I've been playing Skyrim lately and I can only describe it as endlessly entertaining. I had the very same thought that the article talks about. Skyrim is almo

I've been playing Skyrim lately and I can only describe it as endlessly entertaining. I had the very same thought that the article talks about. Skyrim is almost completely realistic-looking. At some point in the near future, the games we play will likely be indistinguishable from reality, or even more likely, much better than reality in every way. But the more surprising thing is that Skyrim has a system that randomly generates more stuff to do than you could reasonably do in a lifetime of playing the game. Now, it's essentially the same thing over and over, but there's no reason to assume that games in the future won't become even better at this. The key point is that there is stuff to do in the game that someone didn't have to manually create. The logical conclusion is that at some point in the future, there will exist an endless supply of stuff to do that is more entertaining than reality, not just in the current "addictive until you eventually get bored a year later" way, but in the "automatically generated by algorithms so complex that the game is constantly new and surprising and you will never get bored" way. I wonder where that will lead. Maybe it's the ultimate bread and circus for the populous, where one could lead an extremely happy and fulfilling life in a virtual world with essentially no cost to anyone. And if you take a step back, that's exactly where we are today, at least in the developed world. For the most part, if you abandon all the trappings of the modern, virtual world, you can live a happy and fulfilling life for nearly zero cost. But we choose to buy cell phones, TV's, and other forms of entertainment that aren't really necessary. Beyond the necessities, it's all entertainment, including that 40 hour job that you don't really have to do to live or that startup you founded because you believe it will make your life better.