SHAMELESS REPOST NUMBER 2
palegray.net recommends a piece by Bruce Schneier up at Wired. Schneier addresses the central fallacy of the "transparent society" idea promoted by David Brin, and also takes on the flawed arguments that attempt to justify increased government monitoring of citizens. From the article:
"If I disclose information to you, your power with respect to me increases. One way to address this power imbalance is for you to similarly disclose information to me. We both have less privacy, but the balance of power is maintained. But this mechanism fails utterly if you and I have different power levels to begin with."
Anyone care to give an opinion in the light of quantum cryptography and time sequency.
Trickfox
Shameless repost 3
JOURNAL OF ELECTRONIC COMMERCE RESEARCH: SPECIAL ISSUE ON VIRTUAL WORLDS
CALL FOR PAPERS
Special Issue on Virtual Worlds
Submissions due: November 1, 2007
Scheduled Publication date: August 2008
Overview:
The emergence of virtual worlds and Web 3.D change the way of
doing business. Web 3.D is the synonym for Internet-based virtual
worlds, where people can create own 3-D *virtual*
personalities. Virtual Worlds such as Second Life and others are
undergoing an evolution similar to that of the Internet in the
mid nineties and might impact profoundly the way people
cooperate, communicate, collaborate, and conduct business. The
recent entering of companies such as Toyota, American Apparel,
Nissan, or Adidas indicate the upcoming role of this platform for
the next generation of conducting electronic business. This call
for papers is intended to cover a wide range of business and
research topics that fall within the broad description of
activities, challenges, opportunities, applications, innovations
and implications associated with Virtual Worlds as the emerging
new online business landscape.
Purpose of the Special Issue:
The purpose of this special issue is to encourage discussion and
communication of important research issues that underpin Virtual
Worlds as an important aspect of e-commerce and to showcase
interesting and significant research work in this critical area.
Specifically this issues is focusing on business and legal issues
of doing business in Virtual Worlds. Of particular relevance to
the described focus are papers about business models, marketing,
promotion, pricing, customer integration, consumer behavior,
legal, cultural and cross-cultural research. The issue, however,
will not be restricted to these topics; rather, it welcomes
reports of theoretical or empirical research that examines
pertinent business issues related to Virtual Worlds e-commerce.
This special issue will be of interest to researchers,
governments, small and large businesses, marketing and PR
companies among others.
List of possible topics are:
* Product Development and Testing in Virtual Worlds
* Image, Branding, Advertising in Virtual Worlds
* Marketing in Virtual World
* Avatar-based Marketing
* Promotion of Virtual Goods in Virtual Worlds
* Pricing of Virtual Goods in Virtual Worlds
* Selling, Cross-Selling Real and Virtual Worlds
* Business Planning for Non-profits in Virtual Worlds
* Fundraising and Virtual Worlds
* Convergence of Real and Virtual Worlds
* Customer Integration and Virtual Worlds
* Technology, Business, Strategy in Virtual Worlds
* Financial Systems, Investments, Currency Exchange Real
and Virtual Worlds
* Emerging Media Presence in Virtual Worlds
* Consumer Behavior, Consumer Acceptance and Virtual
Worlds
* Trust, Cross-Cultural Studies and Virtual Worlds
* Intellectual Property, Copyright, Trademarks and Virtual
Worlds
Wait till they finally understand what the singularity really is.
All of this will start to make sense.
What if you don't know that I am just someone else's avatar (TRAVATAR,-working intelligent robot)?
If I live in that other "virtual world" you may never understand that.
Trickfox