Internet Technology and the Transformation of the Human
Posted on September 7, 2012 in Common Hour Events
2012-13 Miller Humanities Fellow, Jaron Lanier, computer scientist, composer, visual artist, and author of “You Are Not a Gadget”
Thursday, September 20, 2012 at 11:30 a.m. in Mayser Gymnasium
This event will not be recorded.
415 Harrisburg Ave Lancaster, PA 17603 [2 hours 30 minutes from Washington DC]
Jaron Lanier is a computer scientist best known for his pioneering work in the field of virtual reality. He left gaming company Atari in 1985 to co-found VPL Research Inc., the first company to market virtual reality products. Sun Microsystems acquired VPL in 1999.
Lanier was chief scientist of Advanced Network and Services, a nonprofit that funds the advancement of education through technology, from 1997 to 2001 and a visiting scholar at Silicon Graphics from 2001 to 2004. He was scholar at large at Microsoft Research, working on the Kinect device for Xbox 360 from 2006 to 2009. Currently he holds the position of partner architect at Microsoft Research.
Lanier is the author of the international bestseller You Are Not a Gadget (2010), a critique of Web 2.0, a second generation of the World Wide Web responding to people’s desires to collaborate and share information online. In 2010 Time Magazine named Lanier to its annual list of the world’s 100 most influential people. Lanier also composes classical music and collects rare instruments.
This event is open to the public. Free; no tickets required.
