Posts Tagged: digital

Week 13: Augmented Reality

Wikipedia: Augmented Reality

1.  What are the differences between augmented reality and mediated reality?  Do humans tend to gravitate more toward realistic environments or situations rather than those that are clearly digital or virtual?

2.  In the future, will augmented reality lead to more scientific breakthroughs or will we continue to need actual reality to prove scientific research?

3.  Augmented reality is currently used in TV sport game coverage and marketing efforts.  Is augmented reality best suited for media and commercial tendencies?

4.  The main hardware components for augmented reality are: display, tracking, input devices, and computer.  What is it about modern smartphones that makes them prospective platforms for augmented reality?

Augmented reality using a webcam and Flash

1.  What are the advancements in augmented reality that surpass the capabilities of virtual reality?

2.  Is there still a use for virtual reality or has it been replaced?

Virtual societies are still a confusing topic for most people.  In a sense, these online worlds could encourage a further decline in real life social interactions among our already digitally crazed communities.  But virtual societies are an interesting phenomenon if studied closely.

We’ve all heard the stories of online world players being sucked into their games and devoting all of their free time (and even work time!) to progressing through the digital scenario.  This obsession has become so extreme in some cases that it disrupts not only the natural flow of the person’s day-to-day routines but also the people around them.  These virtual players are more a part of their online communities than the real world.  Food and sleep are the only elements of actual life that these gamers continue to resort back to in our actual human environment.  Otherwise, they have no use for reality.

It is interesting to note that virtual worlds compress human behavior by stripping away offline interactions and focusing on the core elements deemed important to its participants.  Virtual societies are not concerned with the day-to-day stresses of actual life.  Some may see these digital places as an escape from reality.  While online communities used to be seen as purely recreational, they are now being considered normal.  They are becoming ingrained into social situations outside of simple games by entering the corporate and educational realms.  Virtual classrooms and office meetings can now be found in virtual environments, allowing participants in any time zone and from any location.

We used to have the mindset of “I’m going to sit down and go on the Internet” during the 90s.  Today, the Internet is connected and always changing even when we may not be sitting in front of a screen.  This is now the case with virtual societies.  These are worlds that continue to progress no matter which players are online or not.  Nothing stops the progression just like in the real world.

By studying people’s habits, actions, and reactions to virtual societies, we can learn about basic human behavior.  It allows us to take away the burdens of our actual lives and see what truly motivates individuals.  Maybe we can learn a thing or two about ourselves from digital communities?  Or maybe virtual societies will become the only reality of the future.  Only time will tell.

As a student of journalism, it’s startling to think what lies ahead on the horizon for print media.  We could be facing a world that becomes entirely digital with no forms of media on paper.  Information and communication will be made up of ones, zeros, and bits.

Although the budgets and staff of traditional print newsrooms are shrinking in today’s digital world, 60% of all news reported comes from print staffers.  Yet they are the ones that are being the hardest hit.  At first I think it doesn’t seem fair.  These are professional journalists that stock the flow of information to everyone around the world.  But who knows how much longer their efforts will be needed.  What will happen when our main source of reporters is left with no funding to continue?  The only answer is for print to find a replacement for traditional print advertising that can rake in the same amount of profit as before the digital age.  But what is that answer?

When I first jumped into the professional field of journalism in the working world, many news sites were beginning to put up subscriptions wall to their online content.  This in turn drove reluctant readers away and didn’t help bring in any new profits.  As a result this idea was abandoned and all bets were placed on online advertising, or “pay per click”.  This wasn’t much of a success either.  As the print paper shrank, online content grew.  And money woes stayed the same … or worsened.

Today we hear of media sites thinking about the online subscription model yet again.  Maybe this time it will work.  Maybe society wasn’t ready for online payments a few years back when the online media boom was just beginning.  Statistics now show that online news is the most popular source for daily information.  The only problem is, will these statistics still be true if readers are required to pay for their online news consumption.  May people enjoy online news because it can be personalized to their tastes and is convenient.  These factors won’t change.  Media outlets are only asking for some compensation to their reporting.

Keep in mind that it’s not only the reporters that are suffering.  How do you think the paper is printed each morning?  What happens if one of those giant printing press machines breaks or the paper trucker needs to make an extra run for more newsprint?  Regular human workers run all these functions at a print institution.  Usually, the staff in the pressroom outnumbers the workers in the newsroom and advertising department of a local paper.  The reporters are not the only ones that are facing layoffs and company bankruptcy.

I hope society learns that media is an industry just like any other well-oiled machine in this country.  In order to stay afloat, profits need to be made and competition needs to thrive.  I hope I don’t see the day when professional journalism is swallowed whole simply because we want to save a few dollars a year on an online subscription to news.

I have always had a lot of questions about Wikipedia and how it goes against typical business models and information collaboration we have learned to trust through the centuries.  This week’s readings and discussions in regard to the rise of networks helped clear some of this blurriness.  It seems that Wikipeida turned everything upside down in terms of company existence and economic rational.  It is the epitome of collaborative production in our new digital age.  Anyone can now share what they want, when they want, and with whomever they want.  With Wikipedia, groups come together to create something new that cannot be made by one single person to the same degree successfully.  Today we have new tools that allow larger groups to collaborate.  But is this effective?  Yes, because it takes advantage of non-financial motivations and allows for different levels of contributions.

Wikipedia began in 1995 under the idea of becoming a user-edited site.  It was intended for small groups of like-minded individuals that trust each other.  Now it has transformed into a collection of millions of contributors on a global scale.  However, it brings up the question: does this type of information gathering need manager oversight?  In our new world, we have adapted to a spontaneous divisions of labor among groups.  Someone starts a thread and others fill in and edit content as it is added.  The page is never completed because it can always have more information added or taken away by anyone.

But what about the accuracy of this information?  Won’t people post irrelevant or false information (intentionally or unintentionally).  Of course errors will appear.  However, those dedicated to the information will weed out the bad and leave the good.  If there is ever a dispute about content that was added or taken away from a page, anyone can look up the history and even pinpoint the specific user in the backlog.  The reputation of contributors is created from this digital history.

Wikipedia now rivals traditional encyclopedias.  In fact, the amount of information on the site is 25 times larger than that found in encyclopedias.  Plus, users need to wait an entire year to have an updated version of the printed encyclopedia.  Wikipedia is always up to date, is free, and constantly growing.  Although I don’t know who is in charge of information gather for encyclopedias or how this process works, the online community is responsibly for the content of Wikipedia and we are all working together for free to create the largest collection of information.

In terms of economic rational, company existence in the first place is now in doubt.  We can go online and create content whenever and wherever suits us best.  It will be interesting to see how companies evolve as we move toward a new economic approach and move away from an accepted and historic approach to business.