#tldr: THERE'S STILL GOOD IN THE WORLD MR FRODO

[aurosoul]

I just had a thought looking at Starfucker Super Trans 2000! A lot of the stuff I’ve seen you work on in AR has been human scale—I assume for practical reasons.

But theoretically, there’s no real reason you shouldn’t be able to create something and then scale it up to be big, right?

My first thought, of course, being that you could theoretically draw a version of Starfucker Super Trans in Figmin XR and then scale it up to actual size! (Though depending on the scale of the game you might need a nice field or parking lot for that XD)

My second thought being that if AR does become more commonplace like you dream, what an educational opportunity! I mean, it’s one thing to say “a blue whale is as long as two school buses put together”, and another to actually take your kid outside and plop down a life-sized model right in front of their eyes!

I think you’re right, AR really does have potential to make a lot of things more accessible. After all, technology tends to become cheaper and more available over time. Maybe someone can’t travel across the country to see a big museum, but they can rent an AR set and plop down a smithsonian dinosaur skeleton in a nearby parking lot!

And going back to the blue whale; giving kids these experiences with animals they might not be able to see otherwise can help give them an appreciation for nature, so they’re more motivated to preserve what’s right around them as they grow up! Say, draw them in with whales, and then show them the kind of fish that live in rivers around them and how beautiful they are too! Make a field trip of it!

AR just holds so much potential as a tool to introduce new experiences, I think. The way you use it especially gives me hope; your work has a feel of wonder to it.

One of my biggest concerns about AR is that it will have a similar effect as the internet, where we rely too much on it, moving too much from the physical world to the digital. You see studies as well that are finding developmental problems coming from not having enough interactions with the physical world. But, the way you mix your work with nature, talk about how while it could be used to replace some toys—making it easier to fulfill the remaining demand sustainably—it also can serve as an introduction for people to find interests they want to pursue more seriously with physical components… I really think we can introduce it to good effect.

I've been sitting on this ask for ages because I wanted to record a video showing a life-sized mech in response to it - but I just wanna say

YES, YES, A MILLION TIMES YES to ALL of this!!!!! 😭💖💖💖

messages like these are what makes my work so worth it, because every word of what you said here is EXACTLY what I'm trying to communicate with everything I do.

early on, the founder of Figmin XR (Javier Davalos) understood that people can't just be told that this technology will change the world for the better - they have to realize it for themselves. so he applied for the first Magic Leap grant, won it, and then got to work creating a software to help people do just that.

everything you've mentioned above is either already in development or already starting to be implemented in schools, museums, workshops - even summer camps!! and I know this because I've been working directly with the people organizing these things, helping to teach them how to use Figmin to teach others. :)

the future will be more digital than it already is today, yes, but that doesn't automatically make it a dystopia. I've said it before and I'll say it again - technology is just a tool, and there are many, many people creating new ways to use it for good.