Presence

The World Wide Web came out of nowhere in the early 1990's - now few of us can imagine a world before the Web. Our children will grow up entirely within the Web era, and the way they learn about the world will reflect that difference.

Incredible computer power - like that of Sony's Playstation2 - brings million-dollar power into the living room. Our children will use the virtual reality capabilities offered by the latest generation of videogame systems to explore uncharted worlds of the imagination - for play and work.

VR by itself is not enough; now our computers can let us have eyes and ears and hands at a distance, so we can reach out and touch something on the other side of the world - and feel it push back. This telepresence is about to become a common feature of life - and it means our children will no longer feel the same bounds of space that we grew up with. Their reach will span the globe. As the technologies of the Web, home virtual reality and telepresence come together, we'll be able to get a grasp on things that seem far beyond us now - and hold the whole world in our hands.

On the left side of the page, you'll see links - paralleling the ideas as they're discussed in the text. When you click on a link, you'll see information about that link on this side of the page, along with a link to another website, which will open in its own window. All you need to do is click on the link, and you'll be looking at whatever article or document crossed my path as I wrote the book.

You can add your own comments. If you've found something of interest to the readers of THE PLAYFUL WORLD, you can add a note, and even include your own links. This way the website can continue to grow well beyond my own abilities to keep it up-to-date. So please feel free to share what you've learned with the rest of us.