Very interesting and important article. Thanks! We definitely need to pay more attention to ethics, and a lot of other areas touched by VR. VR is going to be way, way, way bigger than people think. This topic is critically important to our society.

I agree with a lot of what the author is saying but not all of it. Biggest disagreement is alluding to the metaverse (I read Snow Crash in 1992), there won’t be one VR universe or metaverse, there will be many virtual spaces and environments. Facebook is trying to build the largest social space ever, anticipating as much as a billion users.

Virtual spaces will become as common as websites, but they will be more effective with way more engagement. Just like there are very positive and very negative websites, VR spaces will have the same kind of diversity the web has now… which is a LOT.

VR is the most powerful medium ever, because it engages the whole sensorium. Americans spend 5 hours a day watching TV, and gamers spend an average of 22 hours a week playing video games. VR will have a much bigger pull on the population and our society than TV or video games.

I do have a few issues with the article. A lot of this already exists: “In either situation, we’d be more likely to come out of experience agreeing with the political agenda of the group.” Just like TV does today.

“Beyond societal desensitization is a more targeted desensitization: murder training simulators.” Already happening…they don’t call a large number of video games “shooters” for nothing… “If the experience is real enough, it could be a traumatic event.”… people have already died of a heart attack playing video games…

Yes, VR will have many ethical, psychological, social, and global implications. We’re not paying enough attention to this, so in that regard this is an important article, even if it does miss the point a few times.