This is the third entry of a three-part series exploring heightened technological immersion in the near future. Part Two:Virtual friends and real rewards is here.

In the previous two parts to this story we looked at the pros and cons relating to how immersed we should become in digital technology. Should we be concerned about constant surveillance, about tracking software that we not only wear, but is in many of the things around us, that records what we do, the choices we make? If these choices, or even our opinions, become subject to rewards systems that pay us in some way for our actions, are we opening ourselves up to manipulation, exploitation? If we should at some point be represented by our avatars in virtual worlds, learning, communicating, playing, dating, could we be at risk of losing a sense of who we really are? Will more time in virtual worlds make us more apathetic to the real world, more out of touch with our real friends, or could it help us to be more understanding of the world, and more able to express ourselves with a more diverse set of people?

Nick Yee, a research scientist studying gamer behavior at Ubisoft Entertainment S.A. the third-largest independent publisher of video games worldwide, and author of the The Proteus Paradox, has written extensively about virtual worlds. Yee concluded in one article on virtual reality (VR) technology, “…while we assume that virtual worlds allow us to reinvent ourselves, they are in fact powerful psychological tools for shaping how we think and behave.” Yee has focused much of his work on the potential of virtual reality, and of our living space with avatars. Rather than escapism, or a place in which consumers are constantly manipulated, above all Yee sees the future of VR as a means to better education and heightened awareness of ourselves.

Artificial Intelligence (AI), explained Yee in an interview with SiliconANGLE, is still something more related to science fiction than science reality, however he said, “even though a world with realistic embodied computer agents may still be a ways away, the potential of in-between hybrids can get quite interesting.” He mentioned avatars in virtual worlds that through gestures and the movement of eyes can be persuasive to the individual watching. This, he said, can help as a form of self-therapy, and the possibility of these kinds of avatars being part of our lives soon is very real.

In response to the question of spending too much time with our avatars in the future, he said, “our palette of communication tools will keep increasing, for better and for worse”, adding that, “We’ll develop social norms and different expectations of intimacy from each of these tools, and some form of avatar-based communication will likely become part of this palette.” In time, he said, avatars will just become a part of how we communicate, but that doesn’t mean avatars will replace the forms of communication we already use. They will just “fit into the mix.”

Don’t think of it as escapism

I asked Yee if more time in virtual worlds might make us more apathetic to the real world. It’s a mistake, he replied, that people sometimes think of virtual worlds as being escapist fantasies, separate from the real world. “This distinction is distracting and false,” he contended, explaining that when we make phone calls we are interacting with real people, but the transaction of communication has been mediated by technology. “Virtual worlds are the same,” he said, adding that, “Gamers get married in real life to people they meet in World of Warcraft. They hold vigils in virtual worlds for friends who have passed away. And GamerGate is one recent example of how politics spill over into virtual worlds (and back again) all the time.” In virtual worlds we take with us our cultural identity, our political beliefs, he said, adding that racism and sexism also pervade these worlds.

Yee explained that every new communication medium has triggered moral panics, saying that even the telephone in its earliest forms had people thinking that face-to-face communication would become as outdated as the horse and carriage.

He added, “We often forget how many modalities of communication the typical person masters that are not face-to-face without any trouble (letters, novels, phone calls, emails, text messages, pokes on Facebook, tweets, video conference calls, etc.).” Escapism, social isolation, and behavioral dependence are very real issues, he said, but escapism isn’t a technological problem. Rather, he said, it’s a long-standing psychological problem that can manifest in many different ways. “And with everything in life,” he added, “moderation is key.”

On the topic of manipulation via a rewards system discussed in the previous parts of this story, or coercion via advertising, subliminal, or in your face, Yee explained, “Gamification and virtual worlds are orthogonal things, and there are many possible instantiations of virtual worlds that may or may not revolve around rewards.” He gives the example of Minecraft, a game in which people create anything they choose with 3-D blocks in a virtual landscape. This, he said, is primarily about creativity and sharing rather than rewards. He also added that, “Money is the ultimate reward system in the real world and it certainly gets people to focus on what they can get,” he said, “but people tend to not bring up the issue of money when they ponder the possible evil of gamification.”

Nick Yee

Anything is possible in a virtual world

The space for virtual worlds is open said Yee, a space that may not be game orientated, may not have rewards systems, and may or may not even be anchored to the real world at all – quite different from the assumptions of Schell’s virtual future. 

Much of the criticism of social virtual technology has been towards what we discussed in the first two parts of this story. Immersive technology creating something like a digital Skinner Box, in which the consumer, in a virtual world driven by rewards, is manipulated into making certain choices. While Skinner himself believed this to be a way to make people act better, critics decry it as being an end to human freedom, and the beginning of absolute control by whoever owns or controls the technology. Although Yee doesn’t believe that VR will become a tool of control, rather it will create an opening for more creativity.

Yee explained, “There may be a variety of virtual world ecosystems that may or may not be interoperable. These virtual worlds may or may not rely on human embodiment or obey the space-time mechanics of the real world. Virtual worlds are literally worlds where anything can be made true, so the sky’s the limit.”

We can build any kind of virtual world we want, Yee explained, and they don’t have to be ones which intellectuals will compare to the Skinner Box. However, he pointed out, “Technological gadgets and platforms are never neutral tools. They are built with human biases and change how we perceive and interact with the world and each other.” He gave the example of news-sharing platform Reddit Inc’s upvoting algorithm that favors information, “that can be quickly parsed as good” in order to proliferate “puppy pictures rather than long essay pieces.” He added that Upvoting mechanics often encourage extreme points of view rather than genuine discourse and understanding of different perspectives. “These technological constraints and influences,” he said, “become invisible.” His answer is vigilance; we should know, or try to find out, when data has been manipulated.

In answer to the naysayers currently writing dystopian tracts based on the evils of computer technology Yee explained, “Socrates thought that writing would destroy people’s ability to make oral arguments. People in 18th century England thought novels would corrupt people’s understanding of life and love. Comic books were supposed to turn all boys into violent criminals. But despite our consistent moral panics around every new communication technology for the past 2,500 years, we’ve always managed to adapt and the fabric of human society has remained intact.”

He explained that it’s less about whether a technology is good or bad, but more pragmatically, we always adapt and learn to live with new technologies. “We shape the parameters and usage of the technology as it changes how we interact with each other. There are always growing pains and unintended consequences. But in the end, both survive, usually in different forms.

“In the same way that blogs helped democratize content creation, I think one way to help people become more vigilant is to create tools that allow everyone to create and experiment with their own virtual worlds – imagine a more sophisticated but still easy-to-use Minecraft. Once people think about what worlds they might create from a blank slate, they become sensitized to the possibilities rather than locked in with a particular vision of how these virtual worlds must be.”

Photo credit: Maurizio Pesce via photopin cc