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"The answer to the problem of information overload on the Net is reputations… engineer a system called a reputation server."
- Neal Stephenson
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| Direct Interface | ||
| A form of computer interface that inputs text into a computer by thinking. |
What I like about Varley's work is that you always get the real world view. It's not all clean and beautiful in Varley's universes, but then, it isn't in mine either.
What sort of computer interface do you use? A keyboard? A microphone? A stylus that writes directly on the screen of your computer? Try this one.
| Looking around me, I saw that all my colleagues were busy at the same task. Eyes were rolled up, mouths hung open, here and there a finger twitched. It had to be either a day trip from the Catatonic Academy, or the modern press at work. Okay, so I lied about the open mouths. Not all D.I. Users look like retarded zombies when they interface… |
| Technovelgy from Steel Beach,
by John Varley. Published by Ace Putnam in 1992 Additional resources -
|
This novel was written in 1984, when the idea that you could actually have an interface between your brain and a computer was pure science fiction. However, you might want to take a look at research done on the idea of a brain computer interface before you dismiss the idea. If it could be made to work, it would be a tremendous boon to disabled people.
For more on altered states while communicating, see sniggertrance.
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| MIT Headset Lets You Communicate Without Speaking |
| Tongue Mouse Created By Valve Engineer |
| Skinput Uses Your Skin As An Input Device |
| AcceleGlove Open-Source Data Glove |
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'Drake was the young spatial engineer he employed to terraform the little rock...'
'It diverts integers of the data, the fundamental message-units, so that they no longer agree.'
'Clothes are no longer made from dead fibers of fixed color and texture that can approximate only crudely to the vagrant human figure...'
'Books were just a commodity that had to be produced, like jam or bootlaces.'
'...it rears and spreads its fan. It can pick one man out of a crowd.'
