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We need technology that is less immersive, not more

filiph.net

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Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#21

Post by filiph »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #18

I have a different take than the author. I don't have an issue at all with directed activities being deeply immersive - games most specifically. That is, I like the idea of putting on a headset for a half hour and playing a game, then doing something else. What I think is much more destructive is when "immersion" just looks like "constant distraction", i.e. the idea that we'll wear these immersive devices all the tim…

I agree with you. One part of the article that I cut for brevity but maybe I should have included talks about the kind of immersion that is created by bright colorful moving pictures on a mobile screen. A lot of talent and resources is thrown at the goal of keeping people glued to their phones (TikTok, Candy Crush, etc.). "Engagement" is a form of immersion.

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#22

Post by filiph »

andybak wrote: post #11

I rather missed the point where he explains why immersive games are bad. There's some hand-wavey bit about "[they] don’t teach them anything valuable about the real world, and don’t relax them at all" but that appears to be it. The first bit is beside the point and the second hugely debatable. Similar criticisms could equally be levelled at engaging with any creative output - reading, listening to music etc. And I lo…

> I rather missed the point where he explains why immersive games are bad.

The article's title isn't "immersive games are bad".

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#23

Post by nonameiguess »

kamaradclimber wrote: post #2

Many of the most talented artists of our time don’t do any art — they work in advertising. I think the original quote is: The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads (source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/06/12/click/ ) which is very close to article’s paraphrase

I don't know what the original actually was, but around post-9/11 derivatives finance boom, physicists and electrical engineers started lamenting that all the smartest people of the current generation were wasting all that brainpower on relatively zero-sum arms races between hedge funds trying to win trades against each other.

The one about making people click ads grew out of that after the GFC when software salaries started to boom like finance had earlier in the decade.

I'm sure there was something else earlier that diverted intelligent, talented people into socially unproductive pursuits because it paid better. I recall when I was in college there being huge dilemmas among all the students studying geology whether they should sell out and go work in oil and gas exploration.

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#24

Post by filiph »

haswell wrote: post #15

While sitting with my iPad typing the other morning, something about the experience struck me in a way that it never had before. I've been typing since the early 90s, and can type around 120WPM without looking or thinking about it, and it hit me that in a very real sense, the iPad (and other computing devices) are already an extension of me. I've invested the time to integrate this hardware into my brain via the keyb…

I didn't want to bore the reader with various definitions of immersion but you're raising a very good point. Apart from the "immersion for entertainment" that I'm mostly talking about, there's also the "flow" and the "tech as augmentation". I have obviously no problem with people being more productive through technology. What I have issue with is the (unwitting) funneling of the world's talent and resources into tech that makes us immersed in non-existent worlds just for the sake of entertainment.

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#25

Post by noqc »

kamaradclimber wrote: post #2

Many of the most talented artists of our time don’t do any art — they work in advertising. I think the original quote is: The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads (source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/06/12/click/ ) which is very close to article’s paraphrase

Well, the first is talking about artists, and the second is referring to programmers.

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#26

Post by haswell »

adolph wrote: post #12

There is a balance between immersive and ambient. A large number of people are working on the latter in terms of smart home devices, advanced driver assistance systems and fitbit-like quantified self devices, to name a couple of sectors. Maybe a challenge for ambient technology is that its nature is non-engaging. If it were engaging, it would be immersive and not ambient.

I don't think ambient and immersive are mutually exclusive. Ambient tech just widens the potential space in which someone can become immersed. Before ambient tech, I primarily interacted with my computers. With ambient tech, I interact with my computers and the environment in which those computers exist. Now, I'm one with my apartment. A thought leads to spoken words which lead to direct control of the devices around me.

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#27

Post by [deleted] »

haswell wrote: post #15

While sitting with my iPad typing the other morning, something about the experience struck me in a way that it never had before. I've been typing since the early 90s, and can type around 120WPM without looking or thinking about it, and it hit me that in a very real sense, the iPad (and other computing devices) are already an extension of me. I've invested the time to integrate this hardware into my brain via the keyb…

[deleted]

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#28

Post by baliex »

amadeuspagel wrote: post #7
kamaradclimber wrote: post #2

Many of the most talented artists of our time don’t do any art — they work in advertising. I think the original quote is: The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads (source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/06/12/click/ ) which is very close to article’s paraphrase

Ads have existed long before clicks on and the most talented artists have worked on them long before the most talented programmers thought about making people click on them.

That's true and doesn't detract from it being a waste of talent

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#29

Post by crowcroft »

I used to work for a small business accounting software company.

We used to talk about reducing the amount of time people use the product. Doing accounting is NOT what small business owners should be spending time on, and our goal was to reduce the amount of time spent.

As the company got bigger, we started selling adjacent software, and suddenly time spent in the 'ecosystem' became an important factor for increasing revenue per user and the rest is history.

Especially in the B2B space with sales reps, it's hard to sell people on things they don't have to do.

Re: We need technology that is less immersive, not more

#30

Post by aleph_minus_one »

nonameiguess wrote: post #23
kamaradclimber wrote: post #2

Many of the most talented artists of our time don’t do any art — they work in advertising. I think the original quote is: The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads (source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/06/12/click/ ) which is very close to article’s paraphrase

I don't know what the original actually was, but around post-9/11 derivatives finance boom, physicists and electrical engineers started lamenting that all the smartest people of the current generation were wasting all that brainpower on relatively zero-sum arms races between hedge funds trying to win trades against each other. The one about making people click ads grew out of that after the GFC when software salaries…

> I'm sure there was something else earlier that diverted intelligent, talented people into socially unproductive pursuits because it paid better.

The problem is in my experience (for quite some smart people) not "which job pays so much better (and thus facing a potential dilemma about selling out)", but rather about actually finding a job.

The job market does not like very smart people, but rather self-promoters and sycophant: I know quite some really smart people (with a focus on people having degrees in mathematics and physics (often comparable to PhD or post doctoral experience)) who had quite some difficulties actually finding a job in industry, and thus rather had to take the job positions that they could get.

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