One day people will have computers embedded into their optic and auditory nerves.
They will quite literally see a fantasy world, with filters and augmented reality changing everything they perceive.
Deep fakes and 3D transforms will mean any horny people can see anyone they want to naked. Other people will be able to live in a complete Lord of the Rings fantasy world with dragons, magic, elves and orcs.
...and all of that will be illegal hacks to the official form of the tech, which is supposed to show what the content pushers intended you to see.
The right to run ad-blockers, which would, in passing, enable content alteration like you suggest, would be something we'd actually have to fight for.
Most people wouldn't understand, and would be stuck in a world where they can no longer control what they see or hear, or how what they see or hear gets changed before their brain is allowed to perceive it.
There will be a person on the street corner crying out that the world isn't real... but only the people running hacks and filters will hear her.
I love those science fiction stories where everything is shiny and all the tech is amazing and just works. But, there's no future I can see that goes from here to there.
This concept is very entertaining. The PS3 game Haze and Black Mirror episode Men Against Fire have similar premises. Are there any other works of media exploring this?
One of the more famous ones was the classic game (now, series) Syndicate. The core premise was exactly as described above - a chip that would get wired into the brain to alter all sensory perception. The idea was that the world in the setting had become awful enough that this level of personal surrender was no longer outrageous - people were primarily just altering the perception to be "nicer".
The core plot of the game then assumed that once a critical percentage of people had these, it was a viable tool for criminal organizations to engage in massive campaigns of thought control and overthrow the governments of countries all over the world, essentially replacing states entirely.
Jack Vance's scifi/fantasy classic "The Eyes of the Overworld" starts with a quest which has the protagonist steal magical eye glasses which make the denizens of a village who literally live drenched in shit and mud and eat garbage believe they are lords and ladies living in palaces and eating the most delicious foods.
They know it's not the truth, but for all intents and purposes, while wearing the magical eyeglasses it becomes the truth.
The rest of the book is hilarious and I fully recommend it.
Comments
One day people will have computers embedded into their optic and auditory nerves.
They will quite literally see a fantasy world, with filters and augmented reality changing everything they perceive.
Deep fakes and 3D transforms will mean any horny people can see anyone they want to naked. Other people will be able to live in a complete Lord of the Rings fantasy world with dragons, magic, elves and orcs.
...and all of that will be illegal hacks to the official form of the tech, which is supposed to show what the content pushers intended you to see.
The right to run ad-blockers, which would, in passing, enable content alteration like you suggest, would be something we'd actually have to fight for.
Most people wouldn't understand, and would be stuck in a world where they can no longer control what they see or hear, or how what they see or hear gets changed before their brain is allowed to perceive it.
There will be a person on the street corner crying out that the world isn't real... but only the people running hacks and filters will hear her.
I love those science fiction stories where everything is shiny and all the tech is amazing and just works. But, there's no future I can see that goes from here to there.
Have you started writing yet or is this just teaser?
No, I honestly believe that this will happen one day.
A VR porn version of deepfakes... this is already close enough to possible that I would be shocked if someone weren't already working on it.
This concept is very entertaining. The PS3 game Haze and Black Mirror episode Men Against Fire have similar premises. Are there any other works of media exploring this?
One of the more famous ones was the classic game (now, series) Syndicate. The core premise was exactly as described above - a chip that would get wired into the brain to alter all sensory perception. The idea was that the world in the setting had become awful enough that this level of personal surrender was no longer outrageous - people were primarily just altering the perception to be "nicer".
The core plot of the game then assumed that once a critical percentage of people had these, it was a viable tool for criminal organizations to engage in massive campaigns of thought control and overthrow the governments of countries all over the world, essentially replacing states entirely.
Illustrated in the Syndicate Wars intro: https://youtu.be/CrruSboN1bQ
Jack Vance's scifi/fantasy classic "The Eyes of the Overworld" starts with a quest which has the protagonist steal magical eye glasses which make the denizens of a village who literally live drenched in shit and mud and eat garbage believe they are lords and ladies living in palaces and eating the most delicious foods.
They know it's not the truth, but for all intents and purposes, while wearing the magical eyeglasses it becomes the truth.
The rest of the book is hilarious and I fully recommend it.
Dennō Coil[1] is a wonderful and innocent take on this.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denn%C5%8D_Coil
The book "The Golden Age" by John C Wright has this in a fairly major way (as in it's presence is an important part of the plot).
C.f. Ghost in the Shell, Rainbows End, and certainly many others.