The first computer in the family was a generic S-100 system, which used an 8 bit Zilog Z80 microprocessor and ran CPM (operating system) off of an external dual 8 inch floppy drive. It had 64 kB of RAM memory. We used a SOROC IQ 120 terminal as a keyboard and video terminal. For printouts, we had a teletype for a while, then a tractor feed dot matrix printer. I also did many grade school reports, term papers, and even a class newspaper on that computer using Wordstar. I spent a lot of time working on little Microsoft MBasic programs. My dad put the system together over several months/years, probably starting around 1980, and it lasted the family until 1987 when we got an IBM PC AT. I am startled and impressed by the changes in computing technology and its impact on society over the last several decades. I am a PhD computer scientist and researcher who has been working on virtual reality techniques and technologies, also for decades. Many thanks to my dad and mom for exposing me to science and technology.

Thank you for your work on Babylon 5. Although written in an early Internet and pre-911 era, it held up well, to me, on a recent viewing and seemed to resonate with how we have reacted to events since then. Also, damn you (with all due respect) for your work on Babylon 5. You raised the bar very high. Also, "Sleeping in Light" still makes me teary.

Do you feel that technology changes society and people, or do we retain core human weaknesses and strengths? I feel that Babylon 5 suggests that people in the future are still rather like us in the contemporary, but is this a storytelling conceit to appeal to us as an audience?

It is great to see Rod and other folks exploring and discussing their work in building cheap and effective virtual reality displays and peripherals.

I hope that there won’t be too much criticism on his build concerning price. Please note that he’s including a low cost, but in comparison, a moderately priced tracker. From the build writeup, you can see how you could replace it with something else. All in all, it’s a pretty cheap device to make. Consider the doors it opens. An open approach and open discussion of such builds is valuable and appreciated.

Some other thoughts: the Rift was spun out of some Open Source designs that we had Palmer Luckey work while he was here at the ICT Mixed Reality Lab (MxR) at the University of Southern California’s Institute for Creative Technologies. After witnessing the Kickstarter and seeing the implications it’s already had worldwide, I think that it and these DIY head mounted displays are very important to advancing the VR industry and community. I’m happy to see all the interest and I’d like to see a broad range of hobbyists, scientists, engineers, and companies experimenting and improving on these designs, and discovering how to build the next generation of immersive experiences.

Like Rod, I and my colleagues at Mixed Reality Lab (MxR) http://projects.ict.usc.edu/mxr/ are also firm believers in sharing our work, Open Sourcing what we can, and helping anyone who wants to play with these technologies. We’ve been improving and packaging our various Open Source reference designs for low cost head mounted displays and immersive viewers. We’ll be discussing these items at the 2013 IEEE Virtual Reality Conference in Orlando, FL next week.

To help out the community and add to the conversation, we’ll be open sourcing a lot of data in the next few days. We’ll share our parts lists, 3D printer STL files, and various software packages that will help you create your own immersive experiences. We do have some foldable foam-core viewer designs, but we have been working on 3D printed viewers as well. The prices on 3D printers are coming down and ordering a print from an online 3D print company is fairly easy. We have a Stereo Unity package that lets developers easily create and edit Stereo Project Scenes in Unity and some nice Distortion Correction software for Unity that counters the fisheye distortion that you see with low cost magnifier lenses.

You can see our designs as well as our code at http://projects.ict.usc.edu/mxr/open-source/. We’ve even been working on a few unofficial Oculus Rift Mods which we’ll be releasing any day now.