At 07:00 PM 23/07/00 EDT, Greg wrote:
>Sasha Chislenko's concept of "enhanced reality" was the best description of
>the workings of such a system I've seen:
>
> http://www.lucifer.com/~sasha/EnhancedReality.html
Pretty nifty.
Around the same time, I dramatized this general idea in THE WHITE ABACUS:
==============
A more burly fellow wandered by, just visible within the display. Despite
the day's brightness and evident heat, he was lavishly clad, from his
broad, heavy shoes to his bulky sleeveless gown, furred in ermine. I
regarded him with some envy, conscious of my own nakedness. Under the gown
he wore waistcoat, jerkin, doublet opened at the bulging codpiece. His
massive arms, swinging, moved easily in sleeves slashed and puffed. It was
a formidable display. Fashion glosses flickered: Hans Holbein the Younger,
Henry VIII, items of garb orbiting an historic attractor in couture
data-space. The boy's gaze was fixed upon the spectacle, though not, I
began to realise, with admiration.
`Are you all deaf?' he shouted peevishly. `My luggage!'
The burly fellow frowned once. Striding past without moderating his pace,
he smiled through his square red-brown beard at the boy, nodded, glanced at
the luggage, quirked his lips in approval at the fine bags, sent the boy a
companionable wink, strolled on.
The recorded data stream lost a little crispness as the display widened to
keep them both in register. The boy was plainly agog at the burly man's
insolent disregard. I watched his fists clench, then tremblingly come
under control. He called more loudly.
`Citizen! The red singlet!'
This time the man paused in surprise, turned, touched his hat, brought it
closer to his right ear.
`Morning, petal.'
For an instant I, too, was confused. It seemed the fellow wore almost
every garment ever devised for a 16th century European gentleman, one on
top of the other, with the exception of a singlet. I understood, then,
with something of a shock, that the boy was somehow operating without
Gestell access.
Tsin said at the same moment, `You'll notice, Sen, that the young man is
in vanilla mode. No aks.'
The boy stood poised on the balls of his feet, beside his luggage,
shivering with controlled fury. His voice rose in pitch. `I have just
disembarked from orbit. Due to some extraordinary oversight I have not
been met.'
`That was you in the flying brick, was it?' The burly citizen was polite.
`Why don't you aks for help?' I plunged into the substrate tuple field,
fetched out his un-augmented appearance. He was indeed wearing a shabby
red singlet stained under the armpits in sweat, sloppy shorts of an
execrable tartan, and a pair of heavy walking boots. I let his eidolon
covered him again decently.
=============================
The notion was also described in Samuel R. Delany's astonishing novel STARS
IN MY POCKET LIKE GRAINS OF SAND, back in 1984.
Damien Broderick
[vanilla mode]
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