Product Description
This book by artificial reality pioneer Myron Krueger presents a view of our future interaction with machines, when computer systems will sense our needs and respond to them. In its unique melding of aesthetics and technology, Artificial Reality II shows how simulated worlds allow people to interact with computers in profoundly new ways for problem-solving and recreation. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great
This book shows Myron's advanced view on interactive art. Just essential for anyone interested in digital culture. Myron is a true great! ... Read more

Product Description
This volume addresses virtual reality (VR) -- a tantalizing communication medium whose essence challenges our most deeply held notions of what communication is or can be. The editors have gathered an expert team of engineers, social scientists, and cultural theorists for the first extensive treatment of human communication in this exciting medium.

The first part introduces the reader to VR's state-of-the-art as well as future trends. In the next section, leading research scientists discuss how knowledge of communication can be used to build more effective and exciting communication applications of virtual reality. Looking ahead, the authors explore pioneering approaches to VR narratives, interpersonal communication, the use of 3D sound, and the building of VR entertainment complexes. In the final section, the authors zoom out to view the big picture -- the psychological, social, and cultural implications of virtual reality. Thought-provoking discussions consider important communication issues such as:
* How will virtual reality influence perception of reality?
* What are the legal issues defining communication in virtual reality?
* What kind of cultural trends will this technology encourage?
... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

An all-around book about VR!
If you want explore the world of VR, this book is a good starting point! ... Read more

Product Description
This book is a two-part guide to the science, technology, mathematics, and practicalimplementation of virtual reality. Part 1 contains an explanation of what virtualreality (VR) is (and what it is not!) and what lies inside the hardware componentsof a VR system. It also details the theory of many technically challenging aspects ofVR in a very coherent manner. These include stereoscopy, computer vision, imagebasedrendering, and inverse kinematics, all of which are central to creating animmersive and interactive VR system. Part 2 of the book concentrates on the actualimplementation of a practical VR system. The accompanying CD is a complementto Part 2, providing over 30 projects and associated software that can be used toimplement many aspects of a VR system. ... Read more

Product Description

Mir. The Russian word for "peace," for "one world." Mir 3.0 is the code name for a piece of neural software that can change the world. And it's escaped carrying a virus that is hell-bent on doing just that.

The year is 2036 and the world is in the grip of a new cold war. The Berlin Wall is back up and concentration camps have been recreated. It is an eerily familiar conflict with a chilling new twist -- this is a battle for control of cyberspace and the Wall and the camps are both of the virtual variety. It's a time when epidermal programming is the cutting-edge fetish among the fringe dwellers of the hacker underworld. These epidermal programs are sentient tattoos that can travel on-line and perform tasks for their owners on the Net. They can even move from body to body in forbidden techno-pagan rituals.

Now the Mir virus is on the loose, traveling as a passenger on the tattoos. Like the tattoos, Mir can migrate from consciousness to consciousness, from body to body, from individuals to entire nations, both off-line and on-line. No one, nothing, is safe in its deadly path.

Trevor Gobi, son of the legendary virtual reality investigator Frank Gobi, is on the trail of Mir. His girlfriend Nelly has become infected through a tattoo, a tattoo that assumes a phantasmic form of its own as it incubates on her body. as it threatens her very existence -- and the entire World Wide Net.

Mir is the second novel in the Rim Trilogy. The first, Rim, was nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award and described as "a book destined to become a classic" by Paul Saffo, director of the Institute of the Future. National Public Radio's Moira Gunn called it "incredibly compelling with its mix of technology and metaphysics, human consciousness, and virtual reality."

In Mir, Besher presents a startlingly complete and daunting vision of a future where the on-line, virtual life has become fully as real and crucial to everyone's survival as mundane reality. It is a wildly imaginative, frighteningly believable thriller that is guaranteed to join Neuromancer and Snow Crash as defining paradigms of the cyberfuture.Amazon.com Review
Ultimately a love story--or what Alexander Besher calls more accurately a lovetriangle between a boy, a girl, and her tattoo--Mir manages to beboth serious and silly cyberpunk. This tense, believable thriller stillmanages to make "robotics"/"raw buttocks" jokes. Trevor Gobi, the son ofRim's protagonistFrank Gobi, is tracking down Mir, a devastating virus that has infectedhis girlfriend Nelly (through her sentient tattoo Sinbad) and thatthreatens to crash both the virtual and "real" world. Not quite the tightread Rim was, Mir still succeeds thanks to the sheer volumeof Besher's imagination. --Paul Hughes ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Not Free SF Reader
A cyberpunk book of the slightly later variety.Live tattoos, jokes, and others.How do you feel if your girlfriend only loves you for you tatts?

A bit of espionage, industrial and otherwise, computer virus smuggling, dodgy underworld, dodgy characters, and more abound.

Think sort of a Charlie Stross or Ken Macleod flavour for the general tone.Probably a 3.25 this one.

a sloppy juxtaposition of good ideas
The author is excellently descriptive, I enjoyed many of the author's imaginative ideas (sentient tattoos, Hail A Lama taxis, etc.), and enjoyed his obvious love for the Bay Area (obvious echos of Philip K Dick's love for the same). However his ideas were possibly too fruitful often colliding with each other rather then meshing, leaving the story line in tatters.

The concept of the "Hail A Lama" taxi cabs were a stroke a brilliance that could be the basis for an entire novel. However in MIR it is only given a quickly discarded backstory and then used as impersonal plot continuation device. The character's backstories were often just as rashly introduced in brief flashbacks only to be basically ignored. Thus leaving the characters feeling as if they were only hollow pivot points for a runaway plot. By the end of the book I was reading fairly quickly and mainly only to get it over with -- not that the ending was really worth it anyway.

I think the book was great but...
I loved the book, but I think that Besher needs to work on the ending.Itjust sorta ends, there isn't much to it.All in all the book was excelent,and I would recomend it to anyone.

Buddhist-cyberpunk and virtual reality in the 21st century
Epidermal programming is a cutting edge fetish. Sentient tatoos and theMir 3.0 virus are loose in a world that exists both in consciousness andphysical form -- and techno-pagan rituals can assist in moving both frombody to body.

Original, intelligent, expansive and truly entertaining.The author is creating an epic story arc that is sure to become a classic.Highly recommended for those who can use a bit of altered reality!

Not as good as RIM
While I did not dislike the book. Beshers second novel seems to have lost some of the edge apparent in the first.

All the elements are there, a cyberpunk/buddist setting, a deadly virus that could destroy the world and a few attempting to fight against it. However after a good start the plot seems to meander and the frequent jumps from character to character and in and out of various sub plots that Besher makes can lead to confusion on the part of the reader. I am going to go back to it a second time and feel that it may then grow on me but at the moment I can only say that it is readable but nothing special. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Adorable!
This series is really just cute and full of entertainment. I still get re-read value out of this series, and I've owned it for over four years. It's also a great spike of sci-fi fantasy- the system the characters use is really ingenious and creates great adventures. Not to mention the plot is just awesome.
Otherwise the art is cool- kind of a early nineties style rarely seen but retains its uniqueness, and there's bonus material between the pages and in the back. It's well thought out and I really just love it.

manga wannabe
Hmpf. After waiting so long for my books to be forwarded to me after using the wrong address, I have to say, it wasn't worth the wait.

Released by Tokyopop and classified as manga, it's actually not the least bit Japanese; written by an Anglo-speaking non-Japanese husband and wife team it seems, who themselves are anime/manga otakus. Which is ok. I'm one myself. But there's something lacking in all (that I've seen that is, admittedly the only other one being the cartoon "Martin Mystery") the American/Canadian attempts at making something like manga/anime compared to Japanese manga/anime that's actually been written in Japan by Japanese people and then translated to English by a scanlation group or company like Tokyopop. It's kind of just.. wrong. Like I don't know, an aluminum violin that's been painted to look like it's made out of wood. And that's not saying that every wooden violin is good or even that an aluminum one is necessarily bad - but if you try to make an aluminum one look wood it will just come out looking really tacky. Maybe a master could truly make any observer think it's really made of wood and maybe even work the metal in such a way that it even sounds like it's made of wood, but to complete the simile, the authors of this aren't such masters. The drawing style alone, if I hadn't just read it and you put this with 9 actual Japanese mangas, I'd have no trouble picking out the one counterfeit of the ten. Even if some of the Japanese ones were really, really bad. I swear Catreece the catgirl looks like Minerva Mink from Animaniacs. And then the schoolkids' personalities... I feel like I'm watching a cartoon on Saturday morning on PBS. Yes, PBS!

It's not a bad premise - as far as I know, I've never heard of it before and so it is completely original, and heavens knows, the Japanese use every excuse they can to throw catgirls into their stories. It's like there's some kind of union among anime character, they all go on strike if the series doesn't contain a catgirl. But still, I'm disappointed. Leave the anime and manga to the Japanese. They're the only ones qualified to make it, I say.

I give it 3 stars because it's not really bad. Not the super-awesome thing I was expecting, but they did really hit the nail on the head with the cat's personality at least. And the "these are a few of my favorite fonts" scene was kind of funny. So if I gave it 1, that would take away meaning from the REAL stinkers which deserve negative 37-billion but I'm forced to give 1's to because that's the lowest possible rating. But there are - how should I put it - a lot of better things you could spend your 10 bucks on instead of this.

Internet Hijinks At It's Best!
Reality Check comes from Rikki and Tavisha Simons, the creative team behind their latest series Shutterbox. While Shutterbox is a Goth Romance series, Reality Check is a much more light and cheerful comic. In volume 1, we are introduced to 10th grader Collen Meeks, a geek who longs to access the Virtual Internet System (VIS) in the year 2012. After receiving his True Virtual Reality Helmet (TVR), Collen finally manages to access the VIS...until his cat Catreece also logs on as well. In Real Time, Catreece is a small, cute, annoying cat...on the VIS, she's like the annoying sibling you wish you didn't have! Thus, all sorts of crazy adventures (and misadventures) occur for our computer nerd and his bubbly, ditzy cat.

One thing that stands out when you dive into Reality Check is the wonderful art. Orginally, RC was published in color (the color edition has long been out of print, but you can still find new/used copies at certain stores). TokyoPop has decided to publish RC in their standered B&W format, but it still doesn't take away the amazing detail that Tavisha has done! All the characters (major and minor), backgrounds, ect. are full of life and personality. You can help turning the page to see what they are up to next!

I also like the story that the Simons have written. It creates a fun enviroment that possible might happen in the next several years. The story line never lets you down! It makes you keep on reading to find out how Collen and Catreece will get out of thier scraps on the VIS. Also, all the characters don't have 2D personality, so they are easily likeable and charming!

Plus, as an added bonus, this volume includes are nice gallery of the Simons concept art for the RC series, a treat for fans and newbies alike!

So if you enjoied Shutterbox, give Reality Check a try...it's just a fascinating and great as SB. For anyone wanting to see what American-based manga is all about, the Simons are the perfect team to go to!

OUTSTANDING!!!
This is a great read.It takes your standard, boring, overthinking guy, and makes him deal with a high-tech world that everyone, even cats, can deal with better.It is hilarious seeing him deal with situations that he and his cat, Catreece, stumble into. ... Read more

Product Description

Implement a Hyper-V virtualization solution

Microsoft Virtualization with Hyper-V shows you how to deploy Microsoft's next-generation hypervisor-based server virtualization technology in a corporate environment. You'll get step-by-step guidelines for getting Hyper-V up and running, followed by best practices for building a larger, fault-tolerant solution using System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008. This hands-on guide explains how to migrate physical systems to the virtual environment; use System Center Operations Manager; and secure, back up, and restore your Hyper-V solution.

• Plan and implement a Hyper-V installation
• Configure Hyper-V components
• Install and configure System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008
• Create and manage virtual machines
• Back up and restore virtual machines
• Monitor, back up, and restore the virtual solution
• Secure your Hyper-V environment
• Understand the virtual desktop infrastructure
• Use third-party virtualization tools for Hyper-V

Product Description
Every week, millions of people including many of your employees spend hours playing multi-player online games with a level of engagement they don t bring to work. These aren t just adolescent video games we re talking rich narrative quests with 3-D environments, cool avatars, and compelling goals and rewards. Imagine the value if you could transfer key ingredients of game design and the gamer excitement and focus that come with it to the office. What if your employees could solve customer problems, design new software, or configure better shipping routes working inside a game environment at work?


This isn t just possible, say Byron Reeves and J. Leighton Read; it s inevitable. As global competition intensifies and employee productivity and engagement become more critical, the user experience provided by game technology offers a tantalizing solution for business. This is far more than a quaint metaphor for business and it s way beyond training tools. Implemented in the workplace, elements of games can solve a host of business problems with morale, communication, and alignment all while honing skills like data analysis, teamwork, recruitment, leadership, and more.


Based on extensive hands-on research, case studies, and the authors entrepreneurial ventures, Total Engagement convincingly outlines how games will transform work, from repetitive call-center jobs to high-level teams who must collaborate with members dispersed around the globe. The authors show why you must begin building a game strategy now and offer practical guidelines for how to:

--Select the game design features that can address your company s pain points
--Use avatars to increase engagement and productivity
--Employ virtual currencies to help employees set priorities, share resources, and meet goals
--Implement participant-driven communication systems to facilitate team-building
--Discover untapped leadership skills by shifting collaboration to game-like environments
--Mitigate possible negative effects of game applications at work

Authoritative and provocative, Total Engagement shows you how to become a player to reckon with as the gaming revolution transforms the workplace. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Total Engagement is totally engaging!
Each chapter in this book begins with an interesting short story. The story immerses you into the plot and you want to read the rest of the chapter.

Passionate and enthusiastic employees outperform the average workforce. 3D virtual game environments, to do work in, is certainly the engaging and entertaining way to get work done with high productivity and quality, within organizations.

The book starts with a great introduction with excellent references in first chapter.You will be surprised by who plays and by how much, the topic of the second chapter, along with why these people play the games. Chapter three acknowledges that certain tacit work sucks and discusses corporate problems that games *might* solve (note emphasis). Chapter four describes the elements of best games. The book dedicates a chapter each to virtual currencies, teams, individuals and leaders. Another chapter discusses play and work productivity and suggests a natural convergence of work and play driven by the strong need of engaged workers in a workplace, and improvements in technology in the coming years.

I highly recommend this book.I still have to read chapters 10 and 12, but the authors in chapter 11, caution against the side effects of using games in businesses and concludes - the somewhat obvious - that not every type of work is suitable in a game environment.

Thank you, Byron and Leighton for this excellent resource!

Game on! Your move.
"...on average many [game] players are physically healthier, work harder, make better grades, earn higher salaries, and are more socially connected than those who play less or not at all." Total Engagement, p. 13

I have always been intrigued with the notion that one's work should be challenging, and at the same time: fun. Seriously fun. So, of course, this book by Byron Reeves and J. Leighton Read caught my attention: Total Engagement: Using Games and Virtual Worlds to Change the Way People Work and Businesses Compete.

The book successfully fueled my "fun notion" with compelling business cases and research showing that gaming is not just for high school boys anymore. [Or grown-up kids such as myself.] If businesses want to compete successfully in today's culture, then we will have to overcome our taboo feelings of "playing games" at work.

I could easily write a paper around this book, but I want to keep this brief - so I'll just share three ideas from the book:

* On why people play games: In short, it's all about achievement, immersion, exploration, competition and socializing. Do you see the correlation to the business?

* On virtual money: One economics professor teaches that "economics is less about money than it is about making choices in the face of scarcity." This principle is demonstrated well in the context of gaming, and aptly applied to the art of making leadership decisions.

* On which large enterprises are already experimenting in the field: Check out IBM and Oracle Sun for starters.

If you are in a senior leadership role in your company or run your own business, I invite you to visit the book's website to read the executive reviews and the excerpts. If anything, it will help you understand why the leadership practices of "yesterday" really don't work well with this generation entering the workforce.

Game on! Your move.

[This review is a cross-post from my personal blog.]

How games and gaming will - and should - change business
This book's title, Total Engagement, is a tantalizing banner, but its subtitle, Using Games and Virtual Worlds to Change the Way People Work and Businesses Compete, is a full explanation. Stanford professor Byron Reeves and physician, inventor and CEO J. Leighton Read address the possibilities games offer at work. They explain the many ways that games might change work for the better, making it more meaningful engaging, and productive. They analyze gaming's positive and negative aspects. They are clear about the fact that since millions of people already "game" regularly, even obsessively, many changes they discuss are now under way at desks and in cubicles - everywhere that employees work with computers. Their book gives leaders the tools to use the games that are being played at their companies in a conscious, focused way. Given the broad array of topics that gaming addresses, this book can guide leaders who want to ride the gaming wave, human resources professionals who need to keep up with their shifting domain and others who are interested in workplace change (and games, of course).

A Peek into the Future?
I just finished reading the book Total Engagement. It's rare that I read a book that has me wondering if the authors have caught a glimpse of an unexpected future, and that ten or twenty years from now people will be looking back and be saying: that was the book that spotted this crucial trend. Having lived in Silicon Valley for many years, I'm used to having that experience of being exposed to the future ahead of its time. This could be one of them.

The thesis is simple. Millions of people pay each month to participate in massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs). I've tried them, and I have friends (and kids) that have been totally sucked into them. They punch a bunch of psychological tickets for humans: the game designers know what they're doing. The book discusses how this is done:

* an epic story line(we're saving the galaxy from the Crumlons)
* clear paths to advancement, with transparency about your skills and performance
* intensely meritocratic societies called guilds that work together in groups to accomplish major tasks
* strong social interactions with other people
* the ability to try, fail and try again rapidly, learning quickly
* the option to try on leadership roles

For many people, these games are where they come alive and truly experience their potential to solve problems, meet challenges and lead a team.

And then they go into the modern workplace, which is frequently as stultifying as these virtual worlds are thrilling.Fail!

Read and Reeves are convinced that at least some smart workplaces of the future are going to adapt some of the ways of the games to more fully engage their employees and become more effective as economic organizations.They don't have a magic formula for how to do this, but do invest a great deal of time analyzing what makes people inside these games tick and how those concepts transfer to the workplace.

Fascinating ideas, and well worth watching and thinking about.

Totally Engaged
As I scientist who studies behavior in virtual worlds every day for a living, I was stunned at how much I learned from reading this book. The possibilities for using virtual worlds and games in the workplace are endless, and Reeves and Read do a fantastic job in providing concrete guidelines on how to navigate and leverage the future digital workplace. They combine a hands-on business approach with decades of research about the psychology of media; the result is what is sure to be the canonical text about serous gaming.More importantly, it was downright fun to read.

Jeremy Bailenson
Virtual Human Interaction Lab, Stanford University
[...] ... Read more

Product Description
As virtual worlds increase in their depth and number, evolving into virtual communities with separate rules and expectations, they are often brought into conflict with the legal rules of the physical world.

Law and Order in Virtual Worlds: Exploring Avatars, Their Ownership and Rights provides an understanding of the interface between the laws of the real world and the laws of the virtual worlds.Written for anyone who has ventured into a virtual reality and wondered what, if any, real world consequences would follow their actions, this book raises and answers compelling legal questions about such issues as owning virtual assets, intellectual property right infringements and virtual liabilities in the real world. ... Read more

Product Description
When a beautiful woman steps into a virtual reality game, she finds the ideal man, in this second novel in Love Spell's new "Perfect Heroes" series. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (19)

Don't Judge this Book by its Cover
VIRTUAL HEAVEN was a pleasant surprise.I was expecting something as cheesy as its cover art (the model is icky), but the book ended up being both engrossing and highly entertaining.To summarize, Maggie is accidentally swept into the alternate realm of a reality video game, where she becomes the slave to a warrior named Kered who is on a quest to save his people from all-out war.Sounds crazy, yes?It's actually quite good, and the plot and characters are utterly engaging.The story itself is well-written, and the author does a great job immersing you in the video game's world.Plus, the ending is also satisfying and plausible.If I had to complain, it's only to say that the actual love scenes are pretty abstract in detail ... and that's not a big complaint.Anyway, I'm pleased to note that VIRTUAL HEAVEN is the first in a trilogy.I can't wait to read the next one!

Surprisingly good
If this weren't a romance book, I might only have given it 4 stars, or 4 and a half, because I'm a picky, finicky reviewer. But for the romance genre, I must admit, this was actually incredibly good! It had a wonderful, intriguing plot, a compelling storyline and characters that were utterly believable. I have to confess, I couldn't put it down--it was a real page turner.

The heroine was amazing, the hero was cute and adorable in a very manly, smouldering way, and even the minor characters were three dimensional. Moreover, the author's attention to detail was meticulous, giving the reader a true sense of--as the title suggests--virtual reality.

If you like a book with simmering sexual tension and adrenaline-pumping adventure, then this is for you.

My only real qualm was that I thought the cover art on the back of the book was a bit tacky, but maybe that's just me.

Excellent Series
I expected fluff and found a series with tons of original, well developed world building depth.Though a romance series, the Virtual books could stand as straigh SciFi Fantasy.I actually read them backward in order, so book one I found to be a 'set up' book that paves the way the even more detailed and enjoyable 2nd and 3rd book in the series.

Maggie, a silversmith, is urged by her friend who runs a game shop to try out a hot new virtual reality game.Because of a mix of a storm, cosmic alignment, and the celtic pattern of her pendent, all the things necessary to send Maggie to the world the game is based on are in place.

All Maggie wants to do is get home again, but from the moment she appears she finds her fate is tied to the quest and well being of fantastic warrior who believes she's a runaway pleasure slave.

On the surface it's a fluffy premise, but the book is fraught with gritty situations a real sense of peril and a rather disturbing and grim realism of the horror of being a slave and a female in a world where the life of either is held in casual contempt by those in power.

Great characterization.Great world building.I enjoyed it as a scifi fantasy fan as much, if not more, than as a romance fan.

Did not float my boat
The plot sounded interesting-girl sent into virtual reality game and meets the perfect guy. The book soon became to boring for me though and I started skimming about half way through the book. When the author wrote something about the hero getting , um, lusty about another woman in some spa or such that's when I realized this book was not for me. The perfect hero may get lusty about another woman but I do not care to read about it and this hero was to boring and arrogant to be my perfect hero.

For the personification of the perfect hero, in my opionion, Karen Marie Moning could not make them better.

interesting plot
Well at first i wasn't sure I would like this book. I sounded a bit weird. The hero is a character in a virtual reality game that the heroine plays. Something goes wrong and she is suddenly in the game. Maggie, the heroine, is confused, and scared. She wants to go home and the hero Kered has a quest he must complete first before he can help her. They meet up with a friend of Kered's named Vad who has his own story in a later book. I liked this book but it took me a few days to read. ... Read more

Product Description
The proper exploitation of Web-based technologies towards building responsive environments that motivate, engage, and inspire learners, and are embedded in the business processes and human resources management systems of organizations, is highly critical.

Web-Based Learning Solutions for Communities of Practice: Developing Virtual Environments for Social and Pedagogical Advancement provides cutting-edge research on a wide range of topics and discusses their implications within the modern era s broad learning concept. Addressing diverse conceptual, social, and technical issues, this book provides professionals, researchers, and academicians with up-to-date research in developing innovative and more effective learning systems through the use of Web-based technologies. ... Read more

Product Description
In this book, Wagner and Larson give teachers a chance to practice strategies through "virtual reality." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Real situations for pre-service English teachers
This book not only describes and helps the new teacher in the English classroom, but any high school classroom.It illustrates many common classroom problems, then helps identify solutions.Some of the situations they accentuate are defending a grade, mandated testing and especially for the English teacher-problems with student interpretation, what to do when the students have read the book before, and numerous others.As a pre-service teacher in college, I can honestly say that after all the droll books on theory and pedagogy, this book can teach you so much more in a real-life approach. ... Read more

Product Description
Discusses the technical development of virtual reality and explains its present uses and future possibilities. ... Read more

Product Description
An introduction to virtual reality explores the latest technological developments and software that have made this new innovation possible. ... Read more

Product Description
Continuities in artistic form from the fourteenth century in Italy to the present are examined, with emphasis on two overriding tendencies: (1) the formalization of visual representations and their interpretations, and (2) the association of that formality with extreme individualism in the Western world. Challenges to the tradition struck only at certain aspects of it (such as strict perspective and the hierarchy of subject matter) but did not undercut such fundamental characteristics as the nature of a given visual space or harmony derived from concentration of elements rather than, for example, cumulative distribution of elements, commonplace in Islamic and Early Christian art. Theories of art history and criticism have expressed the same inclination toward focusing on pictorial form and the contextual implications of it, not just because post-medieval art does so, but also because of the influence of Enlightenment philosophical thought. Kantian epistemology, too, reduces knowledge to form, a development that led theorists of Pure Visibility to establish an abstract formalism in opposition to the doctrines of content in the idealistic aesthetics that had survived from the pre-Christian Era. It is no accident that the development of this theory is coeval with the emergence of modernism, for both are expressive of the same individualistic concept of existence. Attempts to resist the conception of art as order on the grounds that such rationalism is inimical to free thought have ultimately revealed themselves to be alternative versions of what they resist; thus, deconstructionism, for example, is hardly more than an extreme formalization of conventional criticism. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Richardson's book critiques art historiography.
Richardson removes the visual arts, sometimes forcefully, from the conceptual box most art historians have been content to utilize.At the same time, he also offers a subtle but sustained critique of the convertsto various postmodernist methodologies who claim to integrate art intolarger cultural, social, and political processes.He reveals them to bejust as exclusive, hegemonic and politically ideological as the adherentsto the conventional historiography they claim to have overcome." ... Read more

Product Description
A complete guide to building cutting-edge virtual reality projects. Here are 12 inexpensive virtual reality projects ranging from adapting a Nintendo Power Glove to work on your PC to building 3-D goggles, motion trackers, 3-D sound systems, biofeedback, and more. No programming or electronics experience required! ... Read more

Product Description
During the last decade the word virtual became one of the most exposed words in the English language. Today we have virtual universities, virtual offices, virtual pets, virtual actors, virtual museums, virtual doctors - and all because of virtual reality. So what is virtual reality? Essentially, virtual reality is about the navigation and manipulation of 3D computer-generated scenes. Navigation lets us move around and explore features of a 3D scene (a building for example), and once inside that virtual building, it is possible to interact with objects such as chairs and cups by picking them up or moving them. Virtual Reality is moving very quickly and there are an ever-increasing number of people wanting to know more about this exciting subject. Introduction to Virtual Reality explains what VR is about, without going into the underlying mathematical techniques. Key topics are: The origins of VR; how VR works; how VR is being used. After reading this book you will have a far better understanding of the impact of virtual reality on our everyday lives. ... Read more

Product Description
America leads the world in the creation of new industries. From personal computing to Internet start-ups to biotechnology, hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in value have been created from what were nothing more than figments of imagination in the minds of entrepreneurs. But moving from a dreamy vision to the hard realities of companies operating in the marketplace is a messy business at best. Finding start-up capital, dealing with the clash of egos and personalities, getting the technical specifications right, building the product, and marketing it to the right audience are all stressful, expensive, time-consuming, high-risk endeavors.

A writer's worm's-eye view of an industry coming into being provides the reader a unique perspective on just why America is the world's capital of progress and innovation. Fred Moody spent a year tracking developments at the center for virtual reality research, a cluster of Seattle companies formed around the University of Washington's Human Interface Technology Laboratory, and in The Visionary Position he chronicles the birth of the VR industry.

Virtual reality products hold out immense promise, not only to those hoping to make money from new companies and products, but to those in need as well. Some VR products have the potential to help people with severe sight problems or Parkinson's disease overcome their handicaps; others can help people with severe psychological problems treat their phobia and depression. VR entrepreneurs are looking in these and other areas for the spectacular, high-payoff, commercial breakthrough that will bring widely used applications to military and consumer markets. It's not surprising, then, that an unholy combination of profit motive and idealism brought together an odd group of people at the HIT lab and the companies it spawned: Virtual i/O, F5 Labs, Microvision, and Zombie Virtual Reality Entertainment.
Fred Moody's year at HITL resulted in incredible fly-on-the-wall reporting. He gets inside the lives of an almost unbelievable cast of characters who are trying to make high-tech history: the buttoned-down academic who spent twenty years doing military research before becoming director of HITL; the male software developer who thought nothing of wearing his best dress to corporate presentations; the venture capitalists interested in only one thing--a high return on the investment they would make; the oddball hardware and software engineers more interested in invention than convention; and the company executives at VR start-up firms working desperately to commercialize products and bring them to market.
Today there are approximately 400 companies in the United States at work on virtual-reality products. The Visionary Position is an up-close and very personal look at where it all began. It tells the tale of an industry ready to break out into many markets: business, medicine, exercise, gaming, the Internet, communications, and mass entertainment. It is also an important study of the American way of creating and doing business, and of the American technopreneurial character.

A Man
"Tom Furness--more formally known as Dr. Thomas A.
Furness III--is an exotic commodity in the Pacific Northwest. . . . His enthusiasms are highly contagious, bewitching investors, entrepreneurs, students, fellow faculty, and journalists alike. When he talks about his hopes and dreams for virtual reality, you find yourself reflexively reaching for your wallet--whether to hand over its contents to Furness or to hide it them from him, you're never quite sure. . . ."

A Vision
"Now the speech was building to a crescendo . . . Furness was offering the museum an opportunity to change the world, to shift the paradigm of education, to "open the portal between information and the mind." With the system he envisioned, "if you want to, you can crank it up to a hundred Gs and juggle on Jupiter." Even after more than thirty years of work on this interface, he was still reduced to an awestruck kid when he thought about its potential. . . ."

A Business?
"One message that crossed my screen included an attempt at explaining [the
employees'] obsession with the misfortunes of their [bosses] . . . 'Everyone needs some source of drama in their life. And VIO has it all, sex, . . . office politics, backstabbing, power struggles, good and evil, money, set in a hi-tech world. Dallas with circuit boards.'". . . to conceive a new industry.Amazon.com Review
"For as long as engineers have dreamed of building faster andmore powerful computers," writes Fred Moody in his opening to TheVisionary Position, "some among them have dreamed of displayingcomputer-stored and -generated information in three dimensions, withusers walking through information landscapes the way they walk downgrocery-store aisles and city streets." Chief among these farsightedengineers--and the primary focus of this well-written history of thestill-nascent VR industry--is Dr. Thomas A. Furness III, an electricalengineer who began researching such technology in a secret AirForce-base laboratory nearly a quarter-century before the termvirtual reality was ever uttered. Intending to "turn his newinterface into a powerful weapon of moral and social change," Furnessleft the military in 1989 and took his work to the University ofWashington, where he ultimately created the Human Interface Laboratoryto further its goals. Moody provides us with a fascinating window onall of the ensuing action as various academics, programmers, andfinanciers come together and fall apart over the ongoing developmentand potential commercialization of virtual-reality products.--Howard Rothman ... Read more

Customer Reviews (21)

Worse than "I Sing" by same author
I got both books as a gift when a relative met the author and he suggestedthat they would make a good birthday present for me (some objectivereferral).

Both books are horrible, but this one is by far the worst.

Imight just cut the spine and cover off this book and glue it to a differentone. This way if my relative stops over she sees the title on my bookshelfand think it's not in the dumpster where it belongs.

Disjoint and superficial
I worked at one of the companies mentioned in the book and worked with orknew several of the characters personally.A co-worker actually turned meonto the book after she recognized my old company's name mentioned.Iborrowed it and proceeded to catch up with what happened to these folks forthe few years after Worldesign shut down.

While the few facts I canpersonally relate to are accurate, they do focus a great deal on emotionand bitterness and seem to take one person's accounts as gospel withoutbalance from others.It does state many of the hidden trials ofstartups.

The writing style is weak.I found the plot disjoint and withtoo much coverage in some areas, and mostly too little development/depth inothers.If I were to have read the book without personal knowledge of thepeople mentioned, I would have screamed for more character development.

Iagree with the other reviewer that this is something you borrow from thelibrary.It was a quick read.

Pinpointed the Problem
Moody accurately captures the confusion, competition and corruption of the VRD circle -- as a VRD inventor myself I found the comments about Rutkowski as corrupt accurate-- was a bit surprised that he missed a few characters-- the MIT circle in particular.It provides an excellent lesson inShakespearean intrigue and corporate politics.

Moody mustbe "truth" challenged
If the publisher had used softer paper, there would be a real use for this book

Digital Greedbags
This book is not badly written - I wouldn't say it's well written by any means but it's not bad.The thing that really galls one about the book are the characters - and unfortunately they're not fictitious.I hit rockbottom with the cast when I read about one "dreamer" who whenpresented with an opportunity to contribute a technological innovation tooceanographic research responded with the gushing realization that he could"make millions."Not that he might contribute something tohumanity - but he might "make millions."It's a little hard topicture people primarily driven by a desire for money as"dreamers."Maybe the book should have been subtitled "TheDigital Greedbags who are Hyping VR to Death."

If the point of thebook is to lampoon the crass nature of the people in Seattle working on VR,it succeeds admirably.Somehow, however, I don't think that was intendedto be the point.Read it only if you have a strong stomach for brainlessgreed, hype, and outright BS. ... Read more

Product Description
Virtual reality--one of the most advanced and exciting technologies to emerge in recent decades--offers businesspeople a new way to grasp information and use it quickly and effectively. By literally experiencing information in an artifically created computer generated world instead of reading, hearing, or viewing it on a screen, businesspeople can get information in a way that has proved most successful and most natural for humans. The result is saved time and money, savings that are essential to any enterprise if it is to survive and prosper in today's fast-paced, competitive business environment. Designed and written specifically for businesspeople in business situations, Thierauf's book is an essential source of information, and a major contribution to understanding today's business technologies and how their benefits will accrue in years to come. ... Read more