Jack Nicas

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“Virtual Reality Is Grappling With Questions About How It Affects A User’s Body And Mind”

January 5, 2016 in Excerpts, Science/Tech | Permalink

Eventually Virtual Reality gear will be as omnipresent as smartphones and people will be cagefighting with Genghis Khan and having sex with promiscuous ghosts. Even if the antisocial mayhem we cause in a virtual realm doesn’t directly harm anyone else, there will be psychological consequences for the individual “living” the experience. It’s important to know more about such ramifications, though any universal standards we set to limit future products won’t likely stick for very long.

From Jack Nicas and Deepa Seetharaman at the Wall Street Journal:

Beyond the common issues facing new technologies, such as whether consumers will pony up hundreds of dollars for another device, virtual reality is grappling with questions about how it affects a user’s body and mind.

The experience can cause nausea, eyestrain and headaches. Headset makers don’t recommend their devices for children. Samsung and Oculus urge adults to take at least 10-minute breaks every half-hour, and they warn against driving, riding a bike or operating machinery if the user feels odd after a session.

Apart from the physical effects, Stanford University professor Jeremy Bailenson says his 15 years of research consistently have shown virtual reality can change how a user thinks and behaves, in part because it is so realistic.

“We shouldn’t fathom this as a media experience; we should fathom it as an experience,” said Prof. Bailenson, who also co-founded Strivr Labs Inc., which helps football players relive practice in virtual reality.

The psychological unknowns are prompting some backers to suggest setting standards for content. “We have to be very careful,” said Alex Schwartz, chief executive of maker Owlchemy Labs. “Scares in VR are borderline immoral.”•

 

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“The FAA Roadmap Explicitly States There Must Be One Pilot Per Drone”

August 31, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

A follow-up post to the recent one about Google angling to outdo Amazon in the delivery-drone sector, this one about the regulatory issues involved. Even when navigational and battery challenges are worked through, the greater obstacle in the path may be governmental, at least in the near-term future. From Jack Nicas at the Wall Street Journal:

“Then there are the regulatory hurdles. There, the issue isn’t so much the Federal Aviation Administration’s current effective ban on commercial drones. The agency says it plans to propose rules for small drones in November, with the rules likely finalized one or two years later. That timeline jibes with Google’s and Amazon’s stated plans for delivery drones. Still, the FAA has missed several previous deadlines for the rules, and their importance means several big federal departments will have to weigh in, which could further delay things.

The devil is likely to be in the details of those rules. The FAA has said it will prohibit fully autonomous drone flights for the foreseeable future—even after the broader ban is lifted. Its five-year roadmap for drone integration, released last year,  says that a pilot will be required to fly each drone, or at least have ‘override authority to assume control at all times.’ Some have suggested one pilot could oversee many largely autonomous drones with the ability to jump into control if any device malfunctions, but the FAA roadmap explicitly states there must be one pilot per drone.

Depending on how this policy materializes in the final rule, it could create a big headache for Google’s and Amazon’s plans — and many other potential drone applications. Delivery drones would likely have to be autonomous to be cost efficient.”

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