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Startup Magic Leap Hires Sci-Fi Writer Neal Stephenson As Chief Futurist

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the planning-for-the-future dept.

First time accepted submitter giulioprisco writes Magic Leap, a secretive Florida augmented reality startup that raised $542 million in October, hired renowned science fiction writer Neal Stephenson as its "Chief Futurist." Stephenson offers hints at the company's technology and philosophy: "Magic Leap is bringing physics, biology, code, and design together to build a system that is going to blow doors open for people who create things." According to the Magic Leap website, their Dynamic Digitized Lightfield Signal technology permits generating images indistinguishable from real objects.

48 comments

  1. Wow! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Doors being BLOWN OPEN!! For people who CREATE THINGS!!!

    BUt but but but I thought 3D printing was the game changer??

    Oh my, people blowing doors open and changing games!

    What a brave new world that has such wonders in it!

  2. More hype - by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    than you can shake a holographic stick at. Go Go VR bubble.

  3. I believe it! by QilessQi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    According to the Magic Leap website, their Dynamic Digitized Lightfield Signal technology permits generating images indistinguishable from real objects.

    ...provided the real objects are themselves images. Look! That simulated JPEG looks exactly like a real JPEG!

    --
    Koans and fables for the software engineer
    1. Re:I believe it! by nicoleb_x · · Score: 1

      It's probably BS, but what isn't?

    2. Re:I believe it! by Aighearach · · Score: 4, Informative

      Yes, actually to be honest that doesn't sound like you uncovered a secret meaning, that sounds like the top shelf, most obvious understanding of exactly what they literally said, which turns out to mean just what it sounds like.

      If you've ever seen big-budget films with CGI, and low-budget films with CGI, then you can understand that current technology does not include a system that automatically includes generated images that look real. Or as you put it, that look like "simulated JPEGs." Using current tech, the systems just don't do that. You have generate the objects, and then fiddle with every frame and if you spend millions of dollars per scene, you can finally make it close to seamless. They're talking about doing it without extra post-CGI processing and prettying. In that world, the low-budget films would have perfect generated objects because it would be a basic tool capability and not a human-intensive artistic process.

    3. Re:I believe it! by rtb61 · · Score: 2

      Generating the images is technically very easy the real problem in animation is generating the motion, the interaction between animated objects. The logical push in that direction is the creation of virtual robots, digital actors that would act out the animation script (not just people, but all movable artefacts). Once the motion and interaction is established and achieves the desired story telling goal, it is just a repeated process of adding more and more visual finishes on the existing interactions.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    4. Re:I believe it! by synaptik · · Score: 1

      Ceci n'est pas une pipe.

      --
      HSJ$$*&#^!#+++ATH0
      NO CARRIER
    5. Re:I believe it! by jeffmeden · · Score: 1

      According to the Magic Leap website, their Dynamic Digitized Lightfield Signal technology permits generating images indistinguishable from real objects.

      ...provided the real objects are themselves images. Look! That simulated JPEG looks exactly like a real JPEG!

      I read it more like "this new gizmo permits generating anything! As long as you have some other way of generating it, then this thing won't get in the way at all!"

      The word "enables" sounds more like technology that actually does something, and even that's a stretch. The word "permits" sounds like it's just a link in an otherwise useless chain.

    6. Re:I believe it! by QilessQi · · Score: 3, Funny

      I was actually going for the +1 Funny. How the heck did I get modded Insightful? :-(

      --
      Koans and fables for the software engineer
    7. Re:I believe it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Ceci n'est pas une pipe."

      Suceur de bites!

    8. Re:I believe it! by oldmac31310 · · Score: 1

      Elle a chaud au cul

      --
      http://www.acetonestudio.com
    9. Re:I believe it! by QilessQi · · Score: 1

      Ah, there we go.

      --
      Koans and fables for the software engineer
  4. The killer application is .... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    their Dynamic Digitized Lightfield Signal technology permits generating images indistinguishable from real objects

    Pron. Obviously. If it works, the pron would be awesome.

    1. Re:The killer application is .... by easyTree · · Score: 1

      Yep, you could use it to generate pron scenarios involving lifelike fake-boobs, -lips, -butts, -affection.

      --
      Requiem for the American Dream
  5. Jobs Lives by saccade.com · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Wow, $0.5B of investment without even showing a product? It sounds like they've perfected the Reality Distortion Field.

    1. Re:Jobs Lives by Aighearach · · Score: 1

      We have no idea what they showed people. Maybe they showed prototypes, maybe they only showed business plans. It is a known unknown that is given away in the summary by the word "secretive."

    2. Re:Jobs Lives by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      They have showed the product, just not publicly.

  6. Does all "Leap" = hype? by iMadeGhostzilla · · Score: 2

    Leap Motion was heavily overhyped and after $40M of investments they produced basically nothing useful. I'm very skeptical of companies that only talk about how great product they *will* have, and this hire goes squarely in that direction. Apple at least keep quit until they have something that works.

    Another Leap in this category is Sinclair's QL -- though I'd take it any day over these other Leaps in their current form.

    1. Re:Does all "Leap" = hype? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Most investment is in crap and hype. Very rarely there is something more than crap in a business plan, but in these rare cases the returns are so spectacular compared to the returns on crap, that investors are motivated into buying into ever more crap.

    2. Re:Does all "Leap" = hype? by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

      There was Quantum Leap.

      --
      systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
    3. Re:Does all "Leap" = hype? by nitehawk214 · · Score: 1

      There was Quantum Leap.

      So... yes?

      --
      I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
  7. The Augmetaverse by elysiuan · · Score: 1

    He is not seeing real people, of course. This is all a part of the moving illustration drawn by his computer according to specifications coming down the fiber-optic cable. The people are pieces of software called avatars. They are the audiovisual bodies that people use to communicate with each other in the Metaverse. Hiro's avatar is now on the Street, too, and if the couples coming off the monorail look over in his direction, they can see him, just as he's seeing them. They could strike up a conversation: Hiro in the U-Stor-It in L.A. and the four teenagers probably on a couch in a suburb of Chicago, each with their own laptop. But they probably won't talk to each other, any more than they would in Reality. These are nice kids, and they don't want to talk to a solitary crossbreed with a slick custom avatar who's packing a couple of swords.

    So this is it. The metaverse end-game, except instead of The Street we just get 'the street you are standing on' with your retinas being sprayed with lurid depictions of pedestrians who've configured themselves to show up as their desired sex, weight, hair color, dick size, fursonas, or favorite Naruto outfit.

  8. I imagine by jtownatpunk.net · · Score: 1

    I imagine they'll keep him in a cage like an Oompa Loompa. They'll throw some leaves in his cage and poke him with a stick right before the tour group comes thru.

  9. Re:A pity by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Insightful

    He's smart enough to accept money for a minor bit of marketing.

  10. Ashton Kutcher wasn't available by Eponymous+Coward · · Score: 2

    I'm thinking Stephenson was second choice because Lenovo already hired Ashton Kutcher to be a product engineer.

  11. OT, but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm sick of the word 'code'. I realize from the context he's referring to computer software, but 'code' could mean genetic code, code word, cryptographic encoding, etc etc etc.

    I wish people, or at least nerds, would stick to words like 'programmer', 'program', and 'software'.

    1. Re:OT, but by camg188 · · Score: 1

      I'm sick of the word 'code'.

      App

  12. Neal Stephenson by mseeger · · Score: 2

    Hah, he is just hoping they will finish Clang! for him in order to save him from angry investors....

  13. Back at t'skooil by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    If I'd told the careers adviser that I wanted to be a futurist I'd have got a clip round the ear and been sent to the headmaster. And when the other kids found out, they'd have given me a sound shoeing for being a right ponce.

    Still, nice work if you can get it.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  14. Yesterday's Dilbert was exactly about this by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    On http://dilbert.com/2014-12-17/ Scot Adams tells us on his funny way what he thinks about jobs that rely on guessing the future.

  15. Extra Paycheck by skam240 · · Score: 1

    I guess he needed an extra paycheck after writing that pile of awfull, Reamde.

    I made it 2/3rds deep before I realized I was wasting my life

    --
    I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
    1. Re:Extra Paycheck by drinkypoo · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      I made it 2/3rds deep before I realized I was wasting my life

      And that you could have just read TINAG.

      I read quickly, because I'm good at it, so I enjoyed Reamde. But if you're slow, you might need to try another author.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    2. Re:Extra Paycheck by neminem · · Score: 1

      I enjoyed enough of Reamde that I didn't feel like it was a waste reading it. I did feel like it was essentially 3 different novels with 3 very different feels trying to coexist, and I liked two of them a lot more than the third, but overall, I thought it was a fun read. (That said, you chose a good time to stop reading, as the last third contained a higher ratio of the stuff I didn't think was as interesting.)

    3. Re:Extra Paycheck by skam240 · · Score: 1

      Does being a good reader mean you like a crappy book or do you just have poor taste? Has your mother confirmed your good reader status?

      And for the record, I think it's just super you are such a good reader. Good for you!

      --
      I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
    4. Re:Extra Paycheck by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      And for the record, I think it's just super you are such a good reader. Good for you!

      It's too bad that you're so defensive about your lack of reading ability that you had to cry about it here.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    5. Re:Extra Paycheck by skam240 · · Score: 1

      Just to make sure I'm following what you're getting at

      Disliking a crappy book = poor reading ability?
      Liking a crappy book = good reading ability?
      Calling a book crappy and making fun of you for making claims that sound like they're coming from a first grader = being defensive of own reading ability?

      --
      I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
  16. Way hey! The good old days are back! by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    Product schmoduct. They'll make it up on volume, or something like that.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  17. Re: A pity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Shut up

  18. Futurist...dumbest/easiest "job" in the world by dywolf · · Score: 1

    I hate when people are described as "futurists" and then presented as some sort of authority or given a salary with the title.

    Nothing but a long con.

    --
    The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
    1. Re:Futurist...dumbest/easiest "job" in the world by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 1

      I hate when people are described as "futurists" and then presented as some sort of authority or given a salary with the title.

      So do I. Because I didn't think of it first....

      Nothing but a long con.

      Yeppers. WIsh I could get in on it....

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
    2. Re:Futurist...dumbest/easiest "job" in the world by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      that's the problem with being burdened by integrity

  19. Re: A pity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Neal, if only you were always that concise.

  20. Prediction: company changes direction by asz1596 · · Score: 2

    I fully expect the company will soon be subverted into working on a swordplay game.

  21. Oh, great by ag4vr · · Score: 2

    Maybe as a first project, they can simulate Qwghlm for us.

  22. Re: A pity by gweihir · · Score: 1

    And the moron-fraction makes its expected appearance....

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
  23. Re: A pity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    STFU