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V: Virtual Reality
When I was in my late twenties, I got all hepped up about virtual reality (VR). I was writing Daughter of the Moon at the time and started doing research. Now, this was in the late 80s, so VR implementation was a very new thing. It was a lot more theory than practice. I went to a seminar where Jaron Lanier was a panelist. He later went on to develop VR equipment. During that panel discussion, audience members were allowed to ask questions, and I did, of course. I got enough answers to make my novel realistic-seeming, and especially so since the book takes place in the future.
Recently, I used some of those concepts, sans kludgy goggles and gauntlets, to form the basis for Romantek’s dream universe. It’s really a VR landscape, where dreamers get to experience situations that don’t take place in real life, including meeting computer constructs, existing in different time periods, and enjoying different sensual pleasures (like unfamiliar food).
I love the VR aspects of things like Star Trek’s holodeck, the potential of Google Glass, and even the VR parts of Immersion (a new term of art for VR). Here’s an article about what’s happening today with Immersion. The whole thing excites the heck out of me.
How about you? Do you think you’d ever like to experience virtual reality?
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