by Will Emaus

Created on: July 22, 2010

I've been telling my dad for almost 10 years now to get on the internet.

Why?

How many people do you know that buy magazines, books, look up old newspaper clippings, search for images, watch old history based TV shows, love to see clips of historical or cultural events from the past; want to write about those experiences...

...and spend their entire retirement pursuing all of the above without logging into a computer?

The internet changed the world. In my case it became possible to actually turn off my TV set; an experience I was regarding more and more as a bad drug or an almost evil sort of mind control tool; and I just did everything online instead.

Sure, it was difficult at first, early in the 2000's, to try and connect with certain things like sporting events. But I also came to discover that most sports were likewise just some sort of numbing sort of mind candy that was taking me away from items that were actually more important to me.

Now, if there's something I absolutely "have" to see, I'll find a place to watch it online. And usually, the pertinent clips of whatever took place during a televised live event I can find online shortly after the fact.

We can research anything online; I cannot begin to imagine the sort of library I would have needed to learn all of the things that I have learned by just logging on and searching for whatever topic or item interested me at night.

I could use online webcams to visit places and see sunsets that would have cost me thousands of dollars to see in person; the internet has proved to be a tool that can take the place of virtually everything; except to actually do something.

Oh, it tries to do that too. Microsoft's new online gaming tool, to come out soon, has a motion based component that can actually make you feel like you're kicking a soccer ball by kicking in front of the screen.

Of course, you could actually go outside and really kick a real soccer ball too, but the potential to do certain things that maybe you can't just go outside and do is there too which really is very exciting.

I imagine one day that we will have an entire online world to contend with. If I had the time, money or inclination, I wouldn't mind trying to create something like that.

We have online worlds like Second Life today, but they are still very much cartoon like and don't really have all of the accessories needed to be a complete online world.

You can imagine an online world in which all of your Facebook needs could be met within the world; housing all of your music, being able to watch "live" concerts by getting an online ticket and going to a virtual concert hall; MMO's built into the world all with a single ID and avatar that you could just walk into whenever you wanted; virtual places that you could visit connecting to webcams that would give you the opportunity to experience virtual visits of real places in this world.

And then the information; all arranged in a sort of library fashion for you to be able to browse from the privacy of your computer.

It's all coming one day; we will have a real world and an online world for people to choose from. There is virtually nothing left that you cannot access or achieve online.

Did my dad ever go online?

Yeah, he finally did it this year. He finally realized that his house filled with materials to meet his desires was already resident within the confines of an internet browser. He's happier than ever, and I have fun watching him have fun with it all.

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