christopherbishop

the work progresses...

2011-10-14T08:55:00.008-04:00

I have now been at the Bellagio Center for 11 days. It has gone very quickly. I continue to be thrilled and intimidated by the fact that each morning presents a theoretical blank canvas that I can fill at my own rate and pace.

The other residents here are amazing - some of the smartest and most interesting people I have ever met. About half are professors from various universities in the US, Australia and Mexico. Their expertise includes public health, international law, world arts & culture, political science and musicology. A poet from Oregon, a political writer from New York City, a novelist from Athens, an artist from Vietnam. The director of Healthabitat an organization providing housing to aboriginal peoples in many places around the world and a member of the board of Transparency International.

It is with regret that you miss a meal - the conversations range widely and are always extremely interesting. We are treated like royalty - breakfast from 8-9, lunch at 1, tea and a sweet at 4, cocktails at 7, dinner at 7:30 then retiring to the Music Room for after dinner drinks and discussion.

I am developing workshop materials for my *metacognition and reinvention* concepts - hoping to make them portable and more broadly accessible. Hard work but very exciting to have the opportunity to focus solely on this work. More updates later...from beside the lake.

Working in the villa

2011-10-10T04:28:00.005-04:00

Our room in the Villa Serbelloni overlooks the small village of Bellagio where a miniature economy rolls along. The waterfront is a busy place. Various ferries criss-cross Lago di Como - from here - to Lenno, Varenna, Mennagio, carrying passengers and cars and freight. The street level spaces call out to the meandering tourists, buy a silk scarf here, taste local wine there. And of course, many restaurants offering everything from wild boar to rabbit to fish caught steps from where you are sitting. All typical of any resort town.

I feel a kinship with the day to day activities that rumble along in the streets below. I am here to do work as well, albeit in a different mode but still - work. My focus is on a somewhat more distant objective while these folks make sure the cars are all safely on board or that the guest has selected the appropriate bottle of Valpolichella.

The challenge: how to influence and inform the children of Bellagio and their children's children to the way they will live and work in a new global paradigm. Describing how what lies ahead will appear as magic to the ferrymen and waitresses and shopkeepers living and working blissfully unaware on these ancient streets here in the early 20th century.

Bellagio: month on the lake - Saturday

2011-10-08T04:09:00.010-04:00

I am enjoying the delicious irony of reading on my Kindle the letters of a former local - Pliny the Younger - written around 100 A.D. It is said that he had a villa near here - one of many. How surprised he would be to see his work live on almost 2,000 years later delivered through the air to a device that would seem like some magical tablet to his eyes. And yet today’s teenagers might deride it for only being gray-scale and not color.

Would that I could create something that would have such an impact or provide value or even passing interest so long after I have passed and left this mortal coil.

Day One in Bellagio - Wed. Oct 5 2011

2011-10-05T22:55:00.005-04:00

First of all I have to say that I can not believe that I am actually at the Bellagio Center. It is an extraordinary place and I am so honored to be here.

To have a chance to contemplate my life and capture the various paths I have taken is a once in a lifetime opportunity - and the fact that the Rockefeller Foundation thinks this is valuable is just fantastic - what an endorsement.

I feel deeply indebted to them and am eager to create actionable materials designed specifically to help today’s learners be successful in the global borderless workplace.

I have already have fascinating conversations with many of the residents. A gentlemen who is the global CIO of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent, mapping approaches for cooperation among NGOs around the use of technology. A woman writer from Greece. A university professor of Public Health from Sun Yat-sen University assessing health issues facing migrant Chinese workers. Another woman author from New York reflecting on her life and family. And a musicologist/bass player from Houston working on the modes in Italian Baroque music.

What a delight to be around all this brain power and creativity. Very Bennington-esque in a way. Diverse population, all smart people, passionate about whatever topic they are pursuing.

I have started to map out guidelines and content for a workshop to support my metacognition and reinvention concepts. What lies ahead for my month on the lake? Creating and exploring and learning with a group of very special people.

ve to say that I can not believe that I am actually at the Bellagio Center. It is an extraordinary place and I am so honored to be here.

To have a chance to contemplate my life and capture the various paths I have taken is a once n a lifetime opportunity - and that fact that the Rockefeller Foundation thinks this is valuable is just fantastic - what an endorsement. I feel deeply indebted to them and am eager to create very actionable deliverables as a result on this month long residency. taht will help today’s learners be successful in the global borderless workplace.

I have already have fascinating conversations with many of the residents. A gentlemen who is the CEO of the International Red Crescent mapping approaches for cooperation among NGOs around the use of technology. A woman writer from Greece. A university professor from Changdou University assessing and evaluating health issues facing migrant Chinese workers. Another woman author from New York reflecting on her life and family. And a musicologist/bass player from Houston working on the modes in Italian Baroque music.

What a treat to me around all this brain power and creativity. Very Bennington-esque in a way. Diverse population, all smart people, passionate about whatever topic they are pursuing.

I lam really excited about creating and exploring and learning from these people over the next month here on the lake.

digital citizens and cell phone democracy

2011-04-06T20:46:00.005-04:00

Mr. President, we are ready for your web cast.

The digital die has been cast and the trending is clear. The sea change rocking the Middle East provides a glimpse into the dramatically different mode for global government that awaits in the decades ahead. There is no turning back. The marriage of social media and mobile tools to modern democracy has been consummated. Now we must encourage and nurture it. The binary genie is completely out of the bottle and it won’t be going back in.

Back in 2008, Obama began coding the template and shifting forward the paradigm for 21st century citizen/government interaction. He and his audacious young team of fearless tech whizzes birthed this new model. Using blogs, Twitter, email, Facebook, Google apps, the Web - they hacked apart the aging archetype of how politicians interact with constituents and left the competition looking dull and dated. I still love getting emails with embedded videos from President Obama.

In June of 2009, Mr. Obama greeted Muslim students at an ancient university in Cairo in Arabic. This speech was delivered to a first-world educated population, 50% of whom are under the age of thirty. It resonated across the Middle East. Young people who embrace the tools and technologies the President used to get elected are now using them to voice their own vision of hope.

Social media is certainly playing a key role in toppling these long-standing regimes, but the tool set is far broader. In the past several weeks, we have seen cell phones used to capture and share video with a level of immediacy never before achievable. Tweets breaking the latest news. Google Earth used to develop location-based strategies. Tap a few keys, create a Facebook page and within hours a crowd has assembled to dissent - an activity which is then exposed to the world. The finger has indeed become mightier than the sword.

We find ourselves witnessing an accelerating paradigm shift: socio-cultural changes being implemented in a whole new way. We can watch and weigh in - support or condemn - activities occurring on the other side of the world. We are all now digital participants.

These newly-minted and emergent governments will have to find ways to incorporate the power of these new technologies into their day-to-day operations once the proverbial dust settles. Just as today’s digital natives are using these new tools and capabilities to interact with each other, they will more and more expect to use them in their interaction with elected officials.

What are the implications for modern government? Innovation. Accelerated interaction. Improved efficiency. Imagine if a bill was posted to the Web, people were given 48 hours to review and then share feedback with their elected officials. These politicians in turn conduct on-line fora using 3D TV or Webcasts for discussion, interaction and collaboration. Then voting was conducted via Web tools or smartphone.

These are historic times. Everyday people empowered by social media and emergent technologies are driving real change in the world. I look forward to participating in the disruptive innovations these approaches will create as they are assimilated into global citizen/government interaction.

perfect storm

2011-02-26T13:52:00.002-05:00

It feels very much like a *perfect storm* is brewing - social media driving social change.

Gen X/Y and millennials are leading the widening use of the social Web and it’s technology toolkit. In the early days, much like views of the Web, and the telephone before that, people were not sure if there was any real, tangible value to this new technology. The initial goal of Facebook (if you believe the screenplay for *The Social Network*) was to help nerdy boys meet cute girls. Early blog postings and tweets were pretty non-sensical and low impact. “Bobby and I ate nachos on the couch last night while we watched TV.”

But people quickly learned that these tools could be used in other ways: to find old acquaintances, make new friends based on shared interests or create communities using this relationship-building digital connective tissue.

LinkedIn evolved to include groups allowing strangers with expertise to initiate a digital dialogue and encourage others to join in. Topics are wide ranging with social or job related issues being discussed. Some very pragmatic groups exist, and others are quite philosophical. Discussions began to emerge about the challenges facing our planet: climate change, ecological issues, need for sustainable energy, lack of clean water, implications of affordable housing,

So the foundation was well established by the time the well-educated and extremely frustrated Egyptian middle-class and young professionals realized that Facebook and Twitter could help them foment revolution, even - in this case - topple a dictator who had lorded over their country for more than four decades.

Finally, citizens being suppressed by tyrannical regimes are able to access free, global technology-based communication tools, allowing them to virtually connect and collaborate to drive the values of an open society.

With the press of a finger, messages and images can now be shared around the world. Instant conversations can be conducted. Expertise can easily be distributed across borders. People with similar passions weighing in, sharing perspectives, exciting and motivating each other. .

A dictatorial regime overthrown in Egypt - supported by Facebook. Students posting cell phone videos of protesters in Iran. Kiva providing Web-based crowdsourced microloans to help budding entrepreneurs in emerging markets. Konbit using text messages to connect local resources with local needs in Haiti.

Hats off to all the energetic, passionate social media aficionados out there and to the next generation coming of age. I am so very excited to see the innovative and creative ways people will use these newly unleashed capabilities to drive the further flattening of the planet.

The perfect storm has arrived: Social media is now firmly accelerating awareness and participation across the evolving, borderless global community.

Kenny White house concert

2011-02-05T23:50:00.002-05:00

Just came from a wonderful party celebrating a dear friend's birthday. Kenny played and sang his wonderful tunes. He and I did many sessions together in NYC in the 80s. One of our most fun gigs was playing with our 14 piece funk band called The Supreme Court fronted by Marc Cohn at Caroline Kennedy's wedding. It was great to see him again this evening.

Kenny's tunes are complex - both lyrically and musically. He is a virtuoso piano player and arranger as well. There are hints of Elvis Costello, John Hiatt, James Taylor, even Randy Newman. But it is his own very personal sound and world view. Kenny played several melancholy tunes - one about his aging mom - and others about lost love. If you get a chance go hear him play and sing, or at least check out his CDs. I think you'll find his music haunting and beautiful.
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Working from home after the snow

2011-01-12T21:59:00.001-05:00

About 2 feet of fresh white powder fell during the night here in Wilton. Beautiful view out my home office window! It is even a bit too deep for the dogs to frolic in - up to the coonhound's shoulders! Very scenic but I just dug out our car and it was buried. This part of the world is very pretty in the winter - snow on the trees and stone walls.

Sent from my iPod

Will Lee at the Bitter End

2010-12-22T23:38:00.001-05:00

What an amazing band! Oz Noy on guitar, Steve Ferrone on drums, Jerry Z on B-3 and the Einstein of the Electric Bass - Will Lee.

They were playing a set on Bleecker Street at the legendary Bitter End. The music was rhythmically and harmonically complex-not simple to play. But they made it seem easy.

My favorite tunes are the ones with the terrifyingly deep funk grooves that Will lays down. And true to form, he did several things I have never seen him do. An endless fount of innovative ideas.

What a treat to be able to stand 10 feet away and listen to these virtuosi. Lucky me!
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MIT Media Lab at 25!

2010-10-19T10:35:00.004-04:00

Hugh Herr, the biomechatronics professor, pulled up his pant legs to reveal artificial legs and then did a stomping dance next to the podium. Ramesh Raskar, director of the *Camera Culture* lab, describes cameras that look around corners using a femptosecond laser – one trillion (with a T!) frames per second. He also created micro barcodes that enable an eyesight assessor to connect to a cell phone, providing on-site eye exams in underdeveloped countries. Ed Boydan is investigating synthetic neurobiology – the ability to create brain co-processors, working at the intersection of neuro-science and engineering.

These are just a few of the things that I saw at the celebration of the MIT Media Lab’s 25th anniversary last week in Cambridge, Mass. Among the speakers were Eric Schmidt, Chairman and CEO of Google, who said that being involved in a company that shares information with the world is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Peabody Award winning journalist John Hockenbery posed intriguing questions to him as well as to a panel of prominent faculty.

They discussed concepts like the fact that in 2020 materials will be the new software. Glass in buildings will have pores that open and close to manage light. DNA will enter the product space, and we will see more and more bio-engineered materials.

Nicholas Negroponte, co-founder and spiritual leader of the Media Lab, who went on to establish *One Laptop Per Child*, posed the question: “Is digital the new plastics?”. The implication being that it has become so prevalent, so pervasive, so ingrained in our culture that perhaps digital is becoming trivialized.

MIT Media Lab philosophy is: Don’t accept the world as it is but strive to make it a better place. It is always stimulating and exciting to be in the company of such creative and innovative thinkers. My kind of brain candy. Yum.

Cinema Virtua

2010-04-29T15:44:00.009-04:00

A 40 foot tall T-rex appears stage right and comes plodding, thumping toward the podium. Cowering, the speaker pulls a long, thin spear from his coat pocket and drives it deep into reptile’s neck. The dinosaur hesitates, then sways to and fro and finally collapses with a thud onto the stage. Thick dark blood gushes from his wound. The opaque red liquid flows slowly out over the edge of the stage and onto the feet of the audience. And then…in a heartbeat…the giant reptile and his blood are gone.

The latest James Cameron flick? No – it is *cinema virtua* - the art of creating theatrical or cinematic experiences in virtual worlds for entertainment, education, training, collaboration.

I presented this concept at the Society for Applied Learning Technology conference in Orlando in March 2010. In the spirit of full disclosure, the inspiration for this approach came from two gentlemen, Peter Mills and Claus Nehmzow, who run a company called HealthyWorlds. And Greg Cook, a/k/a RacerX Gullwing, is the virtuoso scripter who makes this all possible.

Scripted objects, particles, holodecks and animated textures have the ability to create impactful educational experiences that are truly unprecedented.

In the HealthyWorlds demo, the T-Rex is only the first of many examples. A few minutes later, in another part of their demo, giant fruits and vegetables suddenly start falling at random out of the ceiling, bouncing all over the stage and off the heads of the audience members.

Mark Jankowski, the principal at Virtual Training Partners, shared his virtual negotiation training environment – an amazing series of spaces that leverage rich textures.

He starts in a skybox at the Camden Yards baseball park with his avatar dressed in an Orioles uniform. From there, we fell through the floor into a winter holiday scene where his avatar puts on Santa Claus outfit. The setting is replete with 50 foot tall snowman and giant gifts. From there, we stroll into a concert hall next door where Mark dons tails and waves a conductors baton, talking about the kinds of discussions that occur in this space. Then on to the Himalayas, where he becomes a mountain hiker, wearing a backpack and climbing gear. Amazing.

This is new. These are new ways to present content, make points, share data, create experiential learning. There is no other forum where this is possible.

The idea that you can replicate a Broadway show inside a movie using surreal characters and animated objects to tell a story is unique…to say the least. All the while having a rapt audience of people from all over the planet sitting together and feeling like they are all in the same physical space, creating shared visual memories that really last.

I really enjoyed showing this innovative approach to educators and encouraging them to transform their content, rethink how they create curriculum. Time to move away from 3D Post-It notes and PowerPoint decks to writing short subjects, one act plays and soliloquies. Looking forward to helping evolve this new approach!

My Secret Sauce to Cook Up Multiple Careers

2009-08-06T22:28:00.023-04:00

Last Tuesday I participated in a very innovative networking event in Second Life hosted by the principles of ThinkBalm, Erica and Sam Driver. (I have since created a machinima that you can view here.)

I have been working on a presentation that ties metacognition and reinvention and the new workplace models to my six careers. I feel like poster child for how today's learners will function in the workplace in the 21st century. The critical importance of learning how to learn, and thinking about thinking. And the fact that 85% of the jobs that today's learners will be doing have not been invented yet.

After seeing an amazing demo by the team from HealthyWorlds last spring, complete with a huge T-Rex on stage and oversize fruit falling from the ceiling, I was struck by the tremendous and as yet largely untapped potential of immersive environments to be much more cinematic, much more involving.

Rather than just put up PowerPoint slides and speak to them, or even stream video into these spaces, why not do something totally new...something you simply can not do in any other type of forum.

So I teamed up with three tremendously talented artists - RacerXGullwing (scripter extraordinaire), and two amazing designers - Xandi Mars and Random Cole.

Together, we worked up a storyboard based on my earlier Bennington presentation, distilled it to five minutes, and created several moving visual elements to make it *come alive* for want of a less clichéd qualifier. And it was quite impactful.

The six careers I have had since I graduated from college 35 years ago were laid out on a giant GANTT chart. I briefly described each one and images from that phase of my life popped up. I also talked about the compelling event that inspired me to move from one to the next.

I then introduced my *secret sauce* - the three key focus areas that helped me to move through these careers. They are: antenna, brand and network. Simply put, I trusted my instincts and followed my bliss, was always very aware of my own personal brand - what makes me unique - and focused on the ongoing and constant nurturing of an ever-evolving web of contacts.

Words representing the various factors that influenced my shifts - lifestyle, technology, social, political - floated into an antenna that appeared above my head.

Then the four elements that make up my brand appeared - Musician, Philosopher, Techie and Communicator - each with a unique font and color and style - two above and two next to me. After a few moments, allowing me time to speak to each, they merged into my name - *Christopher!*

Finally, a 3D image of the many social networking tools that I use appeared behind me, followed by a matrix of faces representing my broader network. Both images drifted away from the stage one after the other, out into the audience and then dissolved.

I ended with images from my Moo card which has my avatar portrait and my contact information.

It was great fun! I look forward to doing it again. The plan is to shoot a high quality machinima of this piece and then post it. I also want to flesh out the whole scenario into a longer, much more detailed and really immersive experience. I'll keep you posted.

Smart Sustainable Cities at MIT Media Lab

2009-05-18T18:56:00.018-04:00

According to their overview: “At the MIT Media Lab, the future is lived not imagined.” And what a future it is.

I had the privilege in late April of attending an all day seminar at the MIT Media Lab focused on smart sustainable cities. Twice a year, the Lab produces a Sponsor Day where companies and organizations that help to underwrite their activities are invited to a focused session presented by professors and students. Since IBM is a sponsor, I got to attend, along with colleagues from IBM Research, the Global Innovation Outlook team and CHQ strategy.

Multiple teams shared their perspectives on various attributes of the city of the future, with most aspects of urban life extrapolated out many years.

The main speaker was Bill Mitchell who leads a research group focused on *smart cities*. He and his colleagues talked about topics ranging from urban nervous systems, smart distributed energy systems, health networks, learning networks and personal mobility. Let me share some of the topics and my impressions.

Living Networks: Jarmo Suominen asked that we think of buildings not as skeleton and skin as they were in the 18th century, but rather as intelligent nodes that connect and behave like an intelligent system. Keep in mind that over the next 15 years there will be 350 million Chinese moving from the country to the cities. That is more than the current population of the US. Homes are again centers of work, entertainment and healthcare. Work is becoming distributed and mobile. The economy is weightless. Envisioning a future where architecture participates in the media experience. Architecture as a scrim – people are able to project cell phone images onto the LG HQ building in Seoul.

Smart Distributed Energy Systems: I loved the description of renewable energy sources like solar and wind as – at the end of the day – really just weather! So you need to manage them accordingly and design for variables including daily, seasonal and inter-annual changes. Much of the challenge around energy use is in how we think of it. Our culture has a bit of a feeling of entitlement – like we can use however much energy we want whenever we want. But that conservation is one of the key next steps toward smarter energy. Distributed systems for energy built around what is available. Using ZigBee to connect the nodes. Buildings that both produce and consume energy, much like the Internet. A two way interaction not one way – bi-directional.

Urban Nervous Systems: Turning the security paradigm on its side by shifting from privacy to accountability. Citing Kim Cameron’s The Laws of Identity.

Health Care: John Halamka talked about digitized health care estimating it would take $34B to do this. He had his entire genome sequenced in order to identify where there were weaknesses. He has a proclivity for glaucoma so he can now do wellness care to try to prevent the onset of some of these conditions. Or be aware of genetic tendency in his daughter.

Learning Networks – Mitchel Resnick stated that who is allowed to be in the learning network determines what is learned. Quest to Learn is a NYC school for digital kids, bridging the traditional and 21st century literacies. Described as *hard fun*. Again – the importance of human behavior. His perspective is that policy factors are one of the key delineators or roadblocks to incorporation broader vies of learning using technology. (I think this applies to business settings as well.)

Personal Networks – discussion ranged from electric bicycles (Green Wheel) to electric scooters, tiny citycars and personal biomechatronics – load bearing exoskeletons for augmentation of human running and carrying. Even a *personal aircraft* was discussed - Terrafugia - designed by MIT-trained aeronautical engineers! The bicycle is described as the culmination/evolution of a 100 year old technology which works best in flat areas, but does not do well with complex topology. Mobility on demand requires intermodal interchange. For example, if you are going shopping for groceries, you could in theory take an electric scooter to get there, but to return home with your bags you would need a different mode, perhaps a city car. One of my favorite demos was an animation of the citycar showing a prototype of a tiny micro-auto that has no engine but electric motors in the wheels. It can turn 360 degrees and fold up on itself in order to take up less space at the curb when parked.

All in all a very fascinating day. I will describe some of the other demos we saw in another posting.

Metacognition and Reinvention

2009-03-04T16:22:00.003-05:00

In my meeting with Bennington College president Liz Coleman on February 19th, the underlying and understated but agreed to premise was that colleges have to do a better job of creating global citizens. End of statement. To do otherwise would simply be irresponsible.

I had presented the Keynote Address that morning to the graduating class to kick-off their Senior Week conference. (I graduated in 1972 with the first class of men to matriculate.) My theme was Metacognition and Reinvention: the 21^st Century Career Paradigm. Basically making the case that the future workplace is changing so fast that 85% of the jobs these kids will do have not been invented yet (e.g. space vacation consultant) using technologies that don’t exist yet to solve problems we don’t yet know are problems.

The key to success in this new model is to be ready to shift gears – on a moments notice. To move quickly towards the maelstrom du jour. You can’t sit still anymore. Your antennae have to always be up, your spide-y sense tingling. These skills are being taught in a few places, but this approach is in fact in the veritable DNA of Bennington. Learning how to learn. Having designed their own education, based on what they wanted to know and the resources that were readily available to expedite the process, these seniors are uniquely positioned to design their work life.

We plan to have follow on sessions to talk about the two approaches/needs: near term actionable modules/projects/focus zones. And then more strategic, longer trajectory activities, including expanding the college’s ecosystem to include unlikely partners. It is the magical ones with seemingly disparate approaches – including IBM - where a core strategic sentiment or set of objectives or perspectives enable stronger, more impactful and mysterious outcomes than what might be achieved with more traditional alliances.

To be continued…

looking for clues...

2009-02-09T17:52:00.001-05:00

So I went to lunch today with two colleagues and pouring out of the speakers in the corporate cafeteria was a tune that I know well. Robert Palmer singing *Looking for Clues*. Now I toured and recorded with Robert, playing bass and keyboards, and we did a live album in London in 1980 which included other tunes from this record. "Clues" was the album we supported.

I had a strong visceral reaction to hearing this groove. I looked around at my current surroundings and part of me felt like hey where did that creative, talented hip person go? So look at me now. I am a working stiff who has disappeared into a huge technology company. Man, that groove was in the air a long time ago - I must have played that over a hundred times. It was perky and infectious. I reminisced about that vibe and remembered the innocence of that era. Really in the moment. Just dancing with the muse. Making the grooves deep and living from day to day knowing it would all work out some way or another.

Now here we are years later – wow. Has it really been that long? I had a great time doing those gigs but time has gone quickly and I now find myself in a new role, being a dad and a husband and a homeowner and a taxpayer, upstanding citizen, still exploring and investigating and wondering what’s next. Things like virtual worlds and Web 2.0 and the global workforce. Speaking at my alma mater next week about metacognition and the 21st century career paradigm. Which is the good part I guess. Robert’s been gone now for over four years -heart attack in a Paris hotel room took him to the other side of the grass... but me, I’m still here, looking out at the horizon and smiling, still looking for clues.

New Technology Breakthrough Excites the World...Again

2009-01-29T19:02:00.004-05:00

There’s this new technology that folks are talking about. It started on the coast but it’s getting traction all over the world. A few people think it is cool and that it can potentially have a huge impact on how business gets done on the planet.

But there are the naysayers too, of course, describing this new technology as just some children’s game gone awry. They disparage the early adopters, saying they are really just kidding themselves if they think it will ever change anything on a large scale.

Yes, it evolved from earlier technologies but it is a totally new take, really. People are using it in lots of different ways – by one count there are over 100 different approaches. But there are no standards of course. One group is designing it one way based on how they think it should be used, and another makes it look and work in a different way.

And at the end of the day no one really knows if this new tech is going to drive any significant changes – whether it will be adopted by society or by business.

But over time I’d wager – perhaps many years in fact - more and more people will get it and maybe, just maybe, this new technology will actually improve people’s ability to connect and interact and work together and do business with each other.

Many different related businesses will emerge to enhance this technology’s reach and impact. In the end, everyone will probably agree that it really had been a great idea all along and how could they have been so foolish to not have embraced it sooner.

Does this sound familiar? Virtual worlds? The language is 21^st century – but not the technology. I am talking about the steam locomotive, introduced in 1829.

My point is: we have seen this movie. These scenarios could easily be applied to virtual worlds obviously, or to the Internet, the telephone, electricity, the automobile, textile manufacturing in the 18^th century, et al. The models and cycles have already been established.

We just have to be patient, continue to evangelize and push. Eventually, we’ll see 3D internet and immersive digital environments adopted and adapted to address current and as yet unimagined needs, improving the lives of people all over the planet.

The ability to interact and collaborate, to really feel as if you are in a place together with other people while sitting anywhere is too compelling and seductive a notion. I look forward to seeing these concepts fully embraced and expanded upon, driven by the creativity of the 21^st century global community.

making the case for 3D vs. Flat

2008-10-31T15:43:00.002-04:00

Once you have spent any time wandering around in virtual worlds, the Web looks surprisingly flat and 2 dimensional. It feels like back lit magazine pages with postcard sized videos squeaking out low-fi, mono audio. And lonely - very solitary.

Why bother, when you have the option for a collaborative experience that simulates the real world interaction of humans. The traditional Internet experience is asynchronous - no matter what the Web 2.0 evangelists say. You say something and wait, then I say something and wait, then someone else says something and so on. How much real collaborative energy exists in those interactions? None, zero, zip. Today's social networking sites remind me of a guest book at 19th century B&B - * blueberry pancakes were delicious, the view from the veranda was lovely...see you next time...* Snoresville.
Make my digital interaction 3D - I need to be able to go somewhere and talk with someone and sit and have a chat or use digital artifacts to stimulate and drive our discussion.

2008-10-16T13:54:00.000-04:00

Scan It!
Amazing how the interaction of carbon based life forms has changed in the past few years. Used to be once upon a time that you needed to have face to face interaction in order to purchase things. Someone had to ring up your items, and take your money and give you your change and put your purchase in a bag(s). But that era has ended as I discovered last weekend.

I went to my local super grocery store late on a Saturday afternoon and initiated my spree by scanning the key tag with my store assigned ID number. It then assigned me what could only be described as a *wand*. This is what I used to scan each item before I put it in my cart. It would also make the occasional *ringing cash register* sound if I passed by an item on a shelf that was on sale or had a 2 for 1 type of promo running. The sound was somewhat disconcerting at first, but I got used to it. So, I ticked items off my list, grabbing whatever senior management had requested (read: the wife) and then checked out. By once again placing the *wand* in front of a scanning device in an automated check out aisle, it downloaded the data about the items and their costs and then asked me to pay. I used my debit card, took the receipt after the computerized female voice said *don't forget to take your receipt". I then bagged the groceries myself and strolled out of the store.

And then it hit me. Not once during the course of that entire experience had I interacted with another human. It was weird. As if I had not really been in the store. No one had said hello. Or even asked if I wanted paper or plastic.
Time marches on I guess. Maybe next time I'll opt for the real person at the cash register so we two breathing creatures can have some semblance of interaction.

dreaming of life off the grid

2008-04-21T10:10:00.001-04:00

It was triggered by a casual remark. Part of script that the pilot gives four times a day. Just tossed off as one phrase about half way through an hour long monologue delivered through a headset mike to a helicopter full of pasty tourists from the mainland. But it triggered something organic, visceral within me. I was surprised at the effect. But it was there. Undeniable. And I am still grappling with it.

OK – so in the spirit of full disclosure, I’ll be 58 this summer – yikes…scary. At 22 I had hair down to the middle of my back, straight, parted in the middle. And small round glasses like my idol John Lennon. And I did actually go to Woodstock. It was wonderful. Everything you can imagine…times 10. But I digress.

After we had flown over Mt. Wai’ale’ale, and then down along the Na Pali coast, he tilted the chopper and started flying west up the Kalalau Valley. Rather unemphatically he stated “…and there are about 40 hippies living off the grid down there in paradise. They’ve been out there since about the 70’s.”

And something in me clicked. Wow, man - that sounds cool. I could make that work. The scenery was breathtaking - painfully exquisite – lush verdant angular cliffs rising 3,000 feet from the turquoise sea, straight up. Being a child of the 60’s came back to me; a flower power teenager and then a full fledged hippie in college, foot loose and fancy free, being only in the moment. Practicing yoga and reading Ram Dass and being a vegetarian. Wearing basically the same clothes for weeks on end. Devouring music. Savoring every nanosecond - not wasting any synaptic cycles worrying about the future. Calendar-ectomy.

I had a visceral reaction to this guy’s comment. It brought back a flood of memories. And made me long for that sensation, the spontaneity, the joy.

After he set us gently back down on terra firma, I couldn’t get the image out of my mind’s eye - those people living out there, in that beautiful valley, a short walk down to an unspoiled primordial beach. No phones, no computers, no dealines, no video games, no TV. They had no idea who Brittany Spears was. Herding wild goats and growing their own taro.

I asked almost every local I met after that about Kalalau – had they been out there? What had they seen? You can only get there by walking or by boat. It is a grueling two day hike – about 11 miles – on a narrow and rocky path along the coastline. In the summer, the sea on the north side of the island is said to be like glass and you can kayak to the beach. Many people I spoke to had made the trip. And they shared some great stories with me.

One young woman had been out there four times and said it was amazing. There is a lending library which consists of a circle of hammocks under the trees with books on tables all around the perimeter. You take one and lie down under the shade of the koa trees. Another person described the locals as being very low key and friendly and welcoming to visitors. The dress code is quite relaxed – one visitor described having a woman step out of the underbrush wearing nothing but a beaded necklace and hiking boots. There is a defacto *mayor* who keeps an eye on things and comes into town periodically to connect with the real world. People are having babies and raising families out there, too. They do everything that we do living here on the grid – except get stressed and compete and pose.

The rangers go there every Tuesday by either chopper or semi-inflatable boat to check on permits and clean out garbage – it is a state campground officially. And they try to chase the hippies out, but only half heartedly it seems.

Kalalua Valley is rumored to be where the ancient Hawaiians lived – because it is so beautiful and so remote. The next valley along the coast is where they buried their kings and queens, in caves in the cliff faces – out of reach of predators and marauders.

Maybe someday I’ll go back and make the hike in to see what these folks are up to. To see how they live, away from the race de’ rat - with the winning and losing rodents. Where that first stretch in the morning greets the sun, as it floats up over the Pacific. Pull a sourapple from a tree, peel and eat it for breakfast. Then wander down to the beach, wade into the warm blue waves for a soothing swim. Go get a book from the library. Return the one from last night. And be in the moment.

Oh…sounds sweet. If at some point you wonder where I have gone, think of Kalalau.

Friday nite on Millstone Road

2008-04-18T21:52:00.001-04:00

man...glad it is almost the weekend...about to roll over into the Satur-day. busy month again this week...but what's new

brain continues to churn, doesn't realize yet that the work week is over now - trying to slow it down as it meanders in and out of various disparate topics including: Japanese hotels on the moon, prosthetic brains, museums whose contents you program before entering.

Virtual world interaction occuring today across the globe is simply the precursor to wider interaction with carbon-based and other life forms across the galaxy. We are in the nascient stages...at the wee small early hours of the trend - tough to get an accurate picture sitting here in the dawning years of century the 21st. After all, it wasn't that long ago that this was all Pangea...in geologic terms at least.

Looking forward to what's next...excuse me, gotta go book my seat on Virgin Galactic.