I’d mentioned elsewhere that I should probably post a couple more “round-up” posts, so here’s an additional one primarily concerning Industrial Design. As with my previous entry, this is in no particular order and I’ll keep this to links and short comments.
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There’s plenty of stuff to discuss on the general topic of virtual worlds, but under the circumstances – that being I’ve not posted many entries over the past couple of weeks – I’m just going to post some links in no particular order and add a short comment to each.
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There are several interesting posts on the Core77 blog today and one concerned an article written by Carl Alviani titled “Hacking the Physical World: What we taught software designers, and what they’re trying to teach us” (Link). I’m hesitant to state flatly that it’s worth reading because as some of you can doubtlessly imagine, a line like

Distinguishing the design of physical goods from virtual ones is a necessary step…

doesn’t jive with what this blog is all about: the coming together of the tangible (Real) and intangible (Virtual).

Right off the bat, what I’d personally like to know is: “Why is this distinction a necessary step?” I don’t consider it necessary. In fact, I consider such a distinction less relevant with every passing day.

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Still on the road but had some time to surf a bit and came across a couple of things worth taking the time to mention here. The first is an entry over on the C|Net News blog regarding “green toys” (Link). I’m especially interested in alternative materials so reading about a new line of bioplastic toys made from corn starch and vegetables is potentially helpful.

Only thing I’m wondering is: if the bioplastic material starts to “decompose within months, compared to decades like traditional plastics”, then is that really a good thing? After all, the processes needed to make those toys aren’t likely to be very green, so if the product lifecycle is short, the process has to be repeated more often. I’d like a material that might last a few years instead of months. Something to investigate.
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I’d earlier stated that at some point I’d re-post on this blog a piece I’d written elsewhere. Now seems like an appropriate time to do that. So here it is… minus the blockquote tags:

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Avoiding A Short Shot

{Preface: I originally wrote this in June with the intention of submitting it to WorldChanging.com. This was prior to the Second Life Relay for Life event when I was giving some thought to the role technology – and virtual world simulations in particular – would play in our lives. Yesterday I posted an entry over on the Core “Software & Technology” blog that is relevant to the point I was making below. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I can hardly wait to interact with some of the people mentioned in the article I reference in that entry. In any case, I had second thoughts about posting this long entry, but that article reminded me that it may still be worth posting. I hope my rambling, verbose style doesn’t interfere too much with the message.}
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