4 ms·

I agree with this premise. I knew it was over about 2 years ago when I noticed that about half of new startups were built to sell to other startups, or to serve

I agree with this premise. I knew it was over about 2 years ago when I noticed that about half of new startups were built to sell to other startups, or to serve the existing startup market in someway. That’s a sign of saturation. Another paradigm shift in media (like recorded sound, recorded video, radio, tv, computing, web, and mobile) is what’s needed to produce another startup boom. It all comes down to media—�—the media is the message.

mbrock 9y ago
Money as a medium, from McLuhan's Understanding Media, as an encouragement to think of cryptocurrency as a medial paradigm shift... “Money talks” because money is a metaphor, a transfer, and a bridge. Like words and language, money is a storehouse of communally achieved work, skill, and experience. Money, however, is also a specialist technology like writing; and as writing intensifies the visual aspect of speech and order, and as the clock visually separates time from space, so money separates work from the other social functions. Even today money is a language for translating the work of the farmer into the work of the barber, doctor, engineer, or plumber. As a vast social metaphor, bridge, or translator, money—like writing—speeds up exchange and tightens the bonds of interdependence in any community. It gives great spatial expansion and control to political organizations, just as writing does, or the calendar.
chrisco255 9y ago
VR/AR fits that bill. It's just that no one has nailed the form factor and hardware yet so that it can reach mass adoption.
- city41 9y ago
  Or is it a chicken and egg problem? VR interests me, but I don't feel there is a killer app yet to make the plunge worth it.
  - pault 9y ago
    Disregarding the new applications enabled by the medium, think of it as simply a new display form factor. Once the quality exceeds the best flat screens we can produce, having one unobtrusively attached to your eyes at all times becomes a no-brainer (from a cost-benefit perspective; obviously there are lifestyle-altering implications that each individual will have to embrace or reject on their own terms).
    - KGIII 9y ago
      A poster above mentioned that they experienced VR some 30 years ago. I, myself, had a chance to work with it in the early 1990s. Truth be told, it was horrible. It was rudimentary and the graphics were very poor as it was computationally expensive. Exploration stopped and we reexamined the tech a decade later, with similar results. I've long since postulated that I'd absolutely volunteer to 'jack in' to a neural method to control a computer - complete with my standard joke about being willing to even have a wifi antenna poking out of my skull. I wonder, then, if we are going about this the wrong way. We are trying for ocular stimulation directly. If we could skip that and move to neurological stimulation directly, I'd expect VR and AR to finally reach the tipping point. There is, after all, a finite amount of miniaturization that's possible. It is purely a hunch that tells me VR/AR are not destined for wide-scale 'normal people' adoption until it doesn't require external apparatus to utilize. As it is, we already have people who don't even like wearing simple eyeglasses. However, if it didn't require such, then it may just be something we humans add to our bodies to augment it. Thoughts?
      - chrisco255 9y ago
        That seems really far off if it's even possible.
        KGIII 9y ago
        Maybe? We have learned a lot about the brain in recent times. You can, today, hack your way into controlling a mouse with your mind. That's all external and, of course, requires a headset. I doubt I'll be alive to see it, but it seems that is the most probable method to get mass adoption of VR. Right now, it is really niche. Right now, we are still trying to do it the way we've been doing it for the past three decades. Things are faster and smaller but there are limits to those two traits. I'd absolutely love AR. I have a modest collection of automobiles and sometimes work on them. I sometimes make things out of wood. I sometimes can't identify an animal species or plant family. Having the ability to augment that would be a wonderful way to enjoy life even more - at least for me. But, even if we got these down to the size of eyeglasses (which seems really unlikely for the foreseeable future) I'm not sure we will get mass adoption by Jane Q. Public. It's not a cell phone you pick up and put away, but something worn. The form factor is, by itself, a negative. I dunno? I can't predict the future. I'd still volunteer to test a viable method. With the ubiquity of cellular network connectivity, it'd be fantastic to have the sum of human knowledge at your immediate beck and call and without the need for an external device.
- tanilama 9y ago
  Ideal situation, where having wearable VR devices, that is small in size, efficient in energy consumption, fast processing unit that there is no lag, and excellent algorithm that makes interact with real world effortless...what is VR's biggest usage for a common joe?

mbrock 9y ago

Money as a medium, from McLuhan's Understanding Media, as an encouragement to think of cryptocurrency as a medial paradigm shift... “Money talks” because money is a metaphor, a transfer, and a bridge. Like words and language, money is a storehouse of communally achieved work, skill, and experience. Money, however, is also a specialist technology like writing; and as writing intensifies the visual aspect of speech and order, and as the clock visually separates time from space, so money separates work from the other social functions. Even today money is a language for translating the work of the farmer into the work of the barber, doctor, engineer, or plumber. As a vast social metaphor, bridge, or translator, money—like writing—speeds up exchange and tightens the bonds of interdependence in any community. It gives great spatial expansion and control to political organizations, just as writing does, or the calendar.

chrisco255 9y ago

VR/AR fits that bill. It's just that no one has nailed the form factor and hardware yet so that it can reach mass adoption.

city41 9y ago
Or is it a chicken and egg problem? VR interests me, but I don't feel there is a killer app yet to make the plunge worth it.
- pault 9y ago
  Disregarding the new applications enabled by the medium, think of it as simply a new display form factor. Once the quality exceeds the best flat screens we can produce, having one unobtrusively attached to your eyes at all times becomes a no-brainer (from a cost-benefit perspective; obviously there are lifestyle-altering implications that each individual will have to embrace or reject on their own terms).
  - KGIII 9y ago
    A poster above mentioned that they experienced VR some 30 years ago. I, myself, had a chance to work with it in the early 1990s. Truth be told, it was horrible. It was rudimentary and the graphics were very poor as it was computationally expensive. Exploration stopped and we reexamined the tech a decade later, with similar results. I've long since postulated that I'd absolutely volunteer to 'jack in' to a neural method to control a computer - complete with my standard joke about being willing to even have a wifi antenna poking out of my skull. I wonder, then, if we are going about this the wrong way. We are trying for ocular stimulation directly. If we could skip that and move to neurological stimulation directly, I'd expect VR and AR to finally reach the tipping point. There is, after all, a finite amount of miniaturization that's possible. It is purely a hunch that tells me VR/AR are not destined for wide-scale 'normal people' adoption until it doesn't require external apparatus to utilize. As it is, we already have people who don't even like wearing simple eyeglasses. However, if it didn't require such, then it may just be something we humans add to our bodies to augment it. Thoughts?
    - chrisco255 9y ago
      That seems really far off if it's even possible.
      - KGIII 9y ago
        Maybe? We have learned a lot about the brain in recent times. You can, today, hack your way into controlling a mouse with your mind. That's all external and, of course, requires a headset. I doubt I'll be alive to see it, but it seems that is the most probable method to get mass adoption of VR. Right now, it is really niche. Right now, we are still trying to do it the way we've been doing it for the past three decades. Things are faster and smaller but there are limits to those two traits. I'd absolutely love AR. I have a modest collection of automobiles and sometimes work on them. I sometimes make things out of wood. I sometimes can't identify an animal species or plant family. Having the ability to augment that would be a wonderful way to enjoy life even more - at least for me. But, even if we got these down to the size of eyeglasses (which seems really unlikely for the foreseeable future) I'm not sure we will get mass adoption by Jane Q. Public. It's not a cell phone you pick up and put away, but something worn. The form factor is, by itself, a negative. I dunno? I can't predict the future. I'd still volunteer to test a viable method. With the ubiquity of cellular network connectivity, it'd be fantastic to have the sum of human knowledge at your immediate beck and call and without the need for an external device.
tanilama 9y ago
Ideal situation, where having wearable VR devices, that is small in size, efficient in energy consumption, fast processing unit that there is no lag, and excellent algorithm that makes interact with real world effortless...what is VR's biggest usage for a common joe?