Geekworld

Gosh, I just had this funky dream.

Just came home from a nice christmas party at Sacha Chua's place (she's home from canada for the holidays) with Dom, Clair, JM, Diane and Mike and I had such a great time that I dreamt about it.

Anyway, the dream was just us talking, except the universe had a funky 3d effect: heavy thick lines around things like those 3d fillers that cartoon network is showing. We were walking through town and someone (I think it was sacha) said that she had a YM message so she went to a nearby spot on the wall and the bloody ym client appears on it.

As it turns out, everyone was online in a seamless online 3d environment where people connect via multiple clients. Someone was telling me he was connected via a cellphone, one was through a fancy linux client at home, one was chatting at a computer store, one was over IRC.

Matrix-like, the cool thing about the place was the way communication via the network had a physical equivalent of a device in geekwhorld. Someone wanted to send someone else a program and it appeared in geekwhorld as a black swissknife that he held. And the act of moving the application was as simple as reaching over and handing it to him (although in the dream, it magically moved from one hand to another ala startrek).

To interact in the world, you go to an eletronic store to get devices (for free). The ipod (to listen to streaming audio) was a big walkman. To listen to streaming audio, you walk around town looking for people up on a soapbox and to listen to what he was saying (or the streaming media was broadcasting) you wear the earphones. And the cool thing is you can participate.

And a funny thing is walking around, there was a sign on the road saying that "I cant connect can anyone help me" and our group went up to the sign to help the person out (via the ubiquitous chat clients).

There were events going around, i cant remember what they were, but it seemed like a festival atmosphere. We all ended up at a coffeeshop and continued the conversations we had that afternoon.

The weird thing about the dream was people kept telling me that they were really online, and it was not a dream. Someone said that the experience was more real if you slept in front of the computer and had headphones on, but i knew that i was dreaming and not in front of the computer, and i was supposed to wake up in a few more minutes for simbang gabi.

Since I knew I was dreaming and that i would forget when i woke up (which often happens), someone told me to write on a napkin the name of the online community we were in (something about it opening an editor behind the scenes) but as i was asleep and not in front of the computer, i volunteered to reach out for my phone (which was on a nearby desk. And i texted the name, so that i could contact them when i woke up so we could hang out a bit more.

And when i did, i was holding my phone, and it said geekwhorld (with the h).

I googled it up. Nothing, of course. It was only then that i was convinced that it was a dream. (or is it? jm is online via yahoo messenger. O_o). But it would be cool if it was real.

The future of online communities? We'll see. But nothing beats hanging out in real life with friends. :)