dreams

VR datajournal

[escapechassis]

From 2010: How is the internet changing the way you think?

Briefly surveyed, and most answers fall under: 1) It hasn't, 2) Memory and search engines, 3) Hive mind and inclusion

In a generation the question will be meaningless, so pay attention.

[escapechassis]

The Triumph Of The Virtual, And Its Consequences

The problem with the new gaming technology is that it has become so realistic that with enough time and with little competition from the child's environment—which tends to be safe, boring, and predictable—it tends to erase the distinction between virtual and real.

- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, from Edge.org

I tried to rank order my fears in order of their severity, but soon I realized that I would not complete this initial task before the submission deadline, so I decided to use a random number generator to choose among the fears. It turned out not to be a bad choice. Basically, it refers to the fear that in one or two generations children will grow up to be adults who will not be able to tell reality from imagination. Of course humanity has always had a precarious hold on reality, but it looks like we are headed for a quantum leap into an abyss of insubstantiality.

I don't know if you have been following the launch of the new 3-D version of one of the major multi-player video games, replete with monsters, orcs, slavering beasts, and all sorts of unsavory characters brandishing lethal weapons. To survive in this milieu the player needs fast responses and a quick trigger finger. And now let's reflect on the results of what happens when children start playing such games before entering school, and continue to do so into their teens. A child learns about reality through experiences first, not through lectures and books. The incessant warfare he takes part in, is not virtual to the child—it is his reality. The events on the screen are more real than the War of Independence, or World War II. Of course at a superficial cognitive level they are aware the game is only a virtual reality; but at a deeper, emotional level, they know it is not—after all, it is happening to them.

It is true that some of the oldest and most popular games are based on forms of mayhem. (Chess, for instance, consists in eliminating and immobilizing the enemy forces consisting of infantry, cavalry, messengers, troops mounted on elephants, and the redoubtable queen (which was actually a misunderstanding: the Persian inventors of the game gave the most important warrior the title of "Vizier", after the designati8on for the commanders of the Persian army; the French Crusaders who learned the game as they wandered through the Near East thought the piece was called Vierge, after the Virgin Mary; upon their return to Europe the Virgin became the Queen). But chess, although it can become an obsession, can never be confused with the rest of reality by a sane person. The problem with the new gaming technology is that it has become so realistic that with enough time and with little competition from the child's environment—which tends to be safe, boring, and predictable—it tends to erase the distinction between virtual and real. It is then a short step for a young man on the brink of sanity to get a hold of one of the various attack weapons so conveniently available, and go on a shooting spree that is a mere continuation of what he has been doing, "virtually", for years before.

A few decades ago I started doing research and write about the impact of indiscriminate television watching, especially on children. Then, as the interactive video games began to appear on the market, it seemed that finally the electronic technology was becoming more child-friendly: instead of watching passively inane content, children would now have a chance to become engaged actively in stimulating activities. What I did not have the sense to imagine was that the engagement offered by the new technology would become a Pandora's box containing bait for the reptilian brain to feast on. What scares me now is that children experiencing such reality are going to create a really real world like the one Hieronymus Bosch envisioned—full of spidery creatures, melting objects, and bestial humans.

[escapechassis]

The message on TrueCrypt's new website got me thinking: Using TrueCrypt is not - Pastebin.com

Possible message in the recent Truecrypt announcement. Curious.

"Stay away from future Truecrypt releases. This is clearly a warning from the developers."

[idkcake]

[escapechassis]

But we aren't alone in the universe - humanity is broad enough in potential that, should we explore the possible iterations of the species, one faction could be alien to another. 

Body mods, augmentation, all the branches neurology could evolve towards... Besides which the development of AI could unveil a new infinity of modes of consciousness.

[escapechassis]

Cyberpunk Tech - Pastebin.com

The most comprehensive collection of security software I've found. Roughly sectioned into [Basic Internet], [Web], [Web Hosting], [Security], [Phone], [Email], [Chat], [Firefox Add-ons], [Downloading], [Operating Systems], and [Misc].

[escapechassis]

Neurogames are Ready to Take Flight -- Expect a Breakout Year Ahead

But what are neurogames exactly?

Zack Lynch, the conference organizer, describes them as “a collection of technologies that incorporate your full nervous system into gameplay.” Specifically, that could include wearable devices like EEG headsets and heart-rate monitors along with biofeedback platforms to do things like eye tracking and brain wave sensing. 

They've got a few lectures up on youtube. The possibilities of biofeedback excite me.

[futurescope]

[futurescope]

HYPERMORGEN ICONS

We recently designed some icons to represent topics that will most likely become increasingly interesting in the next few years. 

Some of them are tongue in cheek (like the standford bunnies in the 3D replication icon), some are more critical (like the synthetic biology spidergoat). They are meant to provoke different associations to start discussions about the future.

We would like to create some more. Suggestions welcome via mail, twitter or facebook! 

Get the Icons at the The Noun Project! 

The icons en detail:

Slime Mold Computing Slime mold can not only determine the shortest path through a maze or model optimal railway systems. Scientists from the University of the West of England discovered that Physarum polycephalum slime molds can act as memristors. This means they could be used to create more efficient computer memory. [read more] 

Wearables For some futurists wearables are already half over, soon to be replaced by ingestibles. We think wearables will become interesting in ways we now can´t even imagine. [read more] 

Meat Printing Humans eat about 240 billion kilograms of meat each year. The demand for animal protein has resulted in environmental degradation, cruelty to livestock, and the spread of dangerous diseases. Thiel Foundation just funded Modern Meadow, a company that wants to solve this problem with a new method to print meat with a 3D printer. Will it taste better or worse than Tofurkey? [read more]

Autonomous Car The future of mobility. If the politicians don´t f*ck it up… [read more] 

Graphene The infamous new Wondermaterial almost every big company is dreaming of. The EU just threw a Billion Bucks at research projects dealing with graphene. Let´s keep our fingers crossed… [read more] 

Exoskeleton Known from Science Fiction since more than a century, powered exoskeletons could become relevant in many areas apart from human warfare or for the rehabilitation afterwards. [read more]

3D-Replication While everybody is already fed up with the ubiquitous talk about 3D, we think with 3D scanners becoming affordable 3D replication is going to explode. Think of Copyshops for Objects with the possibility to remix and mash! (Rabbits as a symbol for fast replication? Yeah, we know… but at least it´s the Stanford Bunny.) [read more] 

Encrypted eMail Thanks to the NSA, the eMail Icon needs an upgrade. And don´t forget to update your eMail to encrypted eMail, too… [read more] 

Brain Machine Interface Especially interesting in Combination with other Developments on the Horizon, e.g. Exosceletons. The next logical Step after we all have been assimilated with Google Glass… [read more] 

Synthetic Biology Synthetic Biology is on the rise. Cabbage has been grown with scorpion venom. Mice have been bred to chirp like birds. Glow-in-the-dark kitties and pigs are real. And, naturally, scientists created a goat-spider hybrid to produce synthetic silk. [read more] 

+++ THX A LOT +++

Fast.co Exist: Icons For The Near Future, From Printable Meat To Autonomous Car Warnings - These visuals create a thought-provoking shorthand for the issues that will be created by our emerging technologies.

Bruce Sterling: Design Fiction - Hypermorgen icons

PSFK: Simple Icons Help Visualize - The Trends Of The Near     Future

[escapechassis]

Interesting.

[escapechassis]

So everyone's freaking out about this VR for chickens suggestion without consideration for the interesting implications and possibilities of extra-species VR.

Philosophically, I'm sure we could discuss the non-consensual insertion of creatures into a fabricated reality. There's cruel irony to creating an idyllic world for animals fated to be consumed. Imagine: Aliens invade. Humankind is defeated and reduced to livestock. In a show of faulty compassion, our AI overlords craft a digital world for us to inhabit... This sounds familiar. Why does this sound familiar? Oh right, it's precisely the plot of the Matrix. We're on the verge of creating the chicken matrix. The chicken matrix.

Think about it. This can only end well.

Oh well, it's not like anything alive asked to be born into this world specifically, anyways.

So, has this idea has been around for a while? From 2012:

Food project proposes Matrix style vertical chicken farms

Well, not really. That plot involved removing the cerebral cortex of chickens so that they'd no longer be in any way conscious and able to experience their distressing situation. Our present entanglement in the world of speculative chicken VR is much truer to the real Matrix.

[escapechassis]

Advice on using your alter:

-- Bear in mind John Perry Barlow's observation that "Liberties are preserved by using them". Let your sysop know that you would prefer to be using a handle, and use one wherever you can. -- Try to support boards and conferences which allow handles, and avoid those which don't. -- When using a handle, BEHAVE RESPONSIBLY! There will always be irresponsible users on the nets, and they will always use handles. It is important for the rest of us to fight common anti-handle prejudices by showing that handles are NOT always the mark of an irresponsible user! -- Educate others about the importance of handles (but NEVER argue or flame anyone about it).

[escapechassis]

Famicoman's amazing collection of cyberpunk zines. Some interesting discussion on the post. 

A wiki is maintained here with lots of download links.

[escapechassis]

[5/7/2014 2:58:47 PM] Puzzle: hmm, do you see VR as feeling natural or non-natural?

[5/7/2014 2:59:13 PM] XOVLOV: Ideally natural

[5/7/2014 2:59:44 PM] XOVLOV: Maybe more natural than reality. But also, I don't mind digital environments

[5/7/2014 2:59:54 PM] XOVLOV: Something experienced more as concept + information

[5/7/2014 3:00:17 PM] XOVLOV: Like... I find webspaces I spend a lot of time in develop a kind of architecture

[5/7/2014 3:00:29 PM] XOVLOV: Memory palace like, maybe. But more of an aesthetic drift

[5/7/2014 3:01:24 PM] XOVLOV: Like, ----is all dark corridors. Got some classical column stuff going on too. Dark castle shades.

[5/7/2014 3:02:19 PM] Puzzle: huh, that's interesting actually. i'm increasingly feeling my projects would have to be online, my tendency is towards making an architecture of events

[5/7/2014 3:02:33 PM] Puzzle: which is really why i love comics

[5/7/2014 3:03:30 PM] Puzzle: how it can be formally melded with a web-page as opposed to a piece of paper is interesting

[5/7/2014 3:04:18 PM] XOVLOV: Yeeah, there's a lot more you could do, to, with essentially an infinite canvas and the possibility of non-linear stories via crazy linking

[5/7/2014 3:04:25 PM] XOVLOV: Nobody does that, but they could =_=

[5/7/2014 3:04:54 PM] Puzzle: i'm all about non-linearity - comics as a non-linear medium was what my thesis was all about

[5/7/2014 3:05:17 PM] XOVLOV: Ooooh...

[5/7/2014 3:05:21 PM] Puzzle: yeah, i mean imagine a webcomic where there's no sequence, but each of the submissions are related by content

[5/7/2014 3:05:37 PM] Puzzle: and you read in terms of the relations between different frames, stories,

[5/7/2014 3:05:51 PM] XOVLOV: o_o

[5/7/2014 3:06:11 PM] XOVLOV: [omfg speaking about this stuff sets my brain on fire, pardon coming possibility of rambles]

[5/7/2014 3:06:25 PM] XOVLOV: [Does no one realize how BORING webpaes are presently?]

[5/7/2014 3:06:53 PM] XOVLOV: [We set up this kind standard and people have gotten used to navigating in this super narrow template so everyone sticks to it]

[5/7/2014 3:07:00 PM] Puzzle: *nods* most webcomics are paper comics brutally transmitted to a form irrelevant to it

[5/7/2014 3:07:37 PM] XOVLOV: [Which is great I guess, for standardization and stuff (everyone reads left to write to enable communication, I knooowww, but...) but so so limiting and just, WOW]

[5/7/2014 3:08:25 PM] XOVLOV: [problem is all the coding has really been developed FOR these kinds of layouts, or with them in mind, so it will actually become an increasingly restricting sort of thing]

[5/7/2014 3:08:48 PM] Puzzle: maybe, no reason people can't experiment for their own purposes though

[5/7/2014 3:09:14 PM] XOVLOV: [Huumm, if you go and make everything flash-animated ( D: ) you actually have somewhat more freedom]

[5/7/2014 3:09:40 PM] XOVLOV: HUM.

[5/7/2014 3:09:45 PM] XOVLOV: Yeah and comics, wow

[5/7/2014 3:09:47 PM] XOVLOV: BUT SPACES

[5/7/2014 3:10:06 PM] XOVLOV: The spaces you could create! With wobbly curly web setups and weird linkages and wow

[5/7/2014 3:10:21 PM] XOVLOV: Like, you barely ever get foresty type infospaces from webstuff

[5/7/2014 3:10:29 PM] XOVLOV: it's all too contracted and boxy

[5/7/2014 3:10:34 PM] XOVLOV: so SQUARE

[5/7/2014 3:10:41 PM] XOVLOV: I love cubes but this is out of hand

[5/7/2014 3:10:48 PM] XOVLOV: where are the mandelic circular layouts

[5/7/2014 3:15:07 PM] XOVLOV: OKAY SO

[5/7/2014 3:15:42 PM] XOVLOV: Spaces! So it would be amazing for VR to actually pick up on these mental architectures and represent them

[5/7/2014 3:16:18 PM] XOVLOV: regardless of whether it ever does, VR internet will bee ammaaazziiing

[5/7/2014 3:16:43 PM] XOVLOV: If people can break out of their desire to just translate the flatweb to a 360 scope, which would be pretty lame

[5/7/2014 3:17:07 PM] XOVLOV: Have I pimped out firebox yet? It's a pretty cool concept and what they're doing is on the right track

[5/7/2014 3:17:30 PM] XOVLOV: I wanna get my coding up to snuff and start messing around with that, actually

[5/7/2014 3:17:47 PM] XOVLOV: Note to ----: Would be ultra cool to link some web enviros into the thing

[5/7/2014 3:18:35 PM] XOVLOV: Right and comics, hmm

[5/7/2014 3:18:46 PM] XOVLOV: I dunno, once we get to 3-dimensions

[5/7/2014 3:18:50 PM] XOVLOV: like, wow?

[5/7/2014 3:19:23 PM] XOVLOV: And interactive stuff becomes possible. Maybe a new kind of thing. Between static visual art & film & videogames

[5/7/2014 3:19:42 PM] XOVLOV: videogames really being the most recent form of art to emerge

[5/7/2014 3:19:57 PM] XOVLOV: Like, interactive whatever stuff

[5/7/2014 3:24:14 PM] XOVLOV: (incidentally someone set up pokemon so you can play it off the virtuix omni o: )

[5/7/2014 3:26:42 PM] XOVLOV: Presence! Right, as far as presence goes, I think AR is actually going to be an important bridge

[5/7/2014 3:26:49 PM] XOVLOV: Before VR is entirely immersive

[5/7/2014 3:27:11 PM] XOVLOV: And capable of offering the full sensory battery

[5/7/2014 3:28:12 PM] Puzzle: what counts as AR, digitally augmented reality?

[5/7/2014 3:28:22 PM] Puzzle: like, is photoshopping AR?

[5/7/2014 3:28:31 PM] XOVLOV: Hehe

[5/7/2014 3:28:59 PM] XOVLOV: Technically! I'm thinking mostly of present-time personal visual AR

[5/7/2014 3:29:13 PM] XOVLOV: Or, I guess could work with any of the other senses

[5/7/2014 3:30:09 PM] XOVLOV: They've been making some progress with hand-tracking, which is reeaaally cool

[5/7/2014 3:30:48 PM] XOVLOV: Seeing as that should allow for manipulation of fake stuffs n AR

[prostheticknowledge]

Chromosonic

Experimental electronic textile project by Judit Eszter Karpati with fabric that changes it’s colours with the help of an Arduino - video embedded below:

CHROMOSONIC project is an electronic textile that changes color, using the Arduino open-source platform. The dynamic changes in the textile color derive from processed sound files. Silkscreen was used to cover the textile in a dye that changes with temperature. Sound makes the nichrome wires woven into the fabric heat up, changing the pattern.

The project investigates the relationship between digital world and textile arts, the everchanging boundaries between the digital and physical world.How the world of digital media becomes tangible through the textile medium. My intention was the broadening the field of textile craft and design, bringing together different mediums and looking for new possibilities in textile design. The project mixing different areas: textile design, electronics, IT.

The chromosonic project has it’s own Tumblr blog, where you can find out more here

[escapechassis]

Immersion in cyberspace as a psychedelic experience.

"turn on, boot up, jack in"

[escapechassis]

[escapechassis]

VR torture

Should time dilation become possible, temporal constraints on release of information may become far more navigable. 

It might actually be more humane: Instead of inflicting pain, the game becomes destroying barriers and belief in reality. 

[escapechassis]

drms: My toy theory right now is that personalities (some level of them, anyways) are collections/clouds/webs of definition.

If you examine the definitions you can find where there's the most recursion or looping, and locate the important pillar concepts.