The bright black sand at Diamond Beach, Iceland, is dotted with smooth gray pebbles and glassy chunks of ice. The crash of foamy waves fills my ears as I turn my head to look up and down the beach and see the dark strip of sand fade into white fog as if it goes on forever. I don’t feel the cold, because I’m not really there. Moments earlier, I had been standing in a cable car climbing over Onomichi, Japan.
I’m in a windowless room at Google’s headquarters, holding a cardboard box against my face in a way that positions a smartphone two inches from my eyes. Google Cardboard, as both the phone holder and the accompanying app are called, transforms the computer in your pocket into a virtual-reality headset. It’s something of a gimmick. But it’s also a serious attempt to create a new mass communication and entertainment medium. “Virtual reality will have an important role to play in entertainment, communications, work, and learning,” says Clay Bavor, who leads Google’s virtual-reality project. “Cardboard will be the way that we make these immersive experiences available for everyone.”
To read more, click here.