Organizers at New York Law School in partnership with Harvard Law School, Yale Law School, Trinity University, and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore will host a global conference on virtual worlds, focusing on the impact of online social environments on education, law, politics and society. State of Play V: Building the Global Metaverse will be held on 19-22 August 2007 at the Marina Mandarin Hotel, Singapore, the event's first time in Asia.

From the press release:

"State of Play V looks seriously into virtual worlds and massively multiplayer online games," says Dan Hunter, conference co-chair. "We have expert panels who will talk about how these worlds create legal challenges for real world governments, we will examine how they can be used in education and for learning, and we will ask what are the philosophical implications for the widespread migration of users into these worlds. In addition, we also have a series of discussions about how to make a buck from these worlds, and the challenges of building them. In the workshops at the end of the conference we will have focused sessions on issues of identity, commerce, and the opportunities for ASEAN nations in the development of these worlds."

Experts from around the world will speak about:

• Cross-cultural communication and avatar-to-avatar diplomacy
• Strategies for understanding behaviors and values of virtual world residents
• Regulating speech, property, and addiction in the metaverse
• Building transnational businesses in virtual worlds
• Using virtual environments to teach students of all ages
• Space, place, and virtual world cultures

Further info and registration information for State of Play V can be found at www.nyls.edu/stateofplay.