When I think of all the promises that information technology has made but not followed through on, this is the sort of futurificationing that most alarms me:
The divide that separates people from their online lives will utterly disappear. Instead of leaving behind all those net-based friends and activities when you walk out of your front door, you will be able to take them with you. The buddies you have on instant message networks, friends and family on e-mail, your eBay auctions, your avatars in online games, the TV shows you have stored on disk, your digital pictures, your blog - everything will be just a click away.The promise of the review-laden world has been with us for well over a decade, before the internet when personal computing as being updated by CD-rom mailouts. Yet it is still a shock to find more than three reviews of anything on a site like expedia when you are looking for, say, hotel information. How does the human, disinterested in helping strangers by writing opinions provided for free, populate the world of content in this new world. That human won't. There would need to be a model of exchange of idea to trigger an increase of participation beyond folks like me with foolish dreams of $2,000 a month from Google ads. But no one will pay me a nickle for my thoughts now - will anyone pay everyone for any of theirs?It could also kick off entirely new ways of living, working and playing. For instance, restaurant reviews could be geographically tagged so as soon as you approach a cafe or coffee shop, the views of recent diners could scroll up on your handheld gadget. Alternative reality games could also become popular. These use actors in real world locations to play out the ultimate interactive experience.
But beyond that - why the brave new world of staring at a wrist watch screen wherever you go? What is so wrong with the people physically near you that you would want to exchange them for digial strangers? Again, for geeks of which I am of "C" grade, the transition is already in place. Is it that real is not play? It should be. Is it that real is not play that you rarely have the option of clearly winning? The digital world allows each Rob and Victor to know victories and even robberies that would never be possible in reality. It is any different than striving to be the guy who got the most points in the arcade? What kind of backbone would a society have if that actually became the pervasive goal?
Comments
Flea - March 12, 2006 12:54 PM
That last paragraph reads like it was run through Babelfish a couple times. Time to 'fess up, "Alan"-bot! I had long suspected this was an ad-revenue seeking splog site.
Alan - March 12, 2006 12:56 PM
I do this for you knowing as I do you are actually a brain in a jar and are jealous of the physical world.
Flea - March 12, 2006 2:12 PM
It's the latest model Mi-Go brain container, thank you v. much.
ry - March 12, 2006 3:05 PM
The world being mentioned here disgusts me. Gawd. Why would we want to live in such an insular world?
Is the net the new LSD so we can tune in, turn off(the outside world we don't like), and drop out(of the world and all its inconviniences)?
This is why I will never have a cell phone or blackberry or PDA.
Not to mention the sheer destruction of privacy since we can track almost all of this activity. ;0)
Alan - March 12, 2006 3:27 PM
But there are instant sports stats!
Flea - March 12, 2006 5:29 PM
And ta-tas!
Alan - March 12, 2006 5:35 PM
So...when will there be that 3-D internet we've been promised since 1992?
Chris Taylor - March 13, 2006 8:43 AM
Oh, it's here already. The question is, do you really want to wear expensive VR gloves and goggles to look like an idiot while surfing?
Alan - March 13, 2006 8:59 AM
I think your use of the word "idiot" is very judgmental, especially given this is something done in private.
Chris Taylor - March 13, 2006 2:18 PM
All right then.
This 3-d internet business seems like a bit of rabbit hunting with a dead ferret. I'll wager you'd not prefer to saddle your nose with the VR googles, on account of looking like the cat's uncle gringog.
Alan - March 13, 2006 3:10 PM
But am I not a cat's uncle gringog in most of my most private matters such as the desire for #D internet? Are not you? And - besides - hath not a cat's uncle gringog eyes? hath not a cat's uncle gringog hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same 3D internet, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer? I say that when we allow 3D internet to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all God's children, black men and white men, Jews and gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands, gather round the 3D internet and sing: "Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are all that cat's uncle gringog and free at last thanks to 3D internet."