Howard Rheingold’s online course about Cooperation started last week, using BigBlueButton and not in some fancy Virtual Reality environment. BigBlueButton is our synchronous communication system (let’s say ‘videoconferencing’), but a lot of work happens asynchronously using a wiki, blogs, social bookmarks, and – very important – forums. These asynchronous systems… Continue reading
I moved to HTTPS, since Google and many others recommend doing this. However, there are also those who have objections against HTTPS, such as Dave Winer. I’m still in doubt about it, but for now I will just go for HTTPS even though I don’t ask for passwords or payments… Continue reading
A new, possibly last edition of the famous Cooperation course by Howard Rheingold, the man who gave us the term “virtual community”, launches today. It’s not too late to participate, but be warned: this is not a Massive Online Open Course, but a Small, Intensive Online Course which is reasonably… Continue reading
I had to explain to journalism students how to use social media (I only had one hour!). Call me old-fashioned, but I still believe the first stage is organizing your thoughts and listening. After that participate actively in conversations but don’t just broadcast your messages. So the sequence could be… Continue reading
Today I have to give a very brief talk about journalism and artificial intelligence here in Brussels, Belgium. I’m not an AI-expert but at the newsroom we read and talk about the AI-disruption all the time. I made a mindmap: Your browser is not able to display frames. Please visit… Continue reading
What does philosophy tell us about virtual reality and virtual worlds? I’d like to start with some people who do not belong to the typical college overview of classical philosphers, people who started thinking about the augmentation of human intellect and human emotions such as Vannevar Bush (As Ae May… Continue reading
At the art gallery of Ontario, this very nice use of augmented reality by digital artist Alex Mayhew: ReBlink.
Finally virtual reality platform Sansar is in open beta. I think Linden Lab, owner of Second Life, did a nice job. Will social VR reach more people now or will it just take away people and attention from Second Life? Or will we have to wait for Facebook Spaces to… Continue reading
It’s the book Neuromancer by William Gibson that really made the word “cyberspace” popular. He describes it as thus: A graphic representation of data abstracted from banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of… Continue reading
I attended a lecture by professor Pattie Maes of MIT Media Lab. She founded and directs the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces research group. Some of her main talking points: – The next phase in computing is about intelligence augmentation, by sensors, Augmented Reality and Artificial Intelligence. – AR will “edit” our… Continue reading