Arcadia

Increased computing efficiency also allowed the creation of a Virtual World, which has over time become known as Arcadia – an immersive synthetic world hosted in the data cloud. It has little of the freedom of the internet – almost all space within it is owned and a lot of it is monitored, unless you know how to get around this.

While many people connect using a puck and headset or glasses, some wear retinal lenses and neural laces for increased accuracy of stimulation, while others go all in and have implants in their eyes, ears, nerve stem and attached to an onboard neural processor. This provides total immersion, where the user experiences the sights, sounds, touch and movement of the virtual world as if it were real.

Arcadia is simultaneously a shared space and one where no common values exist. This is partly due to the 2084 equivalent of ‘Facebook Bubbles’ – cliquey communities of shared interest, values and perspectives. However, it is also due to user abilities to change themes and preferences.

You can customise a number of settings, including:

o Filtered (only see those who interact with you); semi-filtered (only see those who you have interacted with or know); unfiltered (see everyone currently connected).

o Colours/smells/fonts/textures can be tweaked – set to your own or to default.

o Time period, clothing and appearance, even species can be changed – either according to a set of vanilla options or personal modifications.

o Shortcut code can be created by users with good coding skills – depending on coding skill and privileges, this can ‘break’ the physics of the world.

o Personalised locations can be built.

o One of the few things that can’t be customised is the statues – these are giant depictions of various Captains of Industry, technologists and capitalists throughout recent history. Some permanently sponsor, and set the system admin ‘laws’, for regions of Arcadia.

All zones of Arcadia, in the vanilla representation, stem off the Garden – the world’s central hub. Depending on your filter levels, this can either be crammed to bursting point with people, like a music festival without end, or sparsely populated. From there, one can go to several zones.

o Directory

§  Search for people and areas of interest – often use codes to hide more illicit activities in unrelated zones.

o Social – “The Forum”

§  Chatrooms

§  Virtual clubs

§  Bulletin/image boards

§  Dating

o Commerce – “The Zocalo”

§  eBay (bids)

§  Virtual high streets

§  Vendorb (stalls like gumtree)

o Information – “The Library”

§  Entertainment

§  Politics

§  Economics

§  Science

o Entertainment – “The Colosseum”

§  Travel & Experiences

·        Virtual travel

·        Personal services

·        Virtual consumables

§  Games

·        Sport

·        Gambling

·        Gladiator

·        Computer games

§  TV, Music, Theatre, Movies

Mainstream content in place like the Forum is monitored, while commercial transactions in the Zocalo are monitored... however, if you want to have a talk to someone about something shady, you might go to the Colosseum to do it; if you want to conduct an illicit trade, you might do it in the Library. Control and monitoring can be subverted by using areas of Arcadia for purposes other than those for which they were designed.

In addition, there are a few other places where activities are not monitored.

o Personal Storage – people can buy their own ‘real estate’ in Arcadia and build it with whatever physical appearance and laws they wish.

o Pandaemonium – Procedurally/dynamically generated space. People often go here on a dare or bet because the utter chaos of its appearance it can be a bit of a headfuck.

o Asphodel - space marked for deletion but not yet overwritten – it can be unpleasant, though not physically dangerous to one’s body in the real world if one is in a data volume that is deleted.

Arcadia is not the Matrix; if you get suddenly yanked out due to a power cut, or if you get hurt or killed in virtual space, it may cause disorientation and discomfort on emergence into the real world, but you will sustain no physical damage.

There are stories, however, of people being tortured in Arcadia, or being subjected to post-hypnotic programming. These may or may not be true, but it is widely accepted that while your physical body is safe in Arcadia, what could conceivably happen to your mind is another matter.