A Faceless Virtual Reality

At the very start of this chapter Bolter and Grusin throw down the disclaimer that these three concepts are not universal truths.

"We do not claim that Immediacy, Hypermediacy and Remediation are universal or aesthetic truths; rather, we regard them as practices of specific groups in specific times." (Bolter: 2000, pg 22)

The concept of Immediacy is something that points towards a user having immediacy access with a medium and also with their desire to interact with this medium. Basically users want a more immediate connection with this medium and feel that they are a part of it and connected with it. When Bolter talks about Immediacy he talks about Transparent Immediacy, to understand this fully we take each word separately. When Bolter says transparent he refers to the goal of developers and interface designers where they strive to make a Interfaceless Interface.

"in this sense, a transparent interface would be one that erases its self, so that the user is no longer aware of confronting a medium, but instead stands in an immediate relationship to the contents of that medium." (Bolter: 2000, pg 23-24)

There are a few different mediums in which a user can feel connected to something, for example a user can be watching a television show, reading a book or playing a video game and they well get this connection with a character and they feel as if they are in the situation with them and feel what they are feeling and react in an emotional way, this is a sense of Immediacy. But the biggest medium form that allows a user to feel connect and involved is Virtual Reality. The purpose of Virtual Reality is to bring the user into an environment and allow them to interact in a real or physical way. This sort of interactivity with the user is achieved with providing the user with a faceless interface in which it tries to deceive the user from believing they are interacting with a medium to achieve this reality.

"Virtual Reality is immersive, which means that it is a medium whose purpose is to disappear" (Bolter: 2000, pg 22)

Bibliography:

Bolter. D and Grusin. R (2000) - Remediation: Understanding New Media

Websites:

Barrow. T 2010 - Immediacy, Hypermediacy and Remediation