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The Virtual World A new medium born at the dawn of the space age and during the very birth of the computer, will come to shape our world and our future out of this world.
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The Virtual WorldA new medium born at the dawn of the space age and during the very birth of the computer,will come to shape our world and our future out of this world.
So what is a Virtual World?A place described by words or projected through pictureswhich creates a placein the imaginationreal enough that you can feelyou are inside of it.
… therefore we find virtual worldsonly on computers right?(hint, massively multiplayer online games)
But wait…Was the digital computer the first place people experienced virtual worlds?What about…
25,000 BCE in the Caves of Lascaux?
Or in 1671 Through The Lanterna Magika
Or in 1894 Through the Edison Kinetoscope
…and computers are here (just barely) but we can already play Spacewar!(world’s first multiple player videogame running on the PDP-1in February 1962 when yours truly was just a couple of weeks old!)
And then in 1974 a couple of guys figured out how to put players on two computers connected by a cable into the same 3D space and…
Maze War had all the features of the modern “first person shooter”
Back to the future again in 1987 and another couple of guys figured out how to put players on regular home computers computers same graphical (2D) space and…
Avatars are born! Lucasfilm’s Habitat
But what about 3D, giving you that “inside” feeling that virtual worlds like the Lascaux Cave gave our ancestors?
It arrived with “Doom” in 1993. Run around fighting monsters all in 3D on a regular PC.
Then in 1995 it all came together: someone else connected 3D Doom-like worlds to the Internet… “Worlds Chat” Space Station
…and created a whole new genre, Internet Social Virtual Worlds. In Worlds Chat you could… Choose your avatar Teleport in
Chat Explore the station And party!
And the mid 1990s “Cambrian Explosion” of Social Virtual Worlds had begun.
Use your own voice, Avatar lip-synching(Noel Paul Stookey in Traveler)
Now that this new multi-dimensional Cyberspace had arrived, what can you do with it?
Cyber-tradeshows Virtual Classrooms
An example… Robotic Lunar Exploration Find the Light • Crater Rim (Sunlight Area) Exploration • Imaging of site from surface—time data collection to correlate with LRO orbital images of same conditions (pan every 2 hours over 1 year) • Geotechnical properties of lunar regolith (bearing strength, soil composition, cohesiveness, block and slope populations) • Biological effects of radiation, reduced gravity over 1 year • Crater Floor (Dark Area) Exploration • Physical environment and geotechnical properties (temperatures, soil characteristics, etc.) • Examine both surface and subsurface of cold trap region • Volatile deposits: elemental and molecular composition, species abundance, physical state, distribution and extent; number of samples from varied locations in crater floor; locations and settings documented Touch the Ice