Peer-To-Peer:

DALi Giving Consumers Unmatched Artificial-Life Experience

DALi (Distributed Artificial Life Inc), a software company that builds infrastructure to support massively scaled Networked Entertainment, announced the availability of its DALiWorld artificial-life environment to consumers and its highly-scalable platform to businesses.

Founded by some of the brightest minds in distributed systems and artificial intelligence, DALi is fulfilling the promise of the Internet by creating a platform that enables millions of users to simultaneously inhabit, interact and/or passively observe within the same virtual environment.

"DALi was founded on the notion that the Internet's potential lies equally in enabling massively shared experiences, as it does in providing today's highly personalized services," said Todd Papaioannou, Ph.D., co-founder of DALi. "DALiWorld embodies that vision, and we believe, represents the next-generation of rich, interactive community experiences. We are enabling, for the first time, a medium where millions of participants and billions of entities can co-exist and interact simultaneously in the same virtual world, from any computing device."

Consumers who become part of the DALiWorld community will find themselves part of the largest, distributed artificial-life environment ever created. Modeled after the Indonesian Ocean, DALiWorld is a virtual ocean of artificial life, distributed across millions of users' computers. Users who download the company's software obtain plots in DALiWorld where they are able to view and interact with completely autonomous, artificial life entities that are free to travel within DALiWorld. The DALiWorld plot and software download are free to consumers.

While DALiWorld is the company's first virtual creation for consumers, businesses may be interested in adopting DALi's platform for Networked Entertainment because it solves the scalability problems that current client/server architectures and existing content creation methodologies impose on developers of Networked Entertainment programming.

"Our platform focuses fundamentally on solving the problem of massively distributed shared experiences," said Donnie Pinkston, DALi co-founder. "However, once that is solved, you need to provide content creation technology that scales in the same way. To achieve this we have had to assemble a team of some of the brightest people in the world, who have brought all their experience in peer-to-peer systems, mobile agents and artificial intelligence to bear."

DALiWorld is a global community, where millions of users are able to participate in building a virtual ocean and creating the ecology and the lifeforms that inhabit it. Each artificial life form in DALiWorld is fully autonomous, continually perceiving its environment and making decisions based on its own individual goals. Life forms are free to eat, mate and breed on their own, allowing the ocean to organically grow and mature.

Because DALiWorld is distributed across the computers of all the participants, life forms are free to swim, crawl, or float between all devices with a network connection. As a fish swims to an adjacent plot and disappears from one computer, the computer on which it seamlessly reappears may be on the other side of the world. As new fish appear on their screens, users can peruse passports to see who owns the fish and where it has recently traveled. Not only will users have a 360-degree view of their plots, but also additional functionality is in development that will allow participants to find and follow their favorite fish and sea creatures anywhere in DALiWorld.

As a technology platform for Networked Entertainment, businesses will be interested in DALi's solution because it allows millions of participants to interact simultaneously from any device. Additionally, DALi's peer-to-peer computing approach combined with the use of mobile agents provides an opportunity for companies faced with large-scale distribution and large-scale content creation problems.

Consumers interested in being among the first to own a plot in DALiWorld should point their browsers to www.daliworld.net for a free download. DALiWorld currently requires both Java and Java3D to function in 3D mode. This means that DALiWorld currently works on all Windows versions, Solaris, Linux and AIX machines. To get the best out of DALiWorld, a 3D-Graphics Card is also useful, but not essential. In the future, DALiWorld will be accessible by any computing device. DALiWorld is written in 100 percent pure Java. The underlying networking infrastructure is an advanced peer-to-peer framework, while mobile intelligent agents live above that framework, swimming through the network.

About DALi

Pasadena, Calif.-based DALi Inc (Distributed Artificial Life Inc), is a software company that builds infrastructure to support massively scaled Networked Entertainment. DALi solves the problems that current client/server architectures and existing content creation methodologies impose on developers of Networked-Entertainment programming. DALi has developed a proprietary platform of components based upon the company's extensive research and experience in massively distributed systems, mobile agent and artificial-life technologies. The manifestation of DALi's platform is its first virtual creation -- DALiWorld. DALiWorld provides users with the largest, distributed artificial-life environment ever created. Founded by some of the brightest minds in distributed systems and artificial intelligence, DALi is fulfilling the promise of the Internet by creating a platform that enables millions of users to simultaneously inhabit, interact and/or passively observe within the same virtual environment. The result is a global community, where millions of users are able to participate in building a virtual ocean and creating the ecology and the lifeforms that inhabit it. Visit www.dalilab.com for more information.

Contact DALi, Michelle Balconi, 781-837-8028.