Serious games, mobile learning and virtual learning worlds were the key themes at the ‘Training in Action’ conference, held in picturesque Sestri Levante, Italy, in early June. The event, which attracted some 150 of Europe’s top learning technologies specialists, was hosted by the LCMS vendor, Giunti Labs, at its Riviera headquarters: a converted 14^th century convent. The conference explored:

• The challenges, threats and opportunities for corporate learning in the Knowledge Society.
• The importance of standards (AICC, SCORM, IMS, OKI and so on).
• Innovation in the application of learning technologies – through a series of case studies from across Europe.

Comment:  Key messages to emerge were that:

• Business simulations that are reliant on human interaction not the traditional number crunching have been developed by, among others, INSEAD Business School;
• Mobile, especially wearable, computing is enabling workplace learning/performance support in a number of industries, notably engineering and medicine;
• Learning via virtual worlds and serious gaming is very much the ‘coming thing’, encouraged by rapid improvements in game-related technology.

Some of the e-learning applications revealed at this event were stunning – although the conference presentations (available at www.traininginaction.org) don’t quite do themselves justice.