Awhile back my brother suggested that "Please seed" would a catchy name for a blog, or perhaps a band or something. I heartily agreed. If you don't know what that means, think BitTorrent.

There really is power in a name, even if it's "just" perception, because even if that's more than some people care to believe, perception quickly becomes their reality. We use names to uniquely label, catalog, and identity not just the human race, but all life.

I haven't written many works by any great stretch, but I've been more inspired recently. Following up on "The last lyrebirds", I've been thinking of penning more speculative fiction. Have you heard of Dalian Hansen's Anima? I haven't read the whole book, but what I've seen of the idea and execution thus far is to be commended. The cover art is wicked, something that belongs on depthCORE, and it's intriguing to me because 26 years ago, Vernor Vinge released True Names, featuring a fictional online world, and which was regarded as being prophetic. And if you know that, you prolly know about Snow Crash, too. Production breeds production, rite?

Well here we have ourselves in the present-day, where fictional stories are being written about real virtual worlds (deliberately loopy wording), and sources of inspiration are considerably closer, and in some respects, meta-tangible.

Where it gets particularly exciting for me is when imagery supplements the text. I'm a fan of well-crafted, well-written children's books, in part because few words often complement — and hold great power alongside — gorgeous pictures. I loved sitting in class and listening to the teacher read, and then, they do that thing where you lick your finger to turn the page… so crisp…

And yet, those pictures are literally two-dimensional, flat. There's always a beauty with less detailed forms of visualization after we've long surpassed it (e.g., monochrome photography and pixelart come to mind), but advancing art and our emotional experiences in reaction means continuing to experiment with form & function.

What I'm saying here is I'd like to see a pop-up book made about Second Life, or within it. Pop-up books are freakin' awesome! If you disagree, you're wrong. One reason behind my fondness for pop-up books is because they're sort of an odd hybrid between the 2 and 3 dimensions: sure, they traditionally take on the appearance of a book like any other, perhaps wider if bold landscapes are contained within, but the actual slats are flat pages, propped up in a not dissimilar way to so many textured plants in Second Life. A cardboard cutout effect.

But since we aren't confined to physical space in SL, there's so much more we can do. We have some great facsimiles of conventional books inworld, THiNC Presses being prominent amongst them, and I'd be blown away if someone created an object that looks like a vintage hardbound tome at first, but when you click it, it expands to encompass the floor, grows into dimensions bigger in an average house, then places you inside the story.

We've had simulated holodecks inworld too, and they're fun, and SL certainly has its share of whimsical imagery, as well as shifting builds like Seifert Surface's crooked house, but what I'm envisioning is not just seeing the world as an end experience, but a more dynamically-transforming way to traverse linear tales with your own interpretation, at your own pace. Flip a page, watch your surroundings change before your eyes and move into place, and go deeper. Not just texture walls, but entire environments would arrange for your exploration. Glowing text or even a voice narration would highlight the particular passage, encouraging you to explore, not just suspend but strangle your disbelief, and indulge in the richness.

It could happen.