From NineShifter Suzanne Kart: "I had an interesting thing happen this week in the business communications class that I am teaching this semester that I wanted to share with you. My students did presentations on "cultural communications." One 20-year-old male student did his presentation on the communications culture of online gaming. I don't know how much you know about this topic (I knew VERY little before the presentation), but people play games in virtual worlds on line. This is not online gambling, but online games. According to my student, 85% are male and most are between the ages of 19-24.
Anyway, in these worlds they are able to use different technologies to express themselves, because obviously they can't really see each other. They are basically working on virtual facial expressions (if I understood this kid correctly). The technology is evolving rapidly.
The reason that I thought this may be of interest is that 1) The Nine Shift addressed concerns over a perceived lack of "human interaction" for people working from home. 2) Your blog has talked extensively about how boys are ahead of everyone in technology. 3) I believe I heard you say that kids instinctively play at things they will need to know as adults. It occurred to me that these boys/young men are developing the technology to express themselves (better human interaction) in the virtual world through their "play." I even told this student that even though we don't know exactly what this means now, I would guarantee that in 10 years (5 years?) we will be able to draw a direct line from this developing technology used for play to the technology used for work."
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