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The Marriage of the Media
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10946 |
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Section : |
NATURAL SCIENCE
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| Issue
Date : |
5 / 1993 |
2,838 Words |
| Author
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Warren Froelich
Warren Froelich is a free-lance science writer in San Diego. |
To the uninitiated, the world according to Venkat Rangan might sound like the set of a science-fiction movie.
In Rangan's world, devices called mediaphones--capable of receiving and transmitting audio and visual images to and from anyplace in the world--are as common as VCRs, cable television, and telephones.
Apparel, in Rangan's world, would include "computerized clothing," where people would don head-mounted video displays, ear phones, gloves with built-in control pads, and position sensors that would track the wearer's head or eye movements.
No longer would anyone need to commute to participate in or experience the sights and sounds of a conference or lecture, or to converse with other participants in the event. All this could be achieved in the privacy and comfort of one's living room.
A New Jersey resident could travel to the West Coast without leaving his or her favorite recliner and, through "surrogate travel," still see and hear the sounds of waves crashing on Southern California's beaches (without getting wet).
Such a world is approaching rapidly.
"This new environment will be up within 10 years," predicts Rangan, assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the University of California in San Diego and director of the multimedia laboratory at UCSD. "Some metropolitan areas," he adds, could begin "taking advantage of the technology within five years."
A new technology and a new vocabulary
What Rangan has in mind borders on the final frontiers of a new communications revolution called interactive multimedia. Many who have been following its early moves, including a growing and serious cadre of scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, corporate leaders, and politicians, believe that interactive multimedia is about to dramatically alter the way the world works, learns, and even plays.
They see previously separate industries of communications, computers, publishing, and movie production jockeying for position as they form unprecedented alliances. Industries whose definition has been quite clear for years are being redefined almost overnight
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