, imitating the atmosphere of a local club where friends, acquaintances and business colleagues meet in a social environment. The distinguishing feature of virtual clubs is support for multiple, simultaneous group interaction, where users can move dynamically from one group to another, and participate in a range of activities. An architecture supporting a range of applications is under development, based on the Montage multipoint audio/video system and stereo audio bridge. Features of the system include dynamic session management, flexible policy support, multicast layered video, and novel user interfaces. Several virtual club applications are currently under development.