Apple Technology Review, Fall 1997: News

Virtual Humans on the Net

Matsushita Electric has developed new computer graphics software for creating animated virtual humans for use in Internet chat rooms. Currently, chat room occupants must make do with crudely designed "avatars" to represent themselves, but Matsushita's new technology imparts more human characteristics and allows the user to control its life-like movements, even to make it dance to music, using a "time stamp" that automatically adjusts the speed of the computer graphics rendering to the tempo of the tune. The company has submitted the technology to the VRML Consortium for consideration as an industry standard for 3D animation (TechWire, 30 Jul 97).

Interactive Online 3D

Interactive three-dimensional online technology will be used increasingly in four kinds of applications: electronic commerce, games, collaborative products, and training. Various industry groups and language designers are working steadily on definitions, object libraries, and facilities that would allow multiple users to interact in distributed 3D scenes. See http://www.livingworlds.com/ by the VRML Consortium and http://atlantic.merl.com/opencom/ by the Mitsubishi Electric Research Lab and the Universal Avatars Development Team. In electronic commerce, the Crowne Plaza corporation is using the technology to conduct virtual tours of its hotels (see http://www.crowneplaza.com/), and Virtual Horizons is developing virtual malls where customers can examine and purchase merchandise (see http://www.virtual1.com/). Several game companies are now allowing hundreds of users to play against each other on the Internet (see http://www.ten.net/ by Total Entertainment Network, http://www.dwango.com/ by Interactive Visual Systems, and http://www.mpath.com/ by Mpath Interactive). For collaborative projects, check out http://www.blacksun.com/, and for education and training take a look at http://www.hyperwave.com/ by Hyperwave Information Management, (Computer Magazine, Jul 97).

When Push Doesn't Come to Shove

Push technology, which allows Web sites to deliver content directly to a user's computer screen without that user having to surf for it, has potential for greatly increasing the information glut rather than alleviating it. Now companies are looking to the next-generation "push," which will enable Web site operators to gather and deliver information tailored more specifically to individual needs. "Push is just a delivery system mechanism so what arrives is what is sent," says the CEO of Autonomy Inc., an intelligent "push" software developer. "It doesn't actually address the problem of delivering the right information to the right people. It's almost like junk mail, because most of what gets pushed to you, you don't want to see. In a corporate environment, what you actually want each morning is not to be pushed 70 stories. You want to be pushed the three stories you really need to see. And they need to be as specific as your interest. If you're only interested in breeding rare South American orchids it needs to be able to be that specific" (Investor's Business Daily, 21 Jul 97).

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