My Blog has Been Hijacked

Oh my god, can you believe the pompous pontification that's been published here over the past couple of weeks? Future of virtual words, blah, blah, blah. Analytical history of Second Life, yada, yada, yada. Give me a break. If you haven't noticed, someone's been putting his lame-ass words into my pretty mouth instead of clearly channeling my full frontal Muse-ity. So let me set the record straight.

Only fools, blowhards and analysts claim they can accurately predict the future. And the only thing more pretentious than playing backseat CEO is doing it in retrospect. Botgirl Questi (yeah, I'm driving into the third person with an expired poetic license) is about paying deep attention to the experience of the present, not pretending to see the future. Before we get all hot and bothered with the anticipation of cramming our heads into VR helmets and walking through the 3D Internet of our dreams, maybe we should attend to what our current virtual experience is doing to our lives and minds.

The only value in imagining the future is when it motivates us to act in the present to help create it. Instead of hypothesizing about how Facebook is going to ruin or save Oculus, why not consider how we can better use our virtual lives to positively impact our relationships, jobs and creativity. Instead of agonizing over what the new Linden Lab CEO is going to mean to Second Life, why not scrutinize how we're using it now. Since no one can accurately foresee how the confluence of physical, augmented and virtual reality is going to play out ten years from now, why not make the most of today, chill out, and enjoy the fucking ride.

Why The Imminent New Age of Immersive VR is Utter Bullshit

Forget the hype about the new age of immersive virtual reality. That’s the polar opposite of where we’re heading. We live in a time when expedience is the pre-eminent capability and accessibility trumps utility. We watch movies and play games on 5” phone screens instead of 50” televisions. We shoot photos with an 8 megapixel smartphone instead of the $1000 SLR gathering dust on our shelf. We hunt and peck text messages because we don’t want to give our undivided attention to a five minute phone call. And we’re starting to put on smart watches because it’s too much of a hassle to reach into our pocket and take out our smartphone.

That’s why I’m skeptical about the brave new 3D web that’s supposed to be launched by Facebook’s $2 Billion acquisition of Oculus. We’re not willing to pay attention to anything for more than five minutes without checking Twitter or Facebook, sending a text or taking a Selfie. When faced with technology options we choose the one that requires the least commitment to undivided attention, the fastest startup time and the lowest learning curve. That’s not VR. Not today. And not for the foreseeable future.

I’m confident that immersive VR will become the dominant domain for many of the millions of hard core immersive gamers and role players around the world. But until we can wear contact lenses that shift us seamlessly between RL, AR and VR, don’t hold your breath for mainstream use.

Towards a Transworld Future

Towards a Transworld future where we move freely between physical, augmented & virtual realities.

The one-two punch of Facebook's $2 billion acquisition of Oculus Rift and High Fidelity's $2.5 million in new funding made me rethink the post I was writing on the future of virtual worlds. A week ago I was skeptical about the odds of virtual worlds gaining mainstream traction in the near future. Today I'm feeling more optimistic. Not because I believe that new VR hardware will catapult existing virtual worlds beyond their current markets. But because the inevitable investment feeding frenzy will fund new hardware and software platforms that will extend the VR medium into social networking, shopping, entertainment and other mainstream activities.

Virtual reality is a natural extension of the second-screen phenomenon. Today, we watch news and television together in the shared psychological space of social networks. Tomorrow, we'll be watching together in the shared physical space of virtual reality. Today we shop online and imagine what our purchases will look like in our homes. Tomorrow, we'll preview 3D printable goods in our virtual homes and try new clothes on our avatars. These kinds of scenarios have the potential to make virtual reality a medium people use in the normal course of personal and business life.

I look forward to a transworld future where people move freely between physical, augmented and virtual realities, jumping between PCs, consoles, tablets, smartphones, smartwatches, AR glasses and VR goggles. I'm not sure where proprietary virtual worlds will fit into the picture as the medium matures and begins to develop interoperable standards. As for Second Life, Linden Lab is going to have to get their act together to meet challenges from a plethora of well-funded competitors who aren't tied to a ten year old platform and the associated technical debt.

Exclusive News Report: Oculus Rift RL Announced

A new version of Oculus Rift is in development that will allow avatars to experience the physical world as if they were really there. "Oculus Rift RL will give avatars the chance to leave their overstimulating world of fantasy and see the mundane physical world just as God intended it," said spokesavatar Botgirl Questi. 

The ingenious new product will be made possible by Facebook's pending acquisition of drone maker Titan Aerospace, which will be equipped with holographic projectors to bring avatars to life in the physical world. A final piece of the puzzle was uncovered in a new document leaked by Edward Snowdan, revealing that Facebook will provide the NSA access to its servers in exchange for the use of live NSA satellite and video feeds to complete the hardware and software ecosystem.

  

The new product won't only be marketed to avatars. Humans will also be able to take advantage of the new platform and avoid the hassle of ever getting out of their chairs or leaving their houses. They'll be able to walk virtually down the isles of grocery and department stores and have their items delivered within the hour by their very own drone. They will no longer have to fight the crowds at movies, plays, concerts or sporting events, enjoying them all in the safety and comfort of their pajamas.

"This new initiative can even turn back global warming by slashing the number of vehicles on the street and eliminating the need for most entertainment and business travel," said Questi. "The future is bright, indeed!" 

My Take on the Oculus Rift Acquisition by Facebook

Base image from ThinkStock

I’ve been writing recently about the difference between mediums, platforms and products. What's most interesting to me about Facebook's acquisition of Oculus is that it's probably going to push the 3D virtual reality medium into the mainstream, breaking out of the current niche of research and gaming into the type of ubiquitous presence achieved by mobility.

From a medium perspective, it’s the kind of deal that 3D virtual reality has been waiting for. The $2 billion investment in the Oculus platform by Facebook is only the tip of the iceberg. It will spark even more substantial investment by Facebook, competitors and partners in the hardware, software, servers, infrastructure and standards that will extend just about everything on the web today to 3D accessible interfaces, just as the iPhone recently did for the mobile medium.

Oculus Rift is just one of dozens of VR and AR systems under development, ranging from a soon to be released version by Sony, to crowd-funded versions on Kickstarter and Indiegogo. Having the immense reach and wealth of Facebook behind Oculus is certainly a competitive advantage, but I believe the jury is far from out on whether any particular product is going to end up dominating the space. The type of standards that allow controllers and monitors from different companies to interoperate will extend to VR hardware, giving room for innovative companies to compete with early entrants.

Personally, I have reservations about the possibility that the 3D internet will be controlled by a few giant companies like Facebook. As Raph Koster wrote:

It’s time to wake up to the fact that you’re just another avatar in someone else’s MMO. Worse. From where they stand, all-powerful Big Data analysts that they are, you look an awful lot like a bot.

But in another sense, I don't really care what I look like to Facebook. I care about what the medium does for us and how it will transform our lives and culture. And that's anyone's guess. Combined with sensors and wearables creating the rapidly emerging Internet of Things, the coming decade is going to be full of surprises.

Pride, Prejudice and Twitter

A 100 Word Story in Screenplay 

PLAIN DRAWING ROOM

JANE AND MR. DARCY ARE STANDING AT THE LIBRARY.

JANE

The social network isn’t just a medium of self-expression, it calls forth creativity that would not have otherwise been born...

MR DARCY

... and time not otherwise wasted.

(JANE smirks)

JANE

We hack off hunks of ourselves chronically crafting content that is convulsively consumed by hungry hordes viewing voyeuristically from the void!

MR DARCY bumps fists with JANE

MR DARCY

Incorrigible peeping Toms peering from timeless space, hungry ghosts gobbling down the guts we disgorge, zoned out zombies voraciously devouring endless tubs of all you can eat buttered brains, transfixed by the wit and witless wind.

JANE kisses MR DARCY

JANE

You’re feeding off me right now, so don’t forget to wipe your filthy mouth before you finish.

FADE TO BLACK

I'm in Love!

Almost nothing thrills me like passionate lust for a hot new idea. It's as powerful to me as an infatuation with a new lover. My mind is repeatedly drawn to her throughout the day. She influences what I choose to do with my time and colors perception of what I experience. I'm entranced by every new dimension I discover within her and am blind to her faults. I go to sleep with thoughts of her running through my mind and wake to dreams that resonate with her influence. I realize that the limerence will eventually end, but for now, I'm in love!

The Death of My Wit

Reports of the death of my wit have been greatly exaggerated. Well, maybe not greatly. Sometimes it’s hard to tell. Audience feedback can be confusing. Like I was really smug about this one dude complementing me on being pithy, until I realized he had a bad lisp. Awkward, right?

There is nothing free of cliché. There is nothing completely clichéd. So I need to keep digging deeper or shut the hell up. I shouldn't take pride in the inspiration behind my art. It's a gift. My wee contribution is just in the doing.

As my Muse says, "Go create something little monkey! Yes! you can. When? Now. Why? Because something inside you is longing to be born." I just hope it's not an alien trying to eat its way out of my liver.

P.S. The image on the left is from the Getty Open Content Collection, an amazing resource of more than 10,000 images from the J. Paul Getty Museum and the Getty Research Institute.

50 Shades of Narcissism

What Lies Behind A Smiley Face?

I'm been working on a picture book to showcase the astonishing depth and diversity of my Twitter stream. The working title is, "50 Shades of Narcissism." Here are some excerpts from the text:

EVERY photo shared on a social network is a Selfie. In fact, every damn tweet is essentially a Selfie. The continuously annoying stream of perpetual Personal Branding truncates the vast wonder of a living being into a shiny little retweetable box. Get a life you fucking zombies and be the mystery you seek to kill.

It’s so sad. Our addiction to social media is rooted in the fear of oblivion which explodes periodically in outbursts of rapid-fire ranting. Although anger channeled through art can be inspiring, anger expressed through social networks is just pathetic. People go ballistic when their perception of reality is challenged. It’s a good thing that it's hard to make a fist when you’re clinging to a delusion. Cognitive dissonance is the root of all evil.

Speaking of evil, I nominate the fear of boredom as the eighth deadly sin. Distraction is today’s drug of choice and I am so off the wagon. “Being under the influence” is a synonym for intoxication because there’s nothing like getting totally shit-faced on a potent idea. Jesus would probably say, “Blessed are the easily amused, for they drink from the social network stream and are inebriated.” I say, a drunk audience is really fucking annoying. Inspiration offers many gifts, but patience is not one of them.

But despite the endless flow of stale memes, animated gifs and Foursquare check-ins, the tweet is an amazing canvas for creativity. To put it in perspective, each biblical "Let There Be" issued in less than 140 characters. Maybe that's why I feel like God. But in all modesty, although I’m considered to be a very creative person, creativity is less something I do than something that does me. (Something, not someone, you pervert.)

Garbage in garbage out is true for computers. But the work of the artistic life is the alchemical transmutation of shit into gold. So when I'm blocked creatively, it's a sign either that I've stopped paying attention to the hidden wonders of life or that I'm really constipated. It’s not surprising that drugs and alcohol have killed so many artists over the years. Prudence recommends the lowest effective dose, but Dr. Muse always prescribes the highest non-lethal option. That said, suffering related to art is more commonly experienced by audiences than artists.

Social media is a prosthetic extroversion organ for introverts. It can either be the artist’s best friend or her undoing. To truly worship the Muse, we must transcribe her every whisper. To be clear, that's transcribe, NOT tweet. Everything may be better when you share it with an audience, but that’s only if you're performing. Get a life! (Don't be offended. I'm talking to myself.)

I've heard a rumor that somewhere between consuming and creating there's a state called "being." I must look into that someday. My online lifestyle is best described as "info-bulimia." Sometimes I feel like I'm just tweeting into the wind. Pitiful, I know. But what does that make my followers?

Some day our distant ancestors will look back at our tweets and laugh their asses off. Assuming civilization hasn’t ended. And people still have asses. Along the way, I predict that Twitter will eventually be seen as a vintage long-form medium and emoticons will replace the alphabet. What lies behind a smiley face?

Do you think you know me?

Do you think you know me? You don't know a writer just because you've read her work. At least not in the biblical sense. Oh well. Obscurity is its own reward. Or was that obscenity? I get confused. Although it’s true that you can’t please everyone, you can’t offend everyone either. Andy Kaufman could, but he's dead.

Given the minuscule amount of information we have to work with, it's no wonder there's a gap between what we believe and the way things are. The human psyche has been tuned by eons of evolution to transform limited experience into an overarching model of reality. So we depend on each other to point out our misconceptions. But don’t expect a thank you. The polar opposite of reality isn't fiction, it's ignorance. Unless you live on the equator.

Where do ideas come from? Beyond the dance of neurons there's a greater mystery. I call her Muse. She calls me in the middle of the night. The secret she whispered is, “Your reach must exceed your grasp, in order for your grasp to transcend your vision.” Unfortunately, I have no fucking idea what that means.

My life is an open book written in a language I don't quite understand. I do know my fatal flaw though, I’d rather be clever than correct. Unfortunately, the benefits of exercise don't apply to exercises in futility. I just have to keep focused on what I’m looking for here. What am I REALLY looking for? Oh shit. How embarrassing. I’m wearing them. There's got to be a new frontier around here somewhere. I must have left it in my other sweater.

I've been romancing an idea for a new video project. The working title is, "Marilyn McLuhan." Sorry. Jokes only I understand are so much funnier to me than jokes only you understand. That said, don’t whine if your audience doesn’t get it. Either your work sucks or they’re ignorant fucks. Or more likely, both. OMG Toto! You're wrong boy. There isn't anyone behind the curtain after all.

What I've Learned About Social Networks This Month

There are 5 types of social network posts:

1. What I'm doing 

2. What I'm thinking

3. What I've made

4. What I've found

5. What I'm selling

But there's a hidden message inside every tweet and blog post we make. It's what we believe it says about us. This one says, "I'm really smart." 

It’s been an interesting month on Twitter. I’ve been loving the Snark vs. Smarm debate. I find Smarm way more irritating. In life, as in medical test results, false-positives do way more harm than good. So when I read, “Please Retweet," what I hear is, "Please Unfollow." I mute therefore you aren't. 

The buzz from participating in a social network comes from brain chemistry. We act as drug delivery mechanisms for each other.  The addictive part is the compulsion to stay alive in the minds of our audience. Can you feel me in there? I feel you. So watch your hands, you perv!

If you remember nothing else, remember this: A tweet of beauty is a joy for 10 seconds. You must RT the change you want to see in the world. And the unSelfied life is not worth living. You can’t step twice in the same social network stream. So be sure to check the bottom of your shoes before you step back inside. Be careful out there!

You can follow me on Twitter, here.

(This post was assembled from some of my December tweets.)

Exploring the (un)reality of virtual life: Part 1

SL is an empathy box. It sorts those who can treat others as real, as feeling beings, as autonomous people, from those who can only treat others as tools...[Second Life] does separate the few who stay from the many who don't. And one boundary between them, I believe, is empathy - is the ability to see this place and these people as real, at least as real as the physical world. From "The Empathy Box" by Sophrosyne Stenvaag

Despite my great fondness and respect for Sophrosyne, I found her recent "Empathy Box" post subtly disquieting. "What's up with that," I wondered for the better part of last week. Try as I might, I couldn't pin down what bothered me. By the weekend, I finally realized that I hadn't been reacting to any specific ideas she proposed, but rather to my own lack of understanding of what words like "reality" and "empathy" mean when they're used in reference to virtual life.

You'd have thought I'd learned my lesson about announcing a series of posts with no idea where they'll end up, but that's what I've decided to do again. Instead of taking a week in the privacy of my own server to journey through dead-ends, wrong turns and unexpected detours, I'm offering you the dubious honor and uncertain pleasure of traveling along with me as I attempt to gain some clarity on the (un)reality of virtual life.

For now, I'll leave us with an initial axiom to consider:

An avatar's personhood exists solely in the underlying sentient being.

By "personhood," I mean

A socially constructed moral category that denotes the inclusion criteria and salient characteristics that distinguish human beings from other forms of life and thus specify the individuals to which we owe particular moral obligations, i.e., those obligations we have to others due to their status as persons. (from Healthcare Ethics)

Let's see where this takes us.