While my own thoughts for my final New Media paper are formulating into a cohesive mass, another student orally presented the gist of his own. It was fascinating in that it tied in almost all current forms of media perhaps into one large gameplaying genre, where nothing (and this came from both what was discussed and my own flights of fancy) is static, everything changes, and all of it done from afar. Even tv programming could be suited to the individual–CSI won’t need those damned flashlights in the middle of the day in my living room, they’ll be smart enough to turn on the lights.
From there, naturally, I went elsewhere; listening with whichever half of my brain is polite, writing with the side that isn’t but insists on its own playgrounds.
So much is already available in technology, so much still in the works. But I see this: A business meeting in Microsoft headquarters, all 15 staffmembers present, dressed in their suits, a cup of coffee and a Danish in front of each of them around the table. The meeting proceeds normally. The ideas flow, as does the coffee. The manager who worries about his department’s cost figures anxiously watches the door; finally gets up, leaves the room, luckily meeting up with his secretary halfway back to his office and she hands him the altered report. He winks, says,"Later," and means it. Back in the conference room, he smiles confidently, his hair more in place, his tie straighter.
Meanwhile, sitting back home in his computer room, he’s never left his chair. He’s not quite as tall as himself in the meeting, about ten years older, and wearing pajamas. He wishes he could taste that Danish.
The virtual world of the future.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology