Comments on: Comments on 21176

Post number 21176

Fofer — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 06:19:35 -0800

The first trans-Atlantic handshake will be attempted today via the Internet. Apparently, this day could one day rival the significance of March 10, 1876. And of course, we all know where this is headed.

By: lambchops

lambchops — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 06:24:46 -0800

"Cyberdildonics"? I don't know about the product, but I sure love that name. Deserves a place in Britain's top 10 words (Sure beats "football" or "muggle")

By: adamgreenfield

adamgreenfield — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 06:31:33 -0800

Sigh. The phantom work sounds spine-tingling, no pun intended - it's just what happened to me when I read the second paragraph of the linked article. But Fofer is correct. Before even clicking on the "where this is headed" link, I thought "teledildonics." Sigh and sigh again.

By: ashbury

ashbury — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 06:36:13 -0800

So, um....this cyberdildonics thing, it vibrates? Unfortunately, I have a hard time imagining this thing going anywhere practical. Aside from the sheer entertainment value, what would be achieved by being able to sense (sort of) an object that isn't there? Any ideas?

By: XQUZYPHYR

XQUZYPHYR — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 06:48:00 -0800

To quote Dennis Miller- "the day a man can lie back in a Barca Lounger with a beer in one hand and a remote control in the other and fuck Claudia Schiffer for $19.95, it's going to make crack look like Sanka." This is exactly why we're never going to have a Star Trek future. Any new technology that involves any kind of visual or tactile simulation is just going to be harnessed for use in porn. Holodecks? VR? Oh yeah, we're really all gonna go back and watch the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Riiiiiight.

By: adamgreenfield

adamgreenfield — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 07:09:39 -0800

ashbury, you're kidding, right? Surgery and diagnosis, for starters. The deep human connection sealed by touch - being able to run a hand over the beloved's check, and never mind the teledildonics. Art, sculpture. Even at-present-unimagined mappings of touch onto other modalities - how about searching for undersea oil deposits or anomalous signals from space by waving your hand through data? Fuse cheap, distributed, pervasive computation to finely-grained (but still macroscopic) manipulation of matter and I can think of a great many non-pr0n, non-entertainment applications.

By: rushmc

rushmc — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 07:24:27 -0800

The porn obsession of internet culture is truly fascinating. On the other hand, methinks there is more than a little truth to the cliche, and some folks really need to get out more.

By: ashbury

ashbury — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 07:34:49 -0800

<shame> adamgreenfield, it simply didn't occur to me. *cheeks go red, me slips quietly and unobtrusively out the back door* </shame>

By: quonsar

quonsar — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 07:48:32 -0800

watch the signing of the Declaration of Independence. i understand jefferson had some hot slave girls...

By: Postroad

Postroad — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 08:04:07 -0800

A passing fad. Sort of like films shown on planes: it is against nature.

By: grum@work

grum@work — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 08:05:54 -0800

How about the signing of the Declaration of Indepence acted out by Playboy centrefolds? /me attempts to get out more often /me fails

By: dhartung

dhartung — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 08:25:24 -0800

Bah. This is just so much hand-waving. Really, though, another application -- and one that could be a cash cow -- would be gaming applications, online or not. In an RPG, feel around for the crack that will make the rock wall swing open. In an FPS, feel the gun recoil. It may not ever be ubiquitous -- I'm not predicting anything on the scale of the 1990s virtual-reality hype. But it could easily be a popular entertainment once the equipment is mass-produced. But mainly, it's useful for remote object manipulation. The way our brains are wired, we need both visual and tactile feedback. Someday, bomb-squad robots will use this combined with humanoid hands, customs inspectors will feel around inside shipping containers, and molecular scientists will feel the shape of a carbon atom. I think the possibility of moving beyond normal human scale is one of the more fascinating possibilities.

By: blindcarboncopy

blindcarboncopy — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 08:31:50 -0800

The secret behind the technology is the speed at which the successive impulses are sent -- up to 1,000 Hertz," UCL said in a statement. OK, who wants to explain what in the world this means? I mean, if a reporter said that, it would be understandable. For a UCL press release to postulate that an e-m pulse somehow moves faster at 1 GHz then it does at, say, 1 MHz would be rather embarrassing. I guess what they might be saying is that by dipping into 1 GHz frequency range they are packing a lot of bandwidth into the connection... Oh yeah, to stay on topic, teledildonics! Woohoo!

By: maniactown

maniactown — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 09:30:02 -0800

I stumbled upon this yesterday... You know this stuff is gonna get taken way too far, way too quickly. "Fox turned into a hardcore porn channel so gradually, no one even noticed" --Marge Simpson Misquoted, but apropos.

By: zekinskia

zekinskia — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 10:02:02 -0800

Considering that porn has led the tech industry for the past 10 years, there's no good reason to assume it will not lead in this arena as well. And from the amount of spam-mail I receive regarding artificial orifices, penis enlargement products, live teens, etc., it wouldn't surprise me to see this technology take off. I for one welcome our new digital-hand-job overlords. (But they'd better have some good safety precautions... the lawsuits could be devastating...)

By: halcyon

halcyon — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 10:06:06 -0800

I've actually done extensive testing with Dildonics. It is cool when used with a webcam and voicechat. I've "shared" experiences with "partners" in different states and countries. But the novelty of it wore off quickly. With some development, though, it could be pretty amazing. www.digitalintimacy.com/dildo/

By: Stan Chin

Stan Chin — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 10:14:04 -0800

I shudder and am also intrigued at the possibility of wireless applications. Wireless fleshlights. Hmm....

By: tss

tss — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 10:14:46 -0800

bcc: Just like movie stills must be presented to us at around 30Hz or so to create the illusion of motion, a haptic device like the Phantom has to respond to user motion with the proper feedback at a very high frequency for the experience to "feel right". Thus, for long distance applications, a very low-latency, high-bandwidth connection is required. I got the chance to use a Phantom once. It felt pretty convincing, but I was always gentle with it. I was afraid I'd overpower the mechanism and owe Stanford several thousand dollars. Others have told me that they're far less flimsy than I had feared, though.

By: owillis

owillis — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 11:11:57 -0800

How about the signing of the Declaration of Indepence acted out by Playboy centrefolds? Perfect for John Hancock. i'll be here all week. remember to tip your waiter

By: adamgreenfield

adamgreenfield — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 16:53:05 -0800

blindcarboncopy - Being neither an engineer nor an A&P head, is it possible that 1GHz is the regime in which perceptual/proprioceptive neural signals travel, and thus the phantom affords a perceived experience isomorphic with touch at the "back end"? That would be my guess, anyway.