Travel porn isn’t travel for sex. It’s the pictures of destinations that are so gorgeous they defy the reality of even our most precious memory of a lovely place. It’s not my phrase. It’s an industry phrase. Some people would call Condé Nast Traveler
Hi Bob: Welcome to the Matrix! Advances in digital scanning and printing now make it possible to reproduce even the experience of being in situ, but is that a good thing? I think creating replicas of fragile cultural sites like the Chauvet cave, Tut's tomb and perhaps whole buildings are important for protection and preservation. Conservation issues aside, I wonder if I would be pleased to wake up in a perfect simulation of Venice, or any other place. How exactly would this type of virtual tourism work? Would the rich pay more to see the original, degraded site, while everyone else files through the replica? Would the revenues from the replica be used to fund conservation of the original?
I feel the same way about museums, where I expect an authentic encounter with the material object. It's pretty clear that many museums and even churches now routinely quietly replace originals with near-perfect replicas without clearly informing the public. I look at the amazing special projects that companies like Factum Arte are doing and wonder about the clients and contracts that they do not inform the public about.
Hi Bob: Welcome to the Matrix! Advances in digital scanning and printing now make it possible to reproduce even the experience of being in situ, but is that a good thing? I think creating replicas of fragile cultural sites like the Chauvet cave, Tut's tomb and perhaps whole buildings are important for protection and preservation. Conservation issues aside, I wonder if I would be pleased to wake up in a perfect simulation of Venice, or any other place. How exactly would this type of virtual tourism work? Would the rich pay more to see the original, degraded site, while everyone else files through the replica? Would the revenues from the replica be used to fund conservation of the original?
I feel the same way about museums, where I expect an authentic encounter with the material object. It's pretty clear that many museums and even churches now routinely quietly replace originals with near-perfect replicas without clearly informing the public. I look at the amazing special projects that companies like Factum Arte are doing and wonder about the clients and contracts that they do not inform the public about.