While the world’s hi-tech policy attention (including mine) has been focused on generative artificial intelligence (AI), the closely related technology of advanced virtual reality — I’ll call it Total Electronic Immersion, or TEI — has continued to move forward, raising both promises and perils. We ignore the policy implications of TEI at our own risk.
The topic is difficult to address because there have been so many variations of virtual reality (VR), using different terminology and many different American, Chinese, Korean, Japanese and other platforms, ranging from the experience of just viewing a smartphone screen to wearing earphones while watching a computer screen to wearing face-covering goggles, earphones, gloves, boots and more so that the user’s entire sensory field is exposed to the electronic environment, or TEI.
Immersive technology, in the broadest sense, is as old as the human experience. Undoubtedly, early humans found themselves drawn to (or immersed in) campfires, fully absorbed by the sight, sound, heat and smell of the experience. The universal human desire to sometimes escape their moment and place has driven immersive innovations from stage performances to movies to television. For about the past 50 years, however, computer technology has permitted an increasingly interactive and comprehensive electronic experience, quite different from just watching a fixed program on a two-dimensional movie or TV screen. As with many technologies, this began with the military’s experimentation with interactive video for low-level training for flight, ground transportation, weapons systems, etc.
Interactive computer technology easily led to early generations of interactive computer games for entertainment (like Atari consoles or Pacman games) that added sound to the interactive experience; all making the electronic experience more immersive. Increasingly powerful computer capabilities combined with rapidly declining production costs inevitably led to the modern interactive video game industry. Today, it generates around $200 billion in sales annually — far larger than the movie industry.
Modern video games — shown on a hi-def video screen with stereo sound, the ability to view 180-360 degrees and user activities controlled by a small controller/joystick — have been the standard technology for video gaming, a light form of immersive technology. Putting video games on the Internet allowed hundreds of millions of users from every nation to simultaneously engage one another with live messaging, adding both community and excitement to the experience, thus making it more immersive. While the videogame industry grew, military and related electronic training technologies became more advanced, by substituting video goggles/headphones for screens/speakers, thus making the training and operational experience in their own way more immersive.
Since the 2010s, commercial and military efforts have led to the creation of a totally immersive, computer-driven experience by adding more detail to the video and audio experience; more realistic motion control through user body attachments (that replace joysticks); full 360-degree motion; user control and touch sensations through gloves and strap-ons; and even odor and temperature. These have all been enormously enhanced by the use of interactive AI, which permits the dynamic creation of quite realistic visual, audio and sensory experiences responding to any/every user activity. The goal is to create an immersive electronic experience that is indistinguishable from a real-world experience, or a fictitious electronic experience that feels as if it were real.
Except, very importantly, in an electronic immersive experience, virtually everything can be controlled while keeping the experience realistic. The user can be someone other than themselves, the other participants can be whoever is selected, the place and time can be selected and all relationships and attitudes can be selected. While sometimes the user will make all of these selections, often some or all selections will be made by an external controlling entity.
All of this gives rise to some enormous promises of TEI, the most prominent that it enables training beyond anything possible through personal, video or even conventional VR training: The fully immersed trainee can use their voice, body and tools to actually experience every stressful aspect of the real event (including harmlessly making what would otherwise have been disastrous mistakes.) TEI permits trainees to repeatedly make mistakes until they are sufficiently experienced so they can complete the genuine task, all while inside a training facility. And the use of AI allows the trainee to experience an unlimited number of variables, reflecting the unpredictable real world.
Theoretically, this could apply to anything from auto repairs to surgery and dentistry. Similarly, meetings that rely on TEI could be nearly indistinguishable from face-to-face meetings, except that participants from anywhere do not need to travel to join the meeting. Theere are important healthcare applications of TEI, from telehealth to remote surgery, as well as realistic online shopping and much much more.
Given the enormous success of the video game entertainment industry, it’s not difficult to see how TEI could impact electronic entertainment. A totally immersive video game, when combined with AI, allows an unlimited range of realistic, fully sensorial experiences. Using AI, no other humans are needed in order to make the “game” completely interactive, dynamic and unpredictable. It’s not surprising that many gaming and social media businesses have set their sights on TEI-enabled games. Although TEI entertainment will certainly appeal to a market segment, it’s probably too soon to tell just how large that segment will be, since total immersion does not appeal to everyone.
Regardless of how widespread TEI entertainment is, it carries some risks. Medical authorities have previously cited the medical risk of addiction to screen-based online activities, raising the question of whether totally immersive social media and entertainment could be even more addictive. One of the main features of TEI compared with screen-based video games is one’s near-total escape from reality — not entirely unlike psychedelic drugs.
Although types of virtual reality have been around for decades, we are at the dawn of totally immersive electronic experiences that will reach into business, military, healthcare government and entertainment. As they grow, we need to keep a continuous watchful eye on them.
Roger Cochetti has served as a senior executive with COMSAT, IBM, VeriSign and CompTIA. A former U.S. government official, he has helped found a number of nonprofits in the tech sector and is the author of textbooks on the history of satellite communications.