Losing All Fear Of Wearable Devices (Or How I Began to Love My New Parietal Lobe)

It will become normal. I remember when I first came to New York and you'd see these people walking around talking to themselves, and I'd think "New York, right? Must be just another poor crazy person in the city." Then it dawned on me that they were talking on their cellphones via a headpiece as they walked. In retrospect, I can't see how I missed those large bulging earpieces from those days.

Wearable computing is the next step, and I think some of the technologies will progress beyond mere augmentations of ocular senses. For example, a small nugget that initially looks like a nose-piercing could in fact fan out a protective cover when, say, a foul odor such as someone passing gas is detected, protecting the wearer from having to experience that bad sensation. You laugh, but extrapolate, and similar sensors could shield the wearer from any harmful airborne toxins that may be making the rounds. Each piece must be carefully shaped to accommodate the nose it is intended for, creating a luxury business at the best of times and critical survival capability during the worst. Another change could be that instead of rings of diamond and gold--pretty to look at, but useless in function--betrothed would wear rings that if squeezed on one side of the world, would elicit that sense of touch right across the globe and she would know he was thinking of her (either that, or he spilled relish and mustard on his hand while eating a hot dog and was rubbing it all away with one of these 'under-sleeves' she had insisted he wear).

The step after that will be the trans-human phase, where the distinction between man and machine is entirely blurred. Vehicle manufacturers will either close down or be at the bleeding edge, offering humans the ability to travel at the speed of various vehicles, except without the vehicles--just their modified bodies. Employees at companies will be told to upgrade their eardrum with internally placed auditory motors which provide not only a constantly soothing corporate sound-collage, but also ensure that even those with worst natural sense of balance can do their job while walking a tight-rope. (Of course, savvy employees will have these hacked in the aftermarket with motors that help their bodies balance in such a way that they can step foot upon walls, and travel happily along the rooftop, upside down).

The tongue will be replaced with a sort of receptacle with a type of scoop that comes out and detects while projecting taste sensations at x1000 what we taste today (like the limits of human visual capability are known today, the limitations of the tongue will be exposed tomorrow, and surpassed).

Kissing a girl will never be the same again.

The Cohobitator

Several months ago:

(1:29:04 AM) FinalCoho: Name a worse company than PayPal. That's right. You can't.
(1:29:14 AM) riverfr0zen: enron
(1:29:14 AM) finalcoho is now known as FinalCoho.

Now, in Dolby Surround Sound:

(11:58:47 AM) riverfr0zen: i feel a very big asperger attack coming on
(11:59:08 AM) riverfr0zen: i thought the wave was over, but it is just beginning.
(11:59:48 AM) riverfr0zen: witness the universe converge at this juncture ...

(12:02:33 PM) FinalCoho: who the hell is this
(12:02:54 PM) riverfr0zen: i wonder the same thing about you.
(12:03:02 PM) riverfr0zen: why are you even in my buddy list?
(12:03:08 PM) FinalCoho: FreeloadingCoho (12:02:45 PM): i wonder the same thing about you.
(12:03:29 PM) riverfr0zen: what is a Coho?
(12:03:47 PM) FinalCoho: that what it says your screenname is
(12:04:25 PM) riverfr0zen: i don't see what is happening
(12:04:46 PM) riverfr0zen: what is your password to the internets?
(12:04:50 PM) FinalCoho: Its telling me your screenname is FreeloadingCoho
(12:04:59 PM) FinalCoho: i bet that isn't true
(12:05:05 PM) riverfr0zen: and you are a FinalCoho?
(12:05:06 PM) FinalCoho: are you running some kind of hacks
(12:05:21 PM) FinalCoho: lol, no i'm not
(12:05:28 PM) FinalCoho: funny though
(12:05:29 PM) riverfr0zen: i am hacking a lot of honeypots very simultaneously.
(12:06:04 PM) riverfr0zen: we are somehow caught up in this cohoverse
(12:06:07 PM) FinalCoho: ok so a quick google search tells me that the 2 of us are a victim of a (harmless) AIM Fishbot scheme
(12:06:19 PM) FinalCoho: http://nixiepixel.com/blog/index.php/aim-fish-bot-help
(12:07:09 PM) riverfr0zen: i don't know if i should subdue it, or simply let it continue.
(12:07:22 PM) riverfr0zen: it is rather amusing
(12:08:09 PM) FinalCoho: yes it is. This happens like once every couple weeks
(12:09:02 PM) FinalCoho: 2 random people are auto messaged somehow and the screenames are switched to a generated fish name ending in Trout Coho or Salmon
(12:09:09 PM) riverfr0zen: it is somewhat worrisome in that one does not know who one may be connected to. it could be a little kid, and one may cuss or swear at it.
(12:09:44 PM) FinalCoho: that goes with the territory of being online in itself
(12:10:34 PM) riverfr0zen: the only resort is to always be on one's best behaviour. but how long can that last?
(12:12:04 PM) FinalCoho: random person + ability to remain anonymous = personality swap
(12:12:33 PM) riverfr0zen: like the switch tyler durden speaks of
(12:12:48 PM) FinalCoho: precisely
(12:12:53 PM) riverfr0zen: it would be hilarious if you got connected to yourself
(12:13:02 PM) riverfr0zen: through this fine social system
(12:13:07 PM) FinalCoho: haha
(12:13:25 PM) FinalCoho: do you visit sites such as Digg
(12:13:49 PM) FinalCoho: i believe i read that it stems from similair social websites
(12:13:50 PM) riverfr0zen: i did in the past. not so much any more
(12:15:16 PM) riverfr0zen: i usually freely slap on my username for aim in all sorts of places. being a little tech savvy, i don't feel very threatened by what may hit me.
(12:15:50 PM) riverfr0zen: plus if the screen suddenly says that all the data is being deleted, i can simply revert to the latest revision.

(12:16:58 PM) FinalCoho: that sounds a little too cliche , like a computer virus from a hollywood movie "Deleting Data" with a skull and crossbones
(12:18:20 PM) riverfr0zen: you mean unlike a non-cliche computer virus with no presentational aspects? it just quietly snips things here and there, leaving the user befuddled over a slow and progressive scale?
(12:18:41 PM) riverfr0zen: a little bit like alzheimer's, i imagine

(12:20:59 PM) FinalCoho: most malicious things that people come across in today's internet are not really a virus but rather just intrusive malware that gets embedded into windows to detect user habits for browsing and advertising
(12:21:49 PM) riverfr0zen: i think the larger problem is that most people on the internet are intrusive malwares :)
(12:22:06 PM) FinalCoho: they don't know how to get rid of it because typically you have to go into safe-mode or the windows recovery console. Yeah that too, people suck
(12:22:46 PM) riverfr0zen: why do the antivirus guys not hire psychics?
(12:23:12 PM) riverfr0zen: if i was a big, rich antivirus software company, this would be my area of research. prescience.
(12:23:44 PM) FinalCoho: psychics do not exist
(12:24:04 PM) riverfr0zen: i agree on that. they claim to, but they probably don't actually.
(12:24:11 PM) FinalCoho: nobody is more spiritually inclined than the next
(12:24:59 PM) FinalCoho: it's like some guy who claims he has telekenesis because he sits on his farm in kansas and a piece of corn fell over
(12:24:59 PM) riverfr0zen: i'm not really talking about spirituality so much as the pre-occurence observational capability
(12:25:51 PM) FinalCoho: it's a fallacy
(12:25:56 PM) riverfr0zen: ha ha. when it was probably just a butterfly in hanoi that did it.
(12:27:15 PM) riverfr0zen: are you sure it is not even remotely possible?
(12:27:33 PM) FinalCoho: only if you recently watched the butterfly effect
(12:27:38 PM) riverfr0zen: i mean, we do get close with people such as kurzweil, etc
(12:27:55 PM) riverfr0zen: i didn't see that one. is that with jim carrey in it?
(12:28:17 PM) FinalCoho: no, that was with Ashton kutcher
(12:28:28 PM) riverfr0zen: that is probably why i didn't see it.
(12:29:11 PM) FinalCoho: I have not heard of kurzweil
(12:29:20 PM) riverfr0zen: but the butterfly effect is something that scientists have spent a lot of time on. it's not as trivial as just some movie concept.
(12:29:33 PM) FinalCoho: i am guessing there is a large age gap between us
(12:29:36 PM) riverfr0zen: kurzweil, who believes in transhumanism
(12:30:25 PM) FinalCoho: interesting, i am reading his Wiki page now
(12:30:35 PM) riverfr0zen: that very soon, it may not only be so cliche as 'machines take over', but that we *become* machines
(12:32:14 PM) FinalCoho: i doubt it
(12:32:26 PM) FinalCoho: something cosmic or a virus will kill human population before we get that far
(12:32:47 PM) riverfr0zen: that's a sort of glass half-empty view
(12:33:49 PM) riverfr0zen: i don't find pessimism to be as productive as optimism
(12:34:12 PM) riverfr0zen: it has its uses, but for me, it is not the state to exist within.
(12:34:57 PM) FinalCoho: have you ever heard of the theory of Lon Timing
(12:35:09 PM) FinalCoho: one time i lon timed
(12:36:23 PM) riverfr0zen: no, please educate me. is it like, a perjorative expression towards asians? like the silly 'me love u lon time' thing.
(12:36:24 PM) riverfr0zen: ?
(12:37:25 PM) FinalCoho: Hahah
(12:37:31 PM) FinalCoho: no but that is a great guess
(12:37:57 PM) FinalCoho: its a theory where sometimes you are time traveling and performing activities watching yourself from a third person point of view
(12:38:39 PM) FinalCoho: like when your stuck behind a volkswagen on the highway but your the one driving it
(12:38:58 PM) riverfr0zen: like some sort of astral projection variant
(12:39:42 PM) riverfr0zen: i imagine that people who play a lot of grand theft auto may somehow develop this trait
(12:41:13 PM) FinalCoho: i don't see the correlation
(12:42:29 PM) riverfr0zen: because that is exactly what you do in that game -- your viewpoint is stuck behind a (possibly) volkswagon as you drive through the highways
(12:42:56 PM) FinalCoho: do you play
(12:43:15 PM) riverfr0zen: not grand theft auto, no. but i play other games.
(12:43:35 PM) riverfr0zen: i'm learning chess right now. i'm horrible at it.

(12:46:21 PM) FinalCoho: yeah, i only like playing digital versions of chess where it tells me the available movements per piece
(12:46:53 PM) riverfr0zen: heh, yeah, that's how i started. since i didn't know how the pieces are actually supposed to move.
(12:47:29 PM) FinalCoho: watch out for those bishops, those guys can do some damage
(12:47:44 PM) riverfr0zen: i'm still on training wheels, though. using an app that won't let you make self-destructive moves, and where you can undo.