<![CDATA[io9: Virtual Worlds]]> http://cache.io9.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/io9.com.png <![CDATA[io9: Virtual Worlds]]> http://io9.com/tag/virtual worlds http://io9.com/tag/virtual worlds <![CDATA[A virtual Morrissey is on the loose in Google Earth]]> If you use Google Earth to look up the Salfords Lads Club in Manchester, England, you'll find a famously coiffed squatter in this virtual world. Punch in "St Ignatius Walk, M5 3RX" on 3D Buildings mode and you'll see a pixelated incarnation of Morrissey, The Smiths' loud-mouthed pontificator, forever standing smugly. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5872406&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Real-Life Inception: Army looks to "counteract nightmares" with digital dreams]]> A soldier tries to sleep. But he is not safe in his dreams. Jolted awake by a nightmare, the combat veteran fumbles in the dark for his 3-D glasses. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5852428&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[A conversation with Nate Simpson of Nonplayer, one of the most gorgeous comics of 2011]]> In the first issue of Nate Simpson's comic book debut Nonplayer, a futuristic, massively multiplayer online game called Warriors of Jarvath may be developing a mind of its own. io9 recently spoke with Simpson about creating this stunning virtual realm. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5795934&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Real police investigate theft of virtual furniture]]> Users of the virtual world Habbo Hotel have engaged the Finnish police to look into 400 cases of theft, with some customers reporting up to 1000 euros worth of "furniture" stolen. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5553672&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Long Before Virtuality, Another Star Trek Alum Tried To Get Edgy With The Holodeck]]> Melinda Snodgrass is best known for writing the Star Trek episode where Data's personhood gets put on trial. But in the mid-1990s, she created Star Command, which took Trek's holodeck much, much further. Just check out this holo-torture sequence. Edgy! More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5305153&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[How Is Virtuality Different Than Star Trek's Holodeck?]]> When we got a chance to take part in a conference call with Ronald D. Moore about Virtuality, there was only one question we wanted to ask him: How is this new show different from Star Trek's holodeck episodes? More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5287364&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Win Fame and Prizes in Our Scifi Sims Contest]]> With The Sims 3 hitting the shelves, it's time to take your avatars to the place they've always belonged: outer space. Or maybe inner space. We want you to turn your Sims games into science fiction masterpieces and win prizes. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5278241&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Discover The Secrets Of Ron Moore's 10-Year Space Probe]]> Ronald D. Moore's long-awaited Virtuality airs June 26, and we've got exclusive concept art showing the inner workings of the deep-space probe Phaeton and its various modules — including a super-detailed diagram explaining the physics of the ship. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5285029&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Scientists Create Method Of Uploading Your Entire Body To A Computer]]> Not simply content with developing technology to one day allow you to upload your brain, scientists are working to upload and re-create your entire anatomy into a computer. Who needs this "real life" stuff, anyway? More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5284899&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Virtual Resurrection: The Dead Who Went To Cyber-Heaven]]> Is there life after death? Maybe, if you're wired. After all, death is just a failure of storage media. Science fiction is full of people who've died in meatspace, only to live on in cyberspace. Here's our inventory of cyber-Heaven. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5281164&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[6 More Heroes Who Might Still Be Trapped In Virtual Reality]]> Yesterday, we looked at six characters who seemingly managed to escape virtual prisons. Now, we'll make it an even dozen as we examine another sextet of science fiction heroes that may or may not still be stuck inside their own minds. Spoilers! More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5280977&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Get Away From It All By Traveling The Multiverse]]> As summer brings thoughts of vacation, why not consider stopping off on one of the many Parallel Earths of science fiction? There's an infinite number of possibilities available to you - and here are some of our favorites. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5279353&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Travel Inside The Horrifying Mind Of A Cyborg Killer, In "Offline"]]> A rogue scientist goes inside the mind of a cyber-soldier to try and reprogram him and redeem his humanity, in the independent film Offline, from director Matthew Santoro. The trailer, featuring stark dystopian visuals and nightmarish distortions, is below. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5280767&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[6 Characters Who Escaped Virtual Prisons... Or Did They?]]> It's the ultimate test for any hero: finding yourself trapped in a prison of the mind, where you can no longer tell the difference between reality and falsehood. Here are six science-fiction heroes who escaped from virtual reality...probably. Spoilers ahead! More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5279494&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Star Trek's Absolute Worst Holodeck Adventures]]> Star Trek used to be exploring strange new worlds, but at some point it turned into a never-ending parade of terrible holographic trifles. Here are the ten absolute worst. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5280450&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[7 Failed Virtual Reality Technologies]]> There was a time when people were calling home virtual reality the wave of the future. Now most people just call it goofy and expensive. Here are 7 virtual reality technologies that didn't work, and never will. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5280347&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Indie Science Fiction Film Tackles Virtual Reality And The War On Terror]]> The upcoming indie science fiction film In-World War combines a DIY ethic, virtual reality, the War on Terror, and the loss of identity into a globetrotting dark comedy. Ah, so that's where all the originality in movie-making went. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5279583&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Virtual Sex: Cheating or Not?]]> You've asked yourself this question 1000 times. When you put on your virtual dolphin suit and do terrible things to that giant squid in your favorite virtual world, does your spouse have the right to be angry? At last, we have the definitive answer. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5276414&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[How To React To Your VR Environment]]> How convincing is virtual reality? To our conscious mind, not at all (Seriously, have you seen Second Life?), but to our subconsciousnesses? Well, it depends how real everyone else thinks it is, apparently. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5274863&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[The Best And Worst Of Virtual Music Video Worlds]]> Who can forget Jeremy London's virtual cigarette, after having fake sex with Alicia Silverstone to Aerosmith's "Amazing"? Some of the best and worst virtual world-building has come from the music video industry. Strange virtual music worlds, we salute you. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5277143&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[The Dumbest Holodeck Episodes Of All Time]]> It's a terrible cliche — the television episode where our intrepid hero goes inside the cyber-world and things start going terribly wrong. Star Trek owns the holographic disaster story, with its litany of holodeck mishaps, but plenty other shows have gone there. Here are the 10 worst holodeck stories. Ever. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5276307&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[The 5 Science Fiction Tales That Made Us Love Virtual Reality]]> For almost as long as there has been science fiction, there's been virtual reality, teaching us about worlds inside machines before we even knew what the internet was. Here are five of the earliest, and best, VR stories we grew up with. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5276088&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Ronald D. Moore's Ten-Year Space Mission Launches Early]]> We've got a slew of promo pictures from Ronald D. Moore's Virtuality two hour TV premiere, whose release date has moved up. So take a gander at the faces who will be slipping in and out of their own virtual worlds, while on a long trip into the black. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5275932&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Win Fame And Prizes In Our Scifi Sims Contest]]> With The Sims 3 hitting the shelves, it's time to take your avatars to the place they've always belonged: outer space. Or maybe inner space. Or maybe just a post-apocalyptic world. The point is, we want you to turn your The Sims games into science fiction masterpieces and win prizes. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5275207&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Second Life Embraces Corporate America, But Is It Mutual?]]> Second Life! It's not just for cybersex anymore... or, at least, that's what Linden Labs is trying to tell the various corporations of the world, as they try to reposition their virtual domain as the latest and greatest way to commute virtually to the office. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5273498&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Can Ray Kurzweil's Rosy Predictions Stand Up To Fact-Checking?]]> When the Singularity arrives in 2045, Ray Kurzweil will finally be infallible. Until, then, however the famous futurist's meat brain has made some ludicrously inaccurate predictions, as Newsweek magazine pointed out recently. Kurzweil has sent an angry letter to the magazine, to try and clear his name. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5274464&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[4 Ways Virtual Reality Living Could Suck]]> Virtual reality sounds like paradise: we'll upload our consciousnesses, ditch our smelly meat bodies, and be beautiful, immortal rockstars in a scarcity-free wonderland, forever. But technology never quite works out the way you hope it will, and science fiction writers have already pointed out four ways virtual reality could suck. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5274180&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Escape . . . To Virtual Worlds!]]> Science fiction has always promised us an escape to imaginary worlds. Now advances in CGI technologies have ripped world-building off the page and rendered it into 3D images that move around in real time. This week on io9, take you on a weird expedition into virtual worlds. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5273677&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Confessions Of A Virtual Dragonrider]]> Have you ever loved a narrative so much that it took over your life? That's what happened to me with Dragonriders of Pern - especially when it became an online world. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5127093&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Second Life Foresaw the US Banking Crisis]]> Yet another financial casualty: Citigroup just became the latest institution to come crawling to the feds for a bailout. Where will it all end? As industry experts become desperate for any kind of divining rod, some observers pointed out that the failure of unregulated banking has already played out — in Second Life. The rise and fall of one of the virtual world’s unregulated banks has some financial researchers taking a closer look at the predictive benefit of virtual environments. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5097324&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Did Somebody Hack Your Virtual Breasts?]]> I can't stop thinking about a story that broke earlier this week about a bug that reduced the breast sizes of tons of large-boobed avatars in the MMO "Age of Conan" (you can see before and after pictures here). No word on whether the boobs have been re-inflated, nor any real explanation of how it happened beyond some hand-waving about patches and "morph values" for body parts. My theory is that it was actually a gang of feminist modders who infected the MMO with properly-sized boobies. [Kotaku] More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5013963&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Virtual Worlds as Test Tube Societies]]> Though you may never visit Second Life, you know about it for the same reason you know about MySpace: it's a digital social space that's transforming how we use the web. Except instead of being a bunch of webpages devoted to bad music and OMG WTF, Second Life is a 3D virtual world where people build crazy houses, transform into dragons, and talk a lot about the Metaverse in scary marketing terms. It's something you need to understand, and luckily there's a new book that can explain it all to you. Second Life "embedded journalist" Wagner James Au's The Making of Second Life hit bookstores last month, and it's one of the most thoughtful and comprehensive books out there on the topic. (That's Au above, in his Second Life incarnation.) More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=375352&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Do Virtual Worlds Have to Make You a Psycho Loser?]]> A new documentary about virtual worlds called Second Skin debuted at the South by Southwest Festival over the weekend, and it's already causing controversy for portraying gamers as social defectives. Though the filmmakers clearly want to offer a positive view of massive multiplayer games like World of Warcraft, they nevertheless managed to focus the documentary almost entirely on people whose immersion in virtual worlds destroys their engagement with the real world. Either that, or the relationships that the gamers form via the virtual world are shown to be unstable and perhaps even illusory. C|Net's Daniel Terdiman wrote a fascinating essay about the movie after its debut, pointing out how strange it is that we're still getting these one-sided portraits of the "loser gamer" despite the fact that gaming is fast becoming the most popular form of entertainment in the world. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=366583&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Science Fiction Kills Fantasy in Video Games]]> Some of the most popular online video games and virtual worlds have fantasy themes — think World of Warcraft or old-school MMO Everquest. But if games are ever to make it out of the dork ghetto, they're going to have to shed their elves and orcs and start giving us more spaceships and high tech. So says Michael Zenke, who blogs about games at MMOG Nation. He says science fiction games (like Tabula Rasa, pictured here) will always beat fantasy in terms of storytelling potential. Zenke bolsters his argument with two interesting points: that science fiction is usually based in reality, and therefore is more appealing to a mass audience; and that science fiction has a much more hopeful outlook than fantasy. Realism and hope just make for better gameplay. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=356342&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Virtual Worlds Are So 1994]]> Sometimes an idea is ahead of its time and backward thinking represses it. Other times, an idea is very much stuck in its own time but can't be realized due to crappy technology. Such is the case with virtual worlds, an idea that captured people's imaginations at the dawn of the Web in the early 1990s. At that time, people dreamed that "the future" would be all VR — just like in Lawnmower Man, or Total Recall. But our digital forebears didn't have the computer power to make that happen. Now that we have that power, using it to recreate a dream from the Rave Age puts virtual world companies like Linden Lab and Metaverse in the ashcan of history. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=325691&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Stop Oppressing Men in Virtual Worlds With Unrealistic Body Expectations]]> Is the virtual universe ready for Men's Lib? In World of Warcraft they are. Fans are getting irked about how the male characters in WOW are so muscle-bound and macho-bulky that they are practically unable to move. While female characters are lithe and flexible, the men hobble around in so much armor that it's as if they're wearing high heeled shoes all over their ridiculously proportioned bodies. Is this a feminist plot? More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=323853&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[New Book Explains How to Peddle Your Ass in Second Life]]> The best thing about Daniel Terdiman's new book, The Entrepreneur's Guide to Second Life, is that it teaches you how to be a hooker. Sure there's informative stuff about how to set up a business and advertise in the metaverse, but what pushes this book into virtual world classic territory is the blithe way Terdiman explains fetishism and fucking in Second Life using the how-to tone you'd expect from an article about home electronics kits in MAKE magazine:
The Second Life sex industry consists of the following categories: fashion, accessories, genitals, clubs, escorts, toys, furniture, and animations. An explanation of each follows.
Even better? The advice from sex entrepreneurs. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=322699&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Second Life Avatars Are Portable As Purse Dogs Now]]> As the Virtual Worlds conference kicked off in Silicon Valley yesterday, IBM announced a partnership with Linden Lab, makers of Second Life, to create portable avatars that you can bring with you to any virtual world. But how? IBM and Linden Lab say they are developing open data formats, or a "universal character creation system," that will let people use their Second Life avatars anywhere. The problem is that most virtual world companies like Blizzard, which owns World of Warcraft, have very strict rules about what your avatar can look like. Same goes for things like the Barbie virtual world. You can't just bring your trippy Burning Man avatar from Second Life into a WOW campaign and slay dragons with your powers of fashion and relating deeply to other people. And I doubt the Barbie world people will welcome your naked sex god avatar. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=309818&view=rss&microfeed=true