8,544 research outputs found

    The Metaverse: Survey, Trends, Novel Pipeline Ecosystem & Future Directions

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    The Metaverse offers a second world beyond reality, where boundaries are non-existent, and possibilities are endless through engagement and immersive experiences using the virtual reality (VR) technology. Many disciplines can benefit from the advancement of the Metaverse when accurately developed, including the fields of technology, gaming, education, art, and culture. Nevertheless, developing the Metaverse environment to its full potential is an ambiguous task that needs proper guidance and directions. Existing surveys on the Metaverse focus only on a specific aspect and discipline of the Metaverse and lack a holistic view of the entire process. To this end, a more holistic, multi-disciplinary, in-depth, and academic and industry-oriented review is required to provide a thorough study of the Metaverse development pipeline. To address these issues, we present in this survey a novel multi-layered pipeline ecosystem composed of (1) the Metaverse computing, networking, communications and hardware infrastructure, (2) environment digitization, and (3) user interactions. For every layer, we discuss the components that detail the steps of its development. Also, for each of these components, we examine the impact of a set of enabling technologies and empowering domains (e.g., Artificial Intelligence, Security & Privacy, Blockchain, Business, Ethics, and Social) on its advancement. In addition, we explain the importance of these technologies to support decentralization, interoperability, user experiences, interactions, and monetization. Our presented study highlights the existing challenges for each component, followed by research directions and potential solutions. To the best of our knowledge, this survey is the most comprehensive and allows users, scholars, and entrepreneurs to get an in-depth understanding of the Metaverse ecosystem to find their opportunities and potentials for contribution

    Supernatural crossing in Republican Chinese fiction, 1920s–1940s

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    This dissertation studies supernatural narratives in Chinese fiction from the mid-1920s to the 1940s. The literary works present phenomena or elements that are or appear to be supernatural, many of which remain marginal or overlooked in Sinophone and Anglophone academia. These sources are situated in the May Fourth/New Culture ideological context, where supernatural narratives had to make way for the progressive intellectuals’ literary realism and their allegorical application of supernatural motifs. In the face of realism, supernatural narratives paled, dismissed as impractical fantasies that distract one from facing and tackling real life. Nevertheless, I argue that the supernatural narratives do not probe into another mystical dimension that might co-exist alongside the empirical world. Rather, they imagine various cases of the characters’ crossing to voice their discontent with contemporary society or to reflect on the notion of reality. “Crossing” relates to characters’ acts or processes of trespassing the boundary that separates the supernatural from the conventional natural world, thus entailing encounters and interaction between the natural and the supernatural. The dissertation examines how crossing, as a narrative device, disturbs accustomed and mundane situations, releases hidden tensions, and discloses repressed truths in Republican fiction. There are five types of crossing in the supernatural narratives. Type 1 is the crossing into “haunted” houses. This includes (intangible) human agency crossing into domestic spaces and revealing secrets and truths concealed by the scary, feigned ‘haunting’, thus exposing the hidden evil and the other house occupiers’ silenced, suffocated state. Type 2 is men crossing into female ghosts’ apparitional residences. The female ghosts allude to heart-breaking, traumatic experiences in socio-historical reality, evoking sympathetic concern for suffering individuals who are caught in social upheavals. Type 3 is the crossing from reality into the characters’ delusional/hallucinatory realities. While they physically remain in the empirical world, the characters’ abnormal perceptions lead them to exclusive, delirious, and quasi-supernatural experiences of reality. Their crossings blur the concrete boundaries between the real and the unreal on the mental level: their abnormal perceptions construct a significant, meaningful reality for them, which may be as real as the commonly regarded objective reality. Type 4 is the crossing into the netherworld modelled on the real world in the authors’ observation and bears a spectrum of satirised objects of the Republican society. The last type is immortal visitors crossing into the human world. This type satirises humanity’s vices and destructive potential. The primary sources demonstrate their writers’ witty passion to play with super--natural notions and imagery (such as ghosts, demons, and immortals) and stitch them into vivid, engaging scenes using techniques such as the gothic, the grotesque, and the satirical, in order to evoke sentiments such as terror, horror, disgust, dis--orientation, or awe, all in service of their insights into realist issues. The works also creatively tailor traditional Chinese modes and motifs, which exemplifies the revival of Republican interest in traditional cultural heritage. The supernatural narratives may amaze or disturb the reader at first, but what is more shocking, unpleasantly nudging, or thought-provoking is the problematic society and people’s lives that the supernatural (misunderstandings) eventually reveals. They present a more compre--hensive treatment of reality than Republican literature with its revolutionary consciousness surrounding class struggle. The critical perspectives of the supernatural narratives include domestic space, unacknowledged history and marginal individuals, abnormal mentality, and pervasive weaknesses in humanity. The crossing and supernatural narratives function as a means of better understanding the lived reality. This study gathers diverse primary sources written by Republican writers from various educational and political backgrounds and interprets them from a rare perspective, thus filling a research gap. It promotes a fuller view of supernatural narratives in twentieth-century Chinese literature. In terms of reflecting the social and personal reality of the Republican era, the supernatural narratives supplement the realist fiction of the time

    Pocket size interactive films: Embedding the mobile devices’ features, characteristics and affordances into filmic interactive narratives.

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    Throughout the history of interactive film, creators have experimented with different modes of interaction to allow for the viewers’ agency. As interactive films have not yet established a standardised form, projects have continually been shaped by new technology. Over time, viewers have shifted from the cinema, to televisions, the personal computer and recently the mobile device. These devices further extend the interactive capabilities that are at the creators’ disposal. Therefore, this thesis proposes that mobile devices could facilitate new forms of interactive film that make use of these features. This study investigates the integration of the mobile devices’ characteristics, features and affordances into an interactive film project that is both viewed and interacted with on a mobile device. First and foremost, it establishes whether the mobile device can be successfully used by authors to relay interactive films. Secondly, it gives insights into design considerations for authors that aim to make use of the mobile devices’ features. Additionally, the thesis gathers insights into the use of game-engine technology for developing similar interactive film projects. The research begins with a literature review establishing the historical and academic context in regards to interactive- films, narratives, and interfaces, thereby focussing on mobile devices. Consecutively, a selection of projects is surveyed to garner insights into the current state of the art. These sections are then used to inform the practice-based part of this thesis in which the production of an interactive film project will be comprehensively documented. A concurrent think-aloud usability test, accompanied by a reflection on the outcomes and production process will conclude the research. The outcome suggests that mobile devices can act as successful vessels for interactive narratives. However, usability tests as well as reflection reveal that the thesis project cannot be strictly classified as an interactive film. Therefore, suggestions for future research as well as insights into the retention of filmic quality can be made in retrospect. Additionally, The use of game-engines for interactive film authoring proves to allow creators rapid prototyping and ease of implementation. Though their use might impact projects by over-complicating interaction paradigms more extensively used in game production.Media files notes: Project Documentation of Creations; an interactive short film for the mobile device. Media rights: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.

    Actes du troisiĂšme colloque annuel du dĂ©partement d’anthropologie, UniversitĂ© de MontrĂ©al 2021

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    Regards croisĂ©s sur l’esprit est le troisiĂšme volume des Actes du Colloque Annuel du DĂ©partement d’Anthropologie de l’UniversitĂ© de MontrĂ©al (CADA). Le volume rassemble cinq des treize communications prĂ©sentĂ©es lors du colloque diffusĂ© exceptionnellement en ligne du 22 au 25mars 2021 en raison de la pandĂ©mie de la Covid-19. Cet Ă©vĂ©nement a montrĂ© que les confĂ©rences virtuelles reprĂ©sentent une alternative qui garantit le dynamisme de la recherche Ă©tudiante.Le monde des esprits chez les Maseual-Nahua de la Sierra Norte de Puebla, Mexique : le traitement de l’épouvante (nemoujtil) comme rĂ©vĂ©lateur / Pierre Beaucage ; Quand le chercheur voit des esprits /Deirdre Meintel ; L’Esprit saint : d’un espace d’intersubjectivitĂ© Ă  un acteur social / Guillaume Boucher ; Conscience de la mort : pensĂ©e symbolique, rites funĂ©raires et quĂȘte d’immortalitĂ© / Émilie Lessard et MĂ©lissa Bernard ; Aesthetics Before Art / Thomas Wyn

    How to Be a God

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    When it comes to questions concerning the nature of Reality, Philosophers and Theologians have the answers. Philosophers have the answers that can’t be proven right. Theologians have the answers that can’t be proven wrong. Today’s designers of Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games create realities for a living. They can’t spend centuries mulling over the issues: they have to face them head-on. Their practical experiences can indicate which theoretical proposals actually work in practice. That’s today’s designers. Tomorrow’s will have a whole new set of questions to answer. The designers of virtual worlds are the literal gods of those realities. Suppose Artificial Intelligence comes through and allows us to create non-player characters as smart as us. What are our responsibilities as gods? How should we, as gods, conduct ourselves? How should we be gods

    AIUCD 2022 - Proceedings

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    L’undicesima edizione del Convegno Nazionale dell’AIUCD-Associazione di Informatica Umanistica ha per titolo Culture digitali. Intersezioni: filosofia, arti, media. Nel titolo ù presente, in maniera esplicita, la richiesta di una riflessione, metodologica e teorica, sull’interrelazione tra tecnologie digitali, scienze dell’informazione, discipline filosofiche, mondo delle arti e cultural studies

    Platform protocol place: a practice-based study of critical media art practice (2007-2020)

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    This practice-based research project focuses on critical media art practices in contemporary digital culture. The theoretical framework employed in this inquiry draws from the work of the Frankfurt School, in particular Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception. Using Adorno & Horkheimer’s thesis as a theoretical guide, this research project formulates the concept of the digital culture industry - a concept that refers to the contemporary era of networked capitalism, an era defined by the unprecedented extraction, accumulation and manipulation of data and the material and digital infrastructures that facilitate it. This concept is used as a framing mechanism that articulates certain techno-political concerns within networked capitalism and responds to them through practice. The second concept formulated within this research project is Platform Protocol Place. The function of this second concept is to frame and outline the body of practice-based work developed in this study. It is also used to make complex technological issues accessible and to communicate these issues through public exhibition and within this written thesis. The final concept developed in this research project is tactical media archaeology. This concept describes the techniques and approaches employed in the development of the body of practice-based work that are the central focus of this research project. This approach is a synthesis of two subfields of media art practice and theory, tactical media and media archaeology. Through practice, tactical media archaeology critiques the geopolitical machinations and systems beneath the networked devices and interfaces of the digital culture industry

    Interactive Sonic Environments: Sonic artwork via gameplay experience

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    The purpose of this study is to investigate the use of video-game technology in the design and implementation of interactive sonic centric artworks, the purpose of which is to create and contribute to the discourse and understanding of its effectiveness in electro-acoustic composition highlighting the creative process. Key research questions include: How can the language of electro-acoustic music be placed in a new framework derived from videogame aesthetics and technology? What new creative processes need to be considered when using this medium? Moreover, what aspects of 'play' should be considered when designing the systems? The findings of this study assert that composers and sonic art practitioners need little or no coding knowledge to create exciting applications and the myriad of options available to the composer when using video-game technology is limited only by imagination. Through a cyclic process of planning, building, testing and playing these applications the project revealed advantages and unique sonic opportunities in comparison to other sonic art installations. A portfolio of selected original compositions, both fixed and open are presented by the author to complement this study. The commentary serves to place the work in context with other practitioners in the field and to provide compositional approaches that have been taken

    Buddhist Poetics, Beat “Cosmo-Politics,” and the Maker Ethos: Asian Americanist Critiques of Whiteness in Midcentury American Beat Writing

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    Buddhist Poetics, Beat “Cosmo-Politics,” and the Maker Ethos: Asian Americanist Critiques of Whiteness in Midcentury American Beat Writing employs Walter Benjamin’s notion of the “ruin”—which is not just a noun or notion, but also a verb, a mode of criticism—to intervene in the ostensibly well-trodden ground of what is known as “Beat literature.” The project broadly argues for the “ruination” of Beat literature, where ruination means not destruction or annihilation, but a return to an unkempt state (as in the image of a ruined building) that more accurately reflects this literature’s many layers of cultural, interpersonal, and transpacific exchange and extraction. Though many have rightly suggested that Beat literature is broadly Orientalist and transpacific in nature, I reveal the specific cultural appropriations, adaptations, and translations that occurred in this period and in these literary texts: the broadly East Asian cultural materials (like Zen Buddhism) so valued in Beat literature and its social communities were derived not solely from “the East” nor from translated Chinese and Japanese texts, but also from the Asians in America with whom Euro Americans were friends and worked alongside. My chapters on Asian diasporic poetry, letters, and autobiographical writing highlight Beat literature’s connections to ethnic studies, settler colonial studies, gender studies, and critical race theory, applying an interdisciplinary approach to text and culture and bringing forward the cultural productions and expertise of Asian/Americans during this midcentury period. Because I am suggesting the work of Asian/Americans be read alongside other canonical Beat texts, their work destabilizes or “ruins” Beat literature, which has been seen as a body of texts that articulate a political, anticapitalist critique of post-WWII and Cold War-era America, but which I show to be reflective of a specific, European American identity grounded in a politics that does not accommodate the effects of settler colonialism and imperialism. The seeming stability and coherence of the category of “Beat” has only been possible because the work of Asian/Americans in this period was erased, unacknowledged. My project’s major intervention may be found in its combination of critique—where I show how whiteness influenced Euro Americans’ artistic choices and cultural appropriations—and recovery, where I reveal from whom and how these appropriations occurred. Further, I suggest that we begin to analyze American Buddhist writing beyond the limited rubrics formerly available to us in “Beat” and avant-garde literatures and in their communities of reception
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