Virtual reality - forever more prospects of you forgetting about your crummy job.

Online massively multiplayer gaming has only started to penetrate the massive field of its potential. Second like has allowed people to become whatever and whoever they want in a world without their usual worries such as financial security or fear of their own actions, so how could this possibly be improved?

The graphical interface systems for Second Life are aging quite rapidly, and movement is also extremely lag affected. As the years move forward, access to extremely high grade visual game performance will mean that people searching for a virtual world hardly need to remember that there is anything 'virtual' about it, i mean take a look at what we can do with current technology within games:The image on the left is a real life picture taken, and the image to the write is the computer generated version. Do take note, that this is not a computer art piece, that is a gaming engine.

Several years down the track, when a majority of internet users have access to super fast internet systems such as ADSL2+, there is absolutely no telling as to what couldn't be done within these games. Games so real that you actually forget you're playing them. Is this where the world is heading? with people becoming increasingly unhappy with their jobs and many people's access to a full lively life (take a look at many Chinese people confined to a single room apartment where they may live the rest of their lives) this idea of virtual freedom may even become more popular than ever, to the point where the virtual economy rivals the power of the dollar.

Could this secondary reality benefit the world? I think so. meetings for multinational corporations could be taken virtually, allowing the Tokyo office to sit in a chair next to the Taiwan office. budding adventurers could explore the Yosemite national park when they're on their break at Burger King. Maybe, like has happened before, romantic relationships could be grown and tended to, completely online.

Virtual Reality applications will no doubt dominate the global stage in years to come. With the advent of new interfacing technology such as the Emotiv headset (http://www.emotiv.com/), which allows you to control your computer with your own thoughts and facial expressions, we may see humanity fall into a virtual reality even more real than the matrix. Thanks for reading.