During its first year of operation, Florida Virtual School had 77 students. The next year, it had 476 students; then 2,489 students the year after that.
Virtual reality has already proved useful in treating phobias and PTSD. It can help people overcome a fear of heights, for example, through simulations of standing on a balcony or walking across a bridge.
I grew up about 30 minutes north of Boston in a town that was a virtual melting pot – I was exposed to all different backgrounds, cultures, and religions, fueling my personal interests in global issues.
The virtual world can never be a substitute for real world experience. And the more it takes over our lives, the more we forget to feel the sun on our skin, the more we forget that there is an entire universe to be discovered even during a 10 minute walk to work.
I know how addictive videogames are – I have friends who can’t get up off the couch because they’re so hooked. They provide these different virtual worlds that you can live in.
I’d really love to work with virtual reality at some point. You could make a killer adventure game with that.
I was standing on the shoulders of other science fiction writers like William Gibson, who had written ‘Neuromancer’ on a typewriter before home computers even really existed, and Neal Stephenson who wrote ‘Snow Crash’ in the early ’90s and imagined an online virtual world before the birth of the modern Internet.
I use Mac. Not because it’s more secure than everything else – because it is actually less secure than Windows – but I use it because it is still under the radar. People who write malicious code want the greatest return on their investment, so they target Windows systems. I still work with Windows in virtual machines.
To be clear, I’m not opposed to apps; I just want them to be geared to my lifestyle. I don’t need a virtual NASCAR racing app, but I’d certainly appreciate one that stopped my husband from plowing into the lawnmower every time he pulls into the garage.
The Internet has kind of allowed me to go to a virtual library whenever I want to find out something about something and not use one source but find multiple ways to research certain topics or subjects.
Control orders put people not convicted of any crime under virtual house arrest based on scant evidence. Billed as a security backstop, they proved unreliable.
Just as we teach our children how to ride a bike, we need to teach them how to navigate social media and make the right moves that will help them. The physical world is similar to the virtual world in many cases. It’s about being aware. We can prevent many debacles if we’re educated.
They’re now turning those seeds into intellectual property, so they have a virtual lock on the seeds upon which we all depend for our food and survival.
The world cannot live without the Arctic; it affects every living thing on Earth and acts as a virtual thermostat, reflecting sunlight and cooling the planet.
I expect there will be more virtual schools.
We have artificial intelligence, virtual reality, augmented reality, 3D-printing, robotics and nanotechnology that have changed the face of modern medicine. It is essential for Indian doctors to familiarise themselves with the latest developments to be able to control technology and not the other way around.
I could manage my life so much better if an app could tell me exactly when my parcels will be delivered so I don’t spend the day under virtual house arrest.
I’m convinced that the main reason we’ve become so obsessed with restaurants is due to our basic need to get out of virtual space and into a real one. We’re not going out to eat merely to share food; we’re there to sit at the same table together, slow down, breathe the same air.
If you look at why people are paid to do things, it’s because they’re creating a good or delivering a service that’s valuable to somebody. There’s just as much potential for that in these virtual environments as there is in the real world.
I’m certainly not opposed to digital technology, whose graces I daily enjoy and rely on in so many ways. But I worry about our virtual blinders.
Ease of navigation is important in both physical and virtual space.
