Virtual doctors: easier to talk to than the real thing

At USC's Institute of Creative Technologies in LA, the future is here – and it's virtual

After writing about Google Cardboard and its predecessor - a device made by the University of Southern California’s Institute of Creative Technologies - last week, I realised I had a layover of several hours in Los Angeles. Seeing as the Institute lies only a 15-minute drive from the airport, I couldn’t resist a visit. What I found strolling around the Institute’s Mixed Reality Research Lab was a view of the future I’d seen before only in books.

In one room I donned a set of Virtual Reality goggles and entered a military training exercise in Afghanistan where I wandered down a dusty street, in and out of buildings (appropriately accessorised with Kilim rugs) looking for a cache of hidden weapons. When I took the goggles off I found I was in a room with black curtains and a concrete floor rather than a dusty back street of Lashkar Gah.

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Edie Lush is a journalist and communications coach. She is executive editor of Hub Culture and has been associate editor of Spectator Business, a political analyst for Hedge Fund Omega Partners and UBS, and a reporter for Bloomberg Television.