have you ever listen about geodetic domes?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geodesic_dome

quite futuristic and charateristic kind of structure, the engineers still study the real applications of these structures, i've watch a documentary on discovery last night about the plan in the near future to cover the entire city of austin ( i think was austin, i'm not sure of remenber well ) with such dome

believe me, when SL tell us that they have talked with futurologist and they have studied various fields to develop the game environments , they don't say lies