Lode wrote in his last post (amongst others) about the fact that the hype of Virtual Reality is over. This doesn’t have to be negative in my opinion. Maybe having a fresh (and more realistic?) view on virtual reality and its possible uses can help.
As a comparison, look at the original promise of artificial intelligence (also called strong AI), versus the current, more realistic view (weak AI). Just as weak AI revived AI’s fortunes, Yvonne Rogers believes that Ubicomp research that enables people to become smart and proactive instead of focusing on a smart environment as in the original vision by Weiser can help bring success to the field.
Speaking of ubiquitous computing, I think that research in ubiquitous computing and more natural forms of interaction can benefit in some part from the previous work in Virtual Reality. Virtual Reality provided a way to interact with a three-dimensional world instead of using the traditional keyboard and mouse (albeit a virtual world), while one of the goals of ubiquitous computing is to interact in a natural way with the real world (which is of course three-dimensional).
Lode also referred to the Reality-Virtuality (RV) Continuum, which I hadn’t heard of yet. It will certainly be interesting to have a look at. I think it all depends on how you define things. Mark Weiser for example referred to ubiquitous computing as the opposite of Virtual Reality, namely embodied virtuality.
Lode
October 18, 2007 — 21:17
(My turn to answer your post ;))
My question at the end was more of a question to think about, can it become a hype again? What will be needed? Will another domain help out? Another Industry (e.g. Gaming and the Novint Falcon?). Similar as what Doug Bowman asked the community to do in his keynote at Intuition.
I quote a part from following url: http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/virtual-reality9.htm
"Jaron Lanier coined the term Virtual Reality in 1987. In the 1990s, the media latched on to the concept of virtual reality and ran with it. The resulting hype gave many people an unrealistic expectation of what virtual reality technologies could do. As the public realized that virtual reality was not yet as sophisticated as they had been lead to believe, interest waned. The term virtual reality began to fade away with the public’s expectations. Today, VE developers try not to exaggerate the capabilities or applications of VE systems, and they also tend to avoid the term virtual reality."
This is something our lab is doing actively. We use the term VE :). It is interesting to know the history..
Lode
October 18, 2007 — 22:17
(My turn to answer your post ;))
My question at the end was more of a question to think about, can it become a hype again? What will be needed? Will another domain help out? Another Industry (e.g. Gaming and the Novint Falcon?). Similar as what Doug Bowman asked the community to do in his keynote at Intuition.
I quote a part from following url: http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/virtual-reality9.htm
"Jaron Lanier coined the term Virtual Reality in 1987. In the 1990s, the media latched on to the concept of virtual reality and ran with it. The resulting hype gave many people an unrealistic expectation of what virtual reality technologies could do. As the public realized that virtual reality was not yet as sophisticated as they had been lead to believe, interest waned. The term virtual reality began to fade away with the public’s expectations. Today, VE developers try not to exaggerate the capabilities or applications of VE systems, and they also tend to avoid the term virtual reality."
This is something our lab is doing actively. We use the term VE :). It is interesting to know the history..
Jo Vermeulen
October 19, 2007 — 07:38
That’s also my point: by being realistic and focusing on practical applications the field and its research can have a fresh start with new goals and objectives, after which interest from the public may slowly come back again. Maybe it’s something every “new field” has to go through.
Jo Vermeulen
October 19, 2007 — 08:38
That’s also my point: by being realistic and focusing on practical applications the field and its research can have a fresh start with new goals and objectives, after which interest from the public may slowly come back again. Maybe it’s something every “new field” has to go through.