"Meta has asked its employees to volunteer to test the metaverse, according to an internal memo viewed by The New York Times. A stranger recently groped the avatar of one tester of a Meta virtual reality game, Horizon Worlds, a company spokeswoman said... ... Mari DeGrazia, 48, of Tucson, Ariz., said she saw harassment and assault happen in Population One 'two to three times a week, if not more.'... 'I’m not going to stop playing, because I think it’s important to have diverse people, including women, playing this game,' she said. 'We aren’t going to be pushed out of it, even though sometimes it’s hard.' In July, Ms. DeGrazia wore a haptic vest — which relays sensations through buzzes and vibrations — to play Population One. When another player groped her avatar’s chest, 'it felt just awful,' she said. She noted that Mr. Zuckerberg has described a metaverse where people can be fitted with full-body suits that let them feel even more sensations, which she said was troubling."
From "The Metaverse’s Dark Side: Here Come Harassment and Assaults/As Meta and other companies bet big on an immersive digital world, questions about its harms are rising" (NYT).
From "The Metaverse’s Dark Side: Here Come Harassment and Assaults/As Meta and other companies bet big on an immersive digital world, questions about its harms are rising" (NYT).
I've never used virtual reality, but shouldn't it be possible for the user to flick a switch that turns off the haptic vest so that the other player can't impose the feeling of touching on you? Also, it seems to me that most video games put you in the role of a fighter, with enemies coming at you. How does the haptic vest work when the enemy is winning?
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42 comments:
There's two feelings in the system, the lady being groped and the guy groping her. Which one is important to turn off.
And is it really a breast being groped and not a sock filled with jello. You don't know what model virtual reality is implementing. You'd have to look at the math.
cf "Stress Analysis of a Strapless Evening Gown"
Let’s be honest. This is all about virtual sex. Zuckerberg is a cyber pimp. Porn is something like 70% of internet traffic and Zuckerberg knows that.
serious Question
If your meta character is wearing meta clothes, then it's not meta rape? right?
Asking for a friend
Oh good. I've been hoping for some new technology that would move younger generations further from reality. Seems gaming has not done enough to our young men and to a lessor extent women. Plus it sounds like this will try to drag older groups in as well although tech adoption rates wain as we age.
When the tech/social experiment goes wrong and it is too large a chunk of our population....
In the meantime get off social media and go do something in the real world. Gain a skill, fix something at grandmas house, find a better job, find a mate, go skiing anything just tear your thumbs off you cell phone and look up toward the horizion.
This is not news. The Second Life virtual environment quickly became home to fantasy sex and men pretending to be women circa 2003 to 2005. Real life lesbians soon came to hate, hate, HATE the Second Life culture because most all of the partners and friends they found turned out to be men. Predators? Closet transvestites? Precursor to what entered the mainstream a few years ago? Probably yes to all.
The bottom line is that when one has either (a) anonymity or (b) no negative consequences for bad behavior, bad behavior becomes more common. Masked protestors. Defund the police. Same thing, same outcome.
Porn has led technology since forever. Photography, movies, VCRs, cable TV, internet, VR. Not news.
Like real-life, the male population of the metaverse will be looking for people to touch them, the female population will be looking to assert their strong womanhood in this cartoon festival world. Not sure how that will work out there. The accusations will be flying.
But somewhere...back in the dark corners of Zuckerberg Lane, there will be a party room where everything they can think of will be tried. Meta employees, personally selected by Mr. Z himself will be the first invited to this special room where all is allowed and no one is to talk about it.
The first rule of the metaverse is don't talk about the metaverse.
My thoughts go to “The Matrix” and the woman in the red dress. Then I realize how sexless a matrix would be if built by Silicon Valley woke scold prudes. It wouldn’t even be as good as “Demolition Man”.
When I read this story the other day I don't recall it mentioning a haptic vest. I'm not sure that changes my opinion.
If he didn't grope her, he didn't grope her.
The other thing that it recalled to mind was this picture of Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau groping Hilary's breast in a cardboard cutout.
https://www.outsidethebeltway.com/favreau_gropes_clinton_cardboard_cutout/
Is there any difference between the two incidents? Does the haptic vest make a difference?
John LGBTQBNY Henry
This makes the “assault” seem less of a joke. A simple fix would be an emergency taser button to electrify your character and flatten the person. Or, in the case of a losing battle as the prof suggests, key suit features could be disabled like the porn search features in your browser. A sensation limiter probably already exists—I doubt many want to actually feel a sword going through them.
A "Karen" from Tucson, Ariz., said she saw harassment and assault happen in Population One 'two to three times a week, if not more.
Population One is a shoot-em-up game, so you should see harassment and assault almost constantly.
"You’ve got your usual assortment of weapons like SMGs, Assault Rifles, Shotguns, Snipers, and so on."
The technology is amazing. 5 years ago at a trade show I got a demo of a VR system from Miller Electric whcih makes welding machines. The VR goggles were in a standard welding helmet. When I put it on, was in a NASCAR garage. I could look all around, though I could not move.
They put a stinger in my hand and told me to weld a bead. I did and it felt and looked so real that I swore I felt weld spatter on the back of my hand.
After they showed me a chart of how my bead was, a bit heavy at first, then a bit wavy but better as muscle memory kicked in. It also gave me a score.
They were selling it as a device to hire and train welders.
At another trade show 3 years ago, there was a large, 20X20 booth, empty except for some literature racks and a small table.
I stopped to see what was going on, they put VR goggles on and suddenly the booth was full of machinery that I could walk around and look at from all angles. Very realistic.
Santa (me) gave me an Oculus Quest for Christmas. I finally got to play with it uninterrupted last night. Absolutely amazing technology.
If you have not done it, there are no words to adequately describe it. Not quite reality but much closer than you might expect. I climbed the Matterhorn last night and kept feeling like I was going to fall off.
John LGBTQBNY Henry
"How does the haptic vest work when the enemy is winning?"
Depends. When a man is winning against women, it works to enable women to complain and sue. Except when the man's avatar claims to be trans, in which case it works to show women their proper place.
It's always important to keep in mind that "virtual" means "not really."
How does the hepatic vest feel to the other player when he’s kicked in the balls?
"They were selling it as a device to hire and train welders."
Maybe they can use them to teach guys how to properly fuck, and put porn out of business.
How does the hepatic vest feel to the other player when he’s kicked in the balls?
Well, since most haptic systems use small vibrators to create a sensation, it probably feels great. It might even be a greater incentive for the man to keep groping the other woman.
I'll try to break this to you gently....VR is going to be dominated by porn in the beginning, just like VHS was.
Wait a second. I once played a game where other people would attack and kill my avatar. What is the statute of limitations on murder?
What exactly is the point of having a haptic vest over your breasts, Ms. DeGrazia?
Setting aside Ms. DeGrazia's obvious interest in virtual sex, this seems like a super simple issue to fix. Turn off the sensations to private areas until you're ready for stimulation.
Darkisland said...
Is there any difference between the two incidents? Does the haptic vest make a difference?
Some men get the dopamine release from the grabbing of the breast and the feeling in their hands.
Other men get the release from the discomfort and pain they see on the other person.
How does the haptic vest work when the enemy is winning?
"Physical contact sends electrical signals to my CPU. The signals can be interpreted as pain."
This Person said...
What exactly is the point of having a haptic vest over your breasts, Ms. DeGrazia?
In the metaverse Ms. DeGrazia is attractive and desirable.
I've read scifi and seen futuristic movies about this sort of thing all my life. My certain conclusion: Porn will make billions off this. Less certain: Gamers will pay for it in huge numbers. Completely wild guess: Government will regulate the hell out of it, sooner rather than later, "for the good of the children."
Wait until the Haptic underwear.
The Shocker awaits.
-Loren
Shouldn't it be possible for the user to flick a switch that turns off the haptic vest so that the other player can't impose the feeling of touching on you?
But doing so would deprive Ms. DeGrazia of the meta experience of experiencing injustice and fighting that injustice. Ms. Degrazia might not want to live in a meta-world where she cannot do that.
I'm only being partially facetious. Perhaps it is worthwhile to have a meta world with such experiences. Sometimes it seems that actual injustice in the world has shrunk to the point where people with a strong sense of justice don't have enough injustice to fight and so need to magnify the amount of injustice we actually have. Maybe an injustice metaverse is just the thing then. Create monstrous new meta injustices to be fought with meta moral courage and meta mass demonstrations with corresponding meta triumphs over meta injustice.
Thinking about this a little more suggests the concept of a meta justice universe is not that far-fetched. In fact, we already have an early version of it in our popular entertainment. Large amounts of popular culture are fighting meta injustice daily, and anyone can meta fight meta injustice by buying the right coffee or thinking the right thoughts. Adding haptic vests isn't that big an incremental step. I don't see why this promising early start couldn't be leveraged into a full-fledged meta justice verse.
The harassment angle is a distraction. Have you seen the Meta advert where three Zgen kids enter a Henri Rousseau jungle? It's next level mind control brought to you by Jeff Zuckerfuck. Phillip K Dick was an optimist.
But doing so would deprive Ms. DeGrazia of the meta experience of experiencing injustice and fighting that injustice. Ms. Degrazia might not want to live in a meta-world where she cannot do that.
That is a really good point that I hadn't considered.
The point of virtual reality is that the constraints of physics need not apply. The purpose of a haptic vest is to feel touches to the avatar's torso. Don't put on the vest. Or, as Ann suggests, turn off inputs from the haptic vest. Or just turn off inputs in sensitive areas. It would be a minor task to provide a configurable personal space bubble around the avatar, allowing only whitelisted avatars to enter.
It hadn't occurred to me that some users would pursue the opportunity to experience injustice to fuel outrage.
What of the users who consider the virtual world to be an appropriate place to violate others? It isn't difficult to imagine the lure of the virtual world as a place to engage in all manner of antisocial behavior and general debauchery.
There would certainly be different regions, with software tuned for different possible behaviors.
Do the louts and the Karens need each other? Would an outrage addict be gratified by being ill-treated in a realm, freely entered, that allows brutish behavior?
If you are having virtual sex with an anonymous person on-line, it is probably another guy.
Further thoughts on justice in a metaverse:
What if you wanted to live in a polite, well-mannered metaverse because you feel our world is too crass. What is so wrong with that? This world would focus on etiquette and proper behavior and the pleasure of a well-ordered and polite society. A lot of people would like that.
But, to have etiquette, you must have the ability to violate etiquette, you must have transgression. Then, in this polite metaverse, boors would be able to commit faux pas, but societal mechanisms would reprimand such poor behavior. Users would then experience the pleasure of contributing to a well-functioning society.
I'm kind of liking this idea.
In the Woke Metaverse YOU can play the role of Handicapper General -- every SJW's dream!
Virtual Intelligence (VI) - definition
The state of believing what you empirically know to be fictitious as concerns physical/emotional is real.
This can be done consciously for experimental or learning purposes or can become an uncontrolled reaction as in rage-quits or stalking/harassing in multiperson environs.
Neither of these environs actually require interaction with any other human, only enough stimulation to satisfy the differences in people seeking action/sensation or verbal/sensation stimulation (typically male/female). The key is the person tends to dissociate their body in favor of their avatar (provided or imagined).
For easily accessible members of each clade you can examine multiplayer gamebois and the women who become personally invested in soap operas.
"How does the haptic vest work when the enemy is winning?"
Watch the movie "Ready Player 1" to see how haptics may work. I think that's the sort of thing Meta is working towards.
If you are wearing a haptic vest while playing a FPS (first person shooter) and are shot in the shoulder, a poke from a haptic vest could be the physical reminder you need to retreat, bandage up, not die, and continue fighting which may result in you winning. During FPS play there is often so much visual and auditory information to process that a physical cue could mean the difference between virtual life and death.
"I've never used virtual reality, but shouldn't it be possible for the user to flick a switch that turns off the haptic vest so that the other player can't impose the feeling of touching on you?"
That's so lame. What's needed is a button you can push so the other player receives an electrical shock in his priaptic underwear. It's called a "zappie in the priappie".
"If you are having virtual sex with an anonymous person on-line, it is probably another guy."
Not that there's anything wrong with that!
Ben Bova's "The Duelling Machine."
When virtual reality gets real.
I'm sure that there are leftist loons getting sexually harassed in their own dreams at this point.
At least they haven't been able to file any lawsuits.
Yet.
Maybe Sloppy Joe Biden can create a federal task force to investigate this virtual groping of women. I'm sure he'd love to learn all about it.
is it Matrix or is it Metaverse to replace asking "Is it live, or is it Memorex = who touched me?"
Maybe Sloppy Joe Biden can create a federal task force to investigate this virtual groping of women. I'm sure he'd love to learn all about it.
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he is beta-testing [the headset and hand gloves] in the basement as we speak
Q: can a customized/personalized Metaverse be built to help demetia / Alzheimers patients?
Narayanan said...
Q: can a customized/personalized Metaverse be built to help demetia / Alzheimers patients?
Yes. They've been doing work on this for 15-20 years that I'm aware of
"Does the haptic vest make a difference?"
I would think so because we are no longer talking about just the idea of his touching her. He used technology on his end to get technology on her end to touch her. He touched her by remote control and got tactile feedback for his efforts. That's an unwanted touch.
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