Third Dimension Beginning To Show Up In Cyberspace

Cyberspace was never meant to be limited to a measly two dimensions.

As envisioned by its sciencefiction progenitors, space as we know it in the corporeal world was vital to the virtual form of existence that would take shape on-line.

But constrained by technology - and perhaps a certain dearth of imagination - the electronic universe that millions of computer users now visit regularly has remained plastered to a flat screen.

Until now. Driven by advances in networking technology, a host of high-tech heavyweights and several small start-ups have begun injecting cyberspace with 3-D. And the spatial metaphor, if it catches on, could radically transform the on-line experience.

For one thing, proponents say it will make it a far more intuitive place for an inexperienced computer user to get around in.

Walking through the door of a virtual library and looking for a book on a shelf, for example, could be a less intimidating prospect for a new net-surfer than pointing and clicking on some random icon and being dizzily transported who-knows-where to the source of the information.

3-D could also alter the picture for those trying to sell stuff on the Net. Theater owners can use the technology to place a ticket-buyer in any seat in the house, and check out the view.

But perhaps more profoundly, the ability to inhabit a common space with others changes the very nature of a communication medium whose major virtue has been its ability to collapse distance.

Until now, the ability to form relationships with people across the country or access information from databases on the other end of town has always come at the sacrifice of the intimate sense of being in the same place with someone.

When that is no longer the case - when you can choose your own “avatar” to represent yourself and interact with people in virtual space almost as you would in real space - 3-D evangelizers predict the formation of stronger virtual communities and forms of expression that don’t come naturally in the medium as it currently exists.

“The Internet needs to be more like your grandmother’s house,” says Mark Pesce, co-author of a new protocol called Virtual Reality Modeling Language, or VRML, which allows users to create and navigate through 3-D spaces on the Net.

“VRML lets us sensualize our data,” continues Pesce, who has been known to give seances before his demonstrations of the software. “If the Internet is going to be the primary communication medium of the 21st century, then it has to allow us to express the things of memory, the things of emotion, the things that we really care about. And for that, 3-D just works better.”