In a move that seems designed to provide Chinese historians with even more ways to torture their poor students (I know at least one thing I’m forcing my sections to do next quarter), IBM and the Palace Museum have teamed up to offer a virtual, immersive, and interactive version of the Forbidden Palace of Beijing. In contrast to the more typical 3D ‘tours’ that abound, the “Forbidden City: Beyond Space & Time” is sort of Second Life meets the Qing dynasty and eunuchs (minus advertising, a virtual economy, and sex). It’s running like a snail on my computer, but is certainly a very neat idea — and in the future, we’ll perhaps being seeing more creative uses of virtual worlds for ‘cultural’ purposes? Full release after the jump: