Virtual Reality: The Revolutionary Technology of Computer-Generated Artificial Worlds - and How It Promises to Transform Society
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By Howard Rheingold
Produced By Simon & Schuster
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This book, by author and renowned VR expert Howard Rhinegold, was first published in 1991 ? nearly twenty years ago. All those years back, Rhinegold still managed to predict VR applications that are only just being realised today. Walking through computer mediated environments, with the power of physical legs; having targeted muscle re-enervation provide the neural connectivity of physical legs if you have none. Doctors treating patients remotely, or operating on precise mock-ups of patients before they lay eyes on them for the first time. Touring buildings, rendered in 3D, from blueprints alone.

Rhinegold explores in great detail just how each and every facet of VR development will change our society, both for the better and potentially for the worse. This disruptive technology as those of us who work with it know, has the potential to change everything, and Rhinegold thoughtfully ? and still surprisingly accurately ? thought to show everyone else, just how.

The book includes haptics, VRD, teledildonics, artificial ears, synthetic proprioception, virtual voices and digital smell amongst the oft-overlooked yet profound sensory changes that will have lasting effects upon our world.