Linden Lab has announced the Open Grid Beta has been opened to the public, based on the work from IBM and Linden lab on developing an open standard for interoperability between virtual worlds.

This initial public beta offers the intergrid teleport code, intended for virtual world developers attempting to make virtual worlds interoperate. It offers a base level of interoperability -- no inventory, textures, or attachments are transfered upon intergrid teleport, and the user’s avatar appears on the target grid as the grid’s default avatar.

Specifically in this first phase of the beta, developers will be able to teleport between Second Life's preview grid and a patched version of OpenSim (an open source server for hosting Second Life-like virtual worlds.)

Along with the Open Grid public beta, Linden Lab have also announced that they are also sponsoring Pyogp, an open source client library and test harness code.

“This is a historic moment in the development of virtual worlds,” said Open Grid Public Beta Manager Whump Linden, “we look forward to your participation.”