Challenges in Virtual Environment Design: An Architectural Approach to Virtual Spaces

Abstract

In this chapter we will discuss some fundamental questions concerning creation and development of interfaces searching for the best way to promote interaction between the subject and information/interface. It starts from the fact that the fundamental and most revolutionary aspect introduced by the Internet is based on its sophisticated technological mechanisms that enhance substantially the concepts of space, time, perception, representation, limits, distance, presence, etc. Our everyday practices gain access to a new realm, cyberspace, which enables us to embrace multiple experiences where we exist in the propagation of our “Id.” This condition represents a huge challenge, for example, the necessity to (re)design the image we have from the world in its physical and virtual spaces. We discuss the imagined trends related to the conception and development of virtual environments, addressing the issue of virtual environments in three levels of complexity: realized spaces, possible spaces and imagined spaces.