Re: storing visiblity info. in VRML (fwd)
Kevin Goldsmith (unitcirc@netcom.com)
Fri, 1 Sep 1995 11:45:34 -0700 (PDT)
Brandon sez:
> I offer the following conjecture: the entire concept of "virtual real
> estate" may very well fall flat on its butt. The whole concept is
> predicated around the notion that users are actually willing to wander
> around a virtual world on foot when the neighborhood is commercial.
> On-foot traversals are tedious, and it's very unlikely that people
> will waste their time going out of their way to see commercials.
>
There are reasons to make people walk though. Randy Farmer and
Chip Morningstar had some good points in their paper on Habitat in the
Benedikt Cyberspace book. One of them was that it was good to make
people walk. It lets them meet their neighbors and feel a sense of
attachment to their "virtual" community. I agree though that the idea of
"Virtual Real Estate" is questionable. Although, I think that the idea
of Condominiums is also questionable, so you have to temper my opinions.
Kevin