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Social, Ethical,
and Legal Issues
in Presence Research
and Applications
Contributing Authors
Ralph Schroeder ralph.schroeder@oii.ox.ac.uk
Eric Meyer eric.meyer@oii.ox.ac.uk
Malte Ziewitz malte.ziewitz@oii.ox.ac.uk
Oxford Internet Institute
Acronyms .....................................................................4
1 Social, Ethical, and Legal Issues in Presence Research and Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.1 Background, Relevance, and Goal of the Report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.2 DenitionsandDelimitations ................................................6
1.2.1 Presence ..............................................................6
1.2.2 Social, Ethical, and Legal Issues ............................................7
1.3 Methodology ..............................................................8
2 Empirical Analysis of Current Issues in Presence Research and Applications ...........9
2.1 Case Studies of Integrated Projects ...........................................9
2.1.1 PRESENCCIA ..........................................................9
2.1.2 IPCity ................................................................13
2.1.3 PASION ..............................................................17
2.1.4 IMMERSENCE ........................................................20
2.2 Input from the Peach Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
2.2.1 Peach Meeting: (Networking session ICT06), Helsinki, November 2006 ..........22
2.2.2 Peach Meeting: (1st WinG consultation), Barcelona, March 2007 ...............23
2.2.3 Peach Meeting: (2nd WinG consultation), Oxford, April 2008 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.2.4 Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik, July 2008 ................................28
3 Synthesis and Scenarios ...................................................30
3.1 Key Dimensions ..........................................................30
3.1.1 Context of Use: Presence Research vs. Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
3.1.2 Degree of Uncertainty: Existing vs. Future Issues .............................30
3.1.3 Level of Immersion: Types of Technologies ...................................31
3.2 Synthesis of Issue Analysis ..................................................31
3.3 Scenarios for Future Applications ............................................35
3.3.1 Scenario 1 – Online Virtual Worlds, Their Governance and Impacts ..............36
3.3.2 Scenario 2 – Online and Ofine Presences in Everyday Life ...................37
3.3.3 Scenario 3 – Training in VEs ..............................................38
3.3.4 Scenario 4 – Research in VEs with Human Participants .......................38
Contents
2
4 Characteristics and Challenges .............................................40
4.1 Key Characteristics of Presence Technologies .................................40
4.1.1 Intermediation of Experience and Action ...................................40
4.1.2 Emergence of Third Parties ..............................................41
4.1.3 Intrinsic Inconspicuousness ..............................................41
4.1.4 Technological Complexity ................................................41
4.1.5 Indeterminacy of Social Implications .......................................42
4.2 Challenges ...............................................................42
4.2.1 Balancing Counter vailing Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
4.2.2 Managing Transitions Between Experiences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .42
4.2.3 Accounting for Non-Users ...............................................43
4.2.4 Coping with Uncertainty and Indeterminacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
5 Strategies and Directions ..................................................45
5.1 Existing Strategies ........................................................45
5.1.1 Ethical Research Practices at Universities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
5.1.2 Product Development and Design ........................................46
5.1.3 Public Debate and Deliberation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
5.2 Future Directions .........................................................46
5.3.1 Academia ............................................................46
5.3.2 Industr y ..............................................................46
5.3.2 Public Policy ..........................................................47
6 Conclusions ............................................................48
7 Appendix ...............................................................49
8 References .............................................................50
3
Acronyms
3D 3-dimensional
BCI Brain-Computer Interface
CAVE Cave Automatic Vir tual Environment
EEG Electroencephalography
ELSA Ethical, Legal, and Social Aspects
ETH Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology)
EU European Union
EULA End User License Agreement
IP Integrated Project
NGO Non-Governmental Organization
OII Oxford Internet Institute
PTSD Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
SL Second Life
SNA Social Network Analysis
SVE Shared Vir tual Environment
TU Technical University
TV Television
UK United Kingdom
VE Virtual Environment
VR Vir tual Reality
4
1 See PEACH, Coordination Action, Annex I – Description of Work, March 31, 2006, p, 5.
2 Giulio Rufni (ed.), D3.1 Visions, Roadmaps, the ERA [Issue I], May 22, 2007, p. 6.
1 Social, Ethical, and Legal Issues in
Presence Research and Applications
1.1 Background, Relevance,
and Goal of the Report
This report analyses the social, ethical, and legal
issues of Presence technologies and their implications
for society. Most generally, Presence is an emerging
andinterdisciplinaryeldofresearchandrefers
to the cognitive experience of being somewhere.1
Presence thus aims at achieving realistic feelings and
experiences of an environment that does not actually
exist, using a broad range of technologies. While
virtual and augmented realities, CAVEs, head-mounted
displays, and high-end cinemas are among the more
well-known examples, recent developments have
brought about novel and potentially more intrusive
technologies like brain-computer interfaces (BCI),
which can translate brainwaves into control signals
and vice versa. Over the past decade, research
in this area has made considerable progress: in
one case researchers have successfully enabled a
tetraplegic to steer a virtual wheelchair through a
virtual environment just with their thoughts. While
Presence technologies are only slowly entering mass
marketsandapplicationsineldslikemedicine,
military, entertainment or gaming, they are likely to
play an increasingly important role in society. Powered
by recent advances in disciplines like neuroscience,
cognitive science, computer science and psychology,
Presence technologies are therefore bound to change
the world as we experience it.
Against this backdrop, Presence technologies are likely
to pose a variety of social, ethical, and legal issues. Our
perception of the world plays a crucial role in vir tually
everything we do. As human beings we act upon our
understanding of the world and make practical and
moral choices – most of the time with considerable
consequences for ourselves and others. The purpose
of Presence technologies is exactly to mediate and
– if necessary – modify this highly sensitive process.
This can be a tremendous opportunity to improve
lives as applications in high-precision surgery show.
On the other hand, the very same technologies can
have a variety of unintended consequences. Given our
limited experience with the long-term implications of
Presence technologies, there is a risk for fundamental
human values as well as legitimate public interests.
Further, Presence technologies can open up a new
channel of control over people’s perceptions. This
leaves considerable potential for strategic manipulation
by governments, corporations, or individuals.
To date, there has been very little research on the
socialaspectsofthisemergenteld.Ashasbeen
noted in the Peach Roadmap (Issue I), social, ethical,
and legal issues have tended to be a relatively isolated
and small-scale part in research on Presence. 2 This is
partly due to disciplinar y specialism, but also because
Presence technologies have entered into the mass
market mainly in the form of online games and virtual
worlds and can otherwise mainly be found in niche
applications. This means that there has been a very
uneven and scattered discussion of these issues, if any.
Presence technologies are often related to a number
of other ‘Presence-like’ technologies with which they
have important overlaps, but this overlap has been
overlooked because Presence technologies are often
related to other computer science developments such
asarticialagentsandsimulations.
5
3 See Ralph Schroeder, POSSIBLE WORLDS: THE SOCIAL DYNAMICS OF VIRTUAL REALITY TECHNOLOGY (1996); Ralph Schroeder &
Ann-Soe Axelsson, Avatars at Work and Play: Overlapping Themes and Intersecting Research Agendas, in Ralph Schroeder & Ann-Soe
Axelsson (eds.), AVATARS AT WORK AND PLAY: COLLABORATION AND INTERACTION IN SHARED VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS
(2006: LONDON: SPRINGER), pp. ix-xv
4 Giulio Rufni (ed.), D3.1 Visions, Roadmaps, the ERA [Issue II], May 15, 2008, p. 11.
6 International Society for Presence Research, An Explication of Presence, available at http://www.ispr.info/ (section “About Presence”)
(last visited March 17, 2009).
7 See, e.g., the discussion on the Peach WinG5 blog, http://www.peachbit.org/ (last visited Jan. 18, 2009).
The goal of this report is therefore to take a closer
lookattheeldinitsentirety,identifythekeysocial,
ethical, and legal issues, and map the strategies
that can or should be taken to accompany the
development of Presence.
1.2 Denitionsand
Delimitations
Before we dive into the analysis, it is impor tant to
clarify a number of concepts. These concepts will not
only guide, but also delimit the scope of the inquiry.
1.2.1 Presence
DeningtheeldofPresenceremainsasomewhat
controversial issue. Different disciplines have different
interests, perspectives, and approaches to the
phenomenon and consequently emphasize different
aspects.Asocialscienceperspectiveisrstand
foremost concerned with the role of human beings in
the context of Presence technologies. In this report,
wewillthereforeuseadenitionthathasbeen
successfully applied in the area of virtual environments
(VE) or virtual environment technologies. 3 Here,
Presence technologies are those in which the user
or users have a sense of being in a place or space
other than the one they are physically in, and being
able to interact with that environment. As we shall
see, technology and environments for “being there
together”, where the user is not experiencing the
environment individually but with others, have become
the most widespread use of the technology and the
one that raises the most complex social, ethical, and
legal issues.
Thisdenitioniscompatiblewithexistingdenitions
and approaches to Presence. According to Slater and
others, the goal of Presence research and applications
is the “successful replacement/augmentation of
sensory data with vir tual generated data.” Further,
the Peach Roadmap (D3.1 Issue III, 4 April 2009)
denesPresenceas“theeldstudyingthescience,
technology and social aspects of increasingly more
powerful, digitally mediated interaction aiming to
produce ‘real’-feeling experiences while assessing the
impact of these new interaction technologies at the
individual and social level.” The International Society
for Presence Research regards Presence primarily as “a
psychological state or subjective perception in which
even though part or all of an individual’s experience
isgeneratedbyand/orlteredthroughhuman-made
technology, part or all of the individual’s perception
fails to accurately acknowledge the role of the
technology in the experience.” 6
Whilethedebateaboutthesedenitionswill
continue,7 the different viewpoints more generally
reectthepervasivenessanddiversityofPresencein
a variety of social settings: Presence as a psychological
state,aeldofresearchandcommercialapplications,
or mechanism for engineering human perception.
Underlying all these approaches is the idea that the
important social implications of this technology relate
to the experience of being in another place or space
and not just to the cognitive science of machine
learning,articialintelligence,orsimulationsandthe
like. Moreover, the most critical social issues relate not
to single-user settings (though these will be discussed
below), but rather, as just mentioned, to multi-user
scenarios where people are interacting in the vir tual
space. That is because in the latter case, the issues
relate not only to one’s person’s well-being, but to
how that person’s well-being depends on others in
the context of Presence technologies.
6
8 See Council of Europe, Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, Rome, November 4, 1950, http://
conventions.coe.int/treaty/en/Treaties/Html/005.htm (last visited Jan. 18, 2009).
9 See, e.g., European Paliament, Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, http://www.europarl.europa.eu/charter/default_
en.htm (last visited Jan. 18, 2009).
1.2.2 Social, Ethical, and Legal Issues
Another key concept in this report is that of social,
ethical, and legal issues. While these have more or less
specicmeaning,theyalsooverlapanddependupon
each other to a certain degree.
1.2.2.1 Social Issues
Social issues generally refer to the implications of the
actions of one person for other persons. The “social”
here comprises the interactions among people and
the dynamics that emerge from them at larger levels
of aggregation. In order to identify social issues, we
therefore have to understand how people behave
with regard to others under different circumstances
and what the consequences of these interactions
are for different units of society, like individuals,
organisations or networks.
A social “issue” therefore usually occurs if there is
sometangiblechangeinthecongurationofsocial
interactions and the environments they take place
in. These changes bring up questions such as who
benetsandwholoses,howisthemotivationof
actorsinuenced,whatrisksandperceivedproblems
occur, and how do people adapt their behaviour
to the new situation and change their practices in
response.
Especially Presence technologies have considerable
potentialtorecongureinteractions.Asintermediaries
of perception, they have an immediate impact on
how people view and make sense of the world and
on how they act upon that basis upon others. Every
change in the technologies of perception potentially
transforms the way people view their environments.
Examining these complex interrelations will be key
challenge with regard to the social issues of Presence
technologies.
1.2.2.2 Ethical Issues
Incontrasttosocialissues,ethicalissuesmostlyreect
a concern with “good” and “bad” conduct. The starting
point here is usually a set of moral principles that are
used to evaluate behaviour and its implications.
Theexactdenition,interpretation,andapplicationof
these principles has been subject to debates among
philosophers for thousands of years. However, it
seems safe to assume that there is a minimum set
of principles and values that can be regarded as
commonly accepted in EU countries. Among those
are values like human dignity, freedom of expression,
privacy, equality and justice, but also more socially
oriented ones like solidarity. Some of these values
arereectedinlegaldocumentsliketheCouncil
of Europe’s European Convention on Human
Rights8 or the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the
European Union9 as well as the law of the European
communities. Others are framed in codes of conduct
of non-state organizations like companies, industry
association or universities. Especially the latter
have been increasingly concerned with providing
ethical guidelines for researchers and mandating
ethical review of research projects. In addition to
such institutionalized forms of ethical review and
assessment, there is also a more applied dimension of
ethics that focuses on the application of ethics in the
everyday practices of people. Examples of such an
approacharetheeldsofbusinessethicsorbioethics,
which are particularly relevant from a public policy
perspective. Presence technologies also seem to be
aeldinwhichsuchconsiderationscanbefruitfully
employed.
Overall, ethical issues involve some form of normative
assessment of social practices and therefore naturally
build on a thorough understanding of the social issues
at hand.
7
1.2.2.3 Legal Issues
Legal issues arise in the context of the normative
framework as established and enforced by legal
authorities and institutions. While regulations,
directives,andrulesaddressspecicproblemsof
society, the abovementioned fundamental rights
and values guide the application of these norms at
a higher level of abstraction. The law, in this sense,
can be seen as aiming to address social issues by
institutionalizing procedures for generating, enforcing,
andsolvingconictsovernorms.Legalissuestherefore
can occur when new circumstances such as new
technologies challenge existing interpretations of the
law. This challenge may be addressed at the level of
legal doctrine and the application of norms in cour t
cases or government regulations. It can also lead to
the insight that the existing legal framework does not
meet the goals anymore it set out to achieve and
therefore needs to be adapted to new circumstances.
A connection with ethics can be seen in that legal
institutions and practices usually attempt to balance
conictingvaluesandprinciplesandtherefore
inevitably require an ethical assessment.
While this report discusses legal issues where they
seem relevant, it is important to point out that this
is not an in-depth legal analysis of the framework
regulating Presence technologies.
1.2.2.4 Need for Comprehensive Perspective
As the preceding paragraphs show, it is not always
possible to clearly delineate social, ethical, and legal
issues. While these are already complex concepts in
themselves, they refer to and build on each other
in many different ways. For example, a thorough
understandingofthesocialissuesisoftentherst
step towards an ethical assessment and further
legal analysis. Conversely, dysfunctional norms and
regulations can be the cause of social issues that
require ethical assessment and, in turn, may lead to a
new legal framework.
The goal here is therefore not to keep these issues
clearly apart and introduce distinctions that do not
actually exist in practice and – in the worst case – may
even distort the analysis. Rather, the key is to be aware
of the different aspects of social, ethical, and legal
issuesandreectonthemcriticallyastheyoccurin
the context of Presence technologies.
1.3 Methodology
The research in this report was carried out as part
of the three-year Peach project. The data on which
the analysis is based was gathered in a number of
ways. For the case studies of the four Integrated
Projects, a number of semi-structured interviews
with researchers and industry representatives have
been conducted face-to-face and by phone. There has
also been much input from the Peach Roadmap and
WinG4 community, extensive desk research, informal
discussions with researchers, and reviews of materials
from conferences and workshops.
8
10 See Appendix for an overview. We would like to thank the interviewees for their time and contribution of their expertise.
11 PRESENCCIA Website, http://presenccia.org/ (last visited May 11, 2008). For more information on the Presencia project see Presencia
Website, http://www.cs.ucl.ac.uk/research/vr/Projects/Presencia/ (last visited May 11, 2008).
12 See Mel Slater, Presentation about PRESENCCIA at the PEACH summer schools, Santorini 2007 and Dubrovnik 2008.
2 Empirical Analysis of Current
Issues in Presence Research and
Applications
summary of its goals and activities before the social,
ethical legal issues are analyzed in greater detail. In
accordance with the Roadmap, we examined these
issues separately in the two main areas, i.e. research
and application. While the former focuses on issues
that arose while conducting Presence research, the
latter attempts an outlook on the – in most cases
hypothetical – mid- and long-term implications of the
ndingsandtheirapplicationinsociety.
The overview is mainly based on a review of publicly
available project reports and deliverables as of March
2009, extensive desk research, and semi-structured
interviews with key researchers and project
leaders during the Peach Summer School 2008 in
Dubrovnik.10
2.1.1 PRESENCCIA
PRESENCCIA stands for “Presence: Research
Encompassing Sensory Enhancement, Neuroscience,
Cerebral-Computer Interfaces and Applications”
and is the successor of the PRESENCIA project.11
ItisbasedonanoperationaldenitionofPresence,
focusing on the successful replacement and
augmentation of sensory data with vir tually generated
data so that people act and respond as if the data
were real.12 Under the aegis of Mel Slater at the
Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, the project aims
to deliver Presence in wide-area distributed mixed-
reality environments. In order to do so, the team of
researchers conducts mostly experiments to provide
In order to gain a better understanding of the social,
ethical, and legal issues of Presence technologies, the
Peach team conducted a number of empirical analyses.
In view of the still limited experience with Presence
technologies in everyday life, we pursued two
approaches. First, we conducted in-depth case studies
of the four Integrated Projects (IPs) PRESENCCIA,
IPCity, PASION, and IMMERSENCE (section 2.1).
Second, we systematically gathered input from the
Peach community on the occasion of several events
(see section 2.2). These events included brainstorming
and feedback sessions explicitly focused on social,
ethical, and legal issues, but also open debates and
discussions at other events, where the Peach team
observed, solicited, and discussed the experiences
and ideas of researchers and industry representatives
involved with Presence technologies on a daily basis.
2.1 Case Studies of
Integrated Projects
Although all four Integrated Projects contribute to
theoveralleldofPresenceresearchandapplications,
they do so from very different angles, using a wide
range of methodologies and analytic frameworks
and pointing to quite different potential applications.
The aim of this section is therefore to scope the
PRESENCCIA, IPCity, PASION, and IMMERSENCE
projects and give an overview of the social, ethical, and
legal issues. Each project is introduced with a short
9
13 Robert Leeb et al., Self-paced exploration of the Austrian National Librar y through thought, International Journal of
Bioelectromagnetism, 2007, Vol. 9, No. 4, 237-244.
14 Robert Leeb et al., Self-paced (asynchronous) BCI control of a wheelchair in Virtual Environments: A case study with a tetraplegic,
Computational Intelligence and Neuroscience special issue: “Brain-Computer Interfaces: Towards Practical Implementations and
Potential Applications”, pp.1-8, 2007.
15 Ana Tajadura, Aleksander Väljamäe & Daniel Västfjäll, Affecting emotional experience with auditory-vibrotactile heartbeat false
feedback, International Multisensory Research Forum, Dublin, 2006.
16 David Corney & R. Beau Lotto, What Are Lightness Illusions and Why Do We See Them?, PLoS Computational Biology, published
September 28, 2007.
17 Pontus Larsson et al., When What You Hear is What You See: Presence and Auditory-Visual Integration in Virtual Environments,
Proceedings of the 10th Annual International Workshop on Presence, Barcelona, Spain, October 25-27, 2007.
18 See Montse Benlloch, Deliverable D1.3: Ethical Issues and Societal Impact of Presence Research, June 30, 2007, available at http://
www.cs.ucl.ac.uk/research/vr/Projects/PRESENCCIA/sharedDocuments/deliverableM18/D1.3-1-mel-revised_nal.doc (last visited May
11, 2008).
an empirical and statistical basis for Presence, gather
data on the unity of perceptual experience, and
examine spatial Presence at the individual level.
2.1.1.1 Project Details
The research appears to be broadly rooted within
the paradigm and methodologies of neuroscience
and focuses on two distinct aspects of Presence.
Therstaspectrevolvesaroundthechallengesand
opportunities of brain-computer interfaces (BCI).
BCIs are technological artefacts that analyze brain
activity and transform the electroencephalographic
changes into control signals. This enables researchers
to establish a direct communication channel between
the human brain and a machine with far-ranging
implications,forinstance,intheeldofmedicine.
Examples of experiments conducted so far are the
successful attempt to let people move through a
virtual model of the Austrian National Librar y by
performing motor imagery13 or using the brainwaves
of a tetraplegic to control the movements of a
wheelchair in a virtual environment.14 The second
aspectconcernstheeldofmulti-sensoryPresence,
i.e. the question of how different senses work
and produce perceptions. Papers in this area have
addressed questions like how false heartbeat feedback
affects emotional response to pictures,15 lightness
illusions and why we see them,16 or auditory-visual
integration in virtual environments.17
2.1.1.2 Analysis
Both aspects pose a number of ethical, legal, and
social issues, which can be broadly grouped into two
categories.
2.1.1.2.1 Research Ethics
Therstcategorydealswithresearchethics.
Virtually all PRESENCCIA experiments involve
human subjects and therefore raise a number of
difcultethicalquestions.Sinceattheheartof
the project is the “successful replacement and
augmentation of sensory data with vir tually generated
data,” questions of deception and respect for the
autonomy of the individual come inevitably on the
agenda. Many experiments take place in a complex
eldofconictingvaluesandintereststhatneed
to be balanced and—if possible—reconciled. The
PRESENCCIA team took on these issues right from
thestartandcommissionedarepor tthatspecically
addresses the ethical dimension of their research.18
One of the key issues in the PRESENCCIA project is
the use of immersive virtual environments to conduct
experiments with human subjects that would not be
ethically admissible in real life. It has been claimed
that such environments can provide a “research
tool for social and psychological scientists and also
for policy makers, in order to investigate problems
under laboratory style conditions that would
otherwise not be possible due to practical or ethical
10
19 Mel Slater, The Whitehead Lectures on Cognition, Computation & Creativity, Jan. 31 2007, Goldsmiths College, University of London,
http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/cccc/whitehead/spring07.php (last visited May 31, 2008) (quote contained in abstract).
20 See Mel Slater et al., A Virtual Reprise of the Stanley Milgram Obedience Experiments, PLOS One (1) 1, Dec . 20, 2006.
21 See, e.g., New Scientist, Morals in Cyberspace, Dec. 21, 2006, http://www.newscientist.com/blog/technology/2006/12/morals-in-
cyberspace.html (last visited Aug. 4, 2008); John Brownlee, The Virtual Milgram Experiment, WIRED BLOG, Dec. 27, 2006, http://blog.
wired.com/tableofmalcontents/2006/12/the_virtual_mil.html (last visited Aug. 4, 2008).
22 Stanley Milgram, OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY (1974).
23 See, e.g., Diana Baumrind, Some Thoughts on Ethics of Research. After Reading Milgram’s Behavorial Study of Obedience, 19 American
Psychologist 421 (1964); Stanley Milgram, Issues in the Study of Obedience: A Reply to Baumrind, 19 American Psychologist 848
(1964).
constraints.”19 A case in point is the “Virtual Milgram”
experiment, which was part of the predecessor
project PRESENCIA20 and has been widely reported
in the media.21 In this experiment, researchers built
on the legendary 1960s study by Stanley Milgram,
who showed that people would administer apparently
lethal electric shocks to a stranger when told to do so
byanauthoritygure.22 The original experiment had
been subject to severe criticism about its treatment
of human participants, resulting in the general
acknowledgment that this line of research should no
longer be pursued in experimental research.23 The
Virtual Milgram experiment was based on the same
setup, but used an immersive virtual environment, in
which the person to be punished was an avatar and
not a recognizable human being. Strikingly, even though
participants knew that neither the strangers nor the
shocks were real, they responded to the situation “as
if it were real,” for instance with emotional distress.
Sodoesthefactthatthepunishmentisinictedon
virtual characters change the ethical assessment of the
setting?
A comprehensive answer to this question depends
on many factors and will go beyond the scope of
this report. However, a key aspect to consider is
the gap between reality and virtual reality and the
degree to which participants are aware of it. While
violent actions on an avatar may trigger an automatic
response by the brain and cause emotional distress,
on a cognitive level participants have a broad range of
unambiguous cues available and know that the virtual
entity is not experiencing real pain. In other words,
while the participant realizes the harmlessness of the
situation on one level, she reacts “as if” it were real on
another. Against this backdrop, the ethical assessment
would certainly not change if the par ticipant were
not aware of the fact that the tortured target was
virtual and responded in exactly the same way in
virtualrealityasinreality.Thedifcultquestionis
therefore where to draw the line when the realization
of virtuality is only weak and does not obviously guide
the participant’s response. Although these concerns
seem serious enough to be discussed in detail, they
do not indicate that experiments like Vir tual Milgram
should not be conducted at all. In fact, even more
realistic experiments are possible today. Rather, it is
important to be aware of these issues and design and
conduct such experiments with the ethical challenges
in mind. This would not only include assessing potential
risks for the physical and emotional well-being of
participants,butalsoaskinghowpossiblebenetsof
the research should be factored into the equation.
Of course, such balancing of countervailing values is
furthercomplicatedbythefactthatpotentialbenets
are uncertain and can only be determined in the long
run.
Finally, while many of these issues are taken care of by
various departmental research ethics committees, also
the multidisciplinary nature of Presence research may
pose some new challenges, such as the compatibility
of ethics guidelines and attitudes of researchers from
different disciplinary backgrounds like psychology and
computer science. It may also be that the relevant
research ethics committees are too unfamiliar with the
nature of the technology and how people respond to
it to be able to appreciate the nature of the research.
While this was not a problem in the PRESENCCIA
project as all computer scientists involved had
11
24 See, e.g., the HIVE project, which aims to research stimulation paradigms to design, develop and test a new generation of more
powerful and controllable non-invasive brain stimulation technologies. For more information, see http://www.hive-eu.org/.
conducted experiments before and ethical approval
was done on an institution-wide basis, this may well be
an issue in other multidisciplinary Presence research
projects.
2.1.1.2.2 Social Implications
While it is only possible to speculate about the
broader societal implications of implementing
PRESENCCIAtechnologiesandndingsonalarger
scale at this point, it seems nonetheless important to
think ahead and sketch the issues most likely to come
up. Most of the technologies used in the experiments
mediate fundamental neurological processes and
therefore touch upon the core of human perception
and agency, both essential for the cardinal value of
individual autonomy. While BCIs basically translate
thoughts into actions with real-world consequences,
the research on multi-sensory Presence concerns the
backchannel of experience, i.e. the way we perceive of
andreacttotheworldaroundus.Specically,BCIsare
saidtohaveabroadrangeofapplicationsintheelds
of medicine, industry, military, and enter tainment.
Virtual environments provide a more or less risk-free
test-bed for prototyping BCIs. For example, errors can
be easily corrected when navigating a wheelchair in
a virtual environment and thus avoid the dangers of
physical reality. The challenge will be rather to develop
applications that are robust and reliable enough to
be employed in real life contexts. For example, a real
BCI-controlled wheelchair may improve the life of
a tetraplegic tremendously, but comes with its own
riskswhenusedintheheavytrafcofinner-city
rush hours, where a failure to accurately translate
brainwaves into control signals can prove fatal. Such
questions of reliability and robustness will become
even more salient if BCIs will be rolled out beyond
niche applications, for instance, for steering not only
wheelchairs, but cars, trucks, or trains. The more
people rely on the technology, the higher the stakes
and potential damages in case of failure. Employing
BCIs for critical and complex tasks therefore requires
extensive testing, development, and quality assurance
to avoid unintended consequences. Fur ther, by
translating brainwaves into control signals, BCIs also
produce vast amounts of personal information and
inevitably leave a trail of personal data, potentially
posing a privacy threat.
While PRESENCCIA exclusively employed “simple”
EEG-based BCIs, there will almost certainly be
extensions to this line of research in the future. One
extension that is already experimented with by other
researchers concerns the way the brainwaves are
picked up. Since the degree of accuracy that can be
achieved through externally applied BCIs is rather
low, researchers in other projects have turned to
more powerful alternatives. Brain implants allow
researchers to obtain much more precise and reliable
signals at much lower error rates. Such implants
would be required, for instance, to achieve the
degree of precision necessary to control a prosthetic
limb. Another extension reverses the process and
uses endogenous control signals to trigger brain
activity.24 Such brain stimulation promises to simulate
bodily experience by directing brainwaves from the
outside. While, again, such applications are not part
ofPRESENCCIA,itisnotdifculttoimaginethe
ethical issues and risks of abuse and manipulation that
come with a technology that allows human beings to
experience virtual situations as if they were real. Such
waysofinuencingtheperceptionofpeoplemay
not only be of interest to advertisers and marketing
companies, but also to fraudsters or even oppressive
political regimes.
Finally, there is the much broader and fundamental
question of how these intermediaries will affect us in
the long run. What does it mean for our thinking if our
thoughts have immediate effects in the environment?
What if the virtual and the real become so close
thatweconfusectionandreality?Whatdifference
does it make for people’s moral judgments if these
boundaries blur? At this point, it is vir tually impossible
to predict the long-term biological and neurological
consequences as well as the social implications arising
from these. Therefore, it is important to be aware
12
25 The following description is based on the information available on the IPCity Website, http://www.ipcity.eu/ (last visited May 11, 2008).
26 See IPCity Website, http://www.ipcity.eu/ (last visited May 11, 2008).
27 See id.
28 See Giulio Jacucci et al., Comedia: Mobile Group Media for Active Spectatorship, Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human
Factors in Computing Systems (2007).
29 CityWall Website, http://citywall.org/pages/about (last visited May 11, 2008).
30 Iris Herbst et al., Multi-dimensional Interactive City Exploration through Mixed Reality, Virtual Reality Conference 2008, VR’08, IEEE
(2008).
of the risks and learn from some of the standards
and practices that have long been employed in the
development of medical and pharmaceutical R&D. Or,
in the case of consumer uses of these technologies
(as opposed to medical settings), if for example
thebenetsofPresencetechnologieshavebeen
advertisedtohavebenecialeffects,whatcanbe
learnt about what is acceptable or not from other
experiences? In order to be prepared and accompany
these emerging technologies, it will be crucial to not
onlyfollowcurrentdevelopments,butalsonda
way to make reliable predictions about their long-
term impact. Methodologically, this can be achieved
through a variety of forecasting methods, including
scenario building and Delphi panels that triangulate
the opinions of experts from academia, business,
government, and civil society. In this regard, it may be
helpful to draw on and learn from the experience and
best practices of technological impact assessments
inrelatedeldslikebiotechnologyandlifesciences.
Combining these with principles and insights from risk
management and risk regulation, decision-makers will
be able to devise strategies to deal with the future
impacts of Presence technologies.
2.1.2 IPCity
IPCity focuses on interaction and Presence in urban
environments. The project aims to investigate analytical
and technological approaches to Presence in real-
life settings.25 According to the IPCity website, this
mission translates into three aspects:26 on an analytical
level, the team aims to extend existing approaches
to Presence by taking into account the multiplicity
and distribution of events in time and space. On a
technological level, mobile and lightweight mixed
reality interfaces will be developed and integrated into
“the fabric of everyday life.” Finally, on a practical level,
the project aims “to provide citizens, visitors, as well
as professionals involved in city development or the
organization of events with a set of technologies” to
collaboratively envision, debate, and experience new
developments and aspects of their cities.27
2.1.2.1 Project Details
The project is structured around three mixed-reality
research issues: Presence and experience, cross-reality
interaction tools, and mixed reality infrastructure.
These themes are explored in the context of a
number of sub-projects. First, the Large-scale Events
sub-project aims to create user experience that
supports the main aspects of spectatorship at large-
scale events: group co-experience, engagement with
an event, and navigation through space. Within this
sub-project, the CoMedia module introduces a mobile
phone application that allows users to collaboratively
create stories and thus integrates real-time event
information, awareness cues, and media-sharing
applications.28 The Illuminate module creates a
pervasive infrastructure that illuminates people and
spaceswithspeciccolours,varyingwithevents,
places, and spectator groups. Finally, the CityWall
module consists of a large multi-touch display installed
in the city of Helsinki that acts as an interface for the
changing media landscape of the city. 29 Passers-by
are encouraged to manipulate media and learn about
local events and festivals.
Second, the TimeWarp sub-project is a pervasive
mixed-reality outdoor game in the City of Cologne,
Germany, linking interactive content with actual
places.30 Players walk the city with portable
positioning and display devices that augment the real
locations with virtual objects and characters, like the
13
31 The Heinzelmännchen are a group of gnome-like ctional characters, starring in a tale written by Cologne teacher Ernst Weyden in
1826. See Wikipedia, Heinzelmaennchen, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinzelm%C3%A4nnchen (last visited May 25, 2008).
32 For a demonstration, see TimeWarp Cologne 2007 Video, available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIhFEtlzpKs&feature=related
(last visited May 25, 2008).
33 See IPCity Website, CityTales, http://www.ipcity.eu/?page_id=11 (last visited May 25, 2008).
34 See Bernhard Reitinger et al., Deliverable D5.1: Initial Demonstrators of MR Infrastructure Components, FP6-2004-IST-4-27571,
available at http://www.ipcity.eu/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/D5.1%20-%20Early%20Demonstrators%20of%20MR%20
Infrastructure%20Components.pdf http://www.ipcity.eu/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/D5.1%20-%20Early%20Demonstrators%20
of%20MR%20Infrastructure%20Components.pdf (last visited May 25, 2008), at 41.
35 See Sabiha Ghellal et al., Deliverable D9.1: Demonstrator of City Tales Applications, FP6-2004-IST-4-27571, available at http://www.
ipcity.eu/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/D9.1%20-%20Demonstrators%20of%20City%20Tales%20Applications.pdf (last visited May
25, 2008), at 17.
36 See Urban Renewal Website, http://www.ipcity.eu/?page_id=8.
37 See Urban Sketcher Website, http://studierstube.icg.tu-graz.ac.at/ipcity/sketcher.php.
legendary Heinzelmännchen.31 Through the technology,
players experience the appearance of existing
buildings in different time periods and engage with
the history of the place. Instead of having to follow a
predenedpathtolearnaboutthesitesandhistoryof
Cologne, tourists can move freely around the city and
engage in a number of games and applications.32
Third, the CityTales sub-project employs a range of
ubiquitous technologies in order to learn about the
human-computer interaction aspects of Presence.
The project’s main research interest is in “the way in
which the user is enabled to create a mixed reality
story”.33 Four modules have been designed around
a Hypermedia Database (HMDB) for managing
hyperlinked media enhanced with metadata.34
Bärlin, an early prototype that was stopped after
not providing satisfactory evidence, represented a
metaphorical approach to Presence. It is centered
around a teddy bear with a built-in video camera
thatallowsuserstolmthemselveswhileholding
the doll in front of them. Leo’s Adventuresisaash-
based web service that allows users to upload and
browse videos and provides simple post-production
animation tools to create new mixed-reality videos.
The platform is built around a narrative featuring Leo,
actionalalien,whostoppedoverinBerlin,Germany,
tondoutabouthumansubcultureandmusic.By
uploading short videos showcasing the hot spots of
the city and including the animated character Leo,
users are supposed to produce the content for a
real-life mixed–reality application. While the Bärlin and
Leo’s Adventures modules are supposed to provide the
Hypermedia Database with content, the remaining
two modules are designed to draw on it. StreetBeat
is a location-aware music-based tour. The goal is “to
immerse the ‘story-browsers’ into a sub-cultural story
told by a professional music editor about hip areas in
Berlin”, creating cultural Presence.35 Finally, CityWhisper
will make available mixed-reality content accessible via
a number of content browsing tools.
Fourth, the Urban Renewal sub-project aims to provide
multidisciplinary urban-planning teams with mixed-
reality technologies, emphasizing the participative and
experimental aspects of urban planning.36 A so-called
mixed reality tent hosts the tools and applications
needed to create the experience, including the Colour
Table, the Urban Sketcher,37 and the Barcode Player.
2.1.2.2 Analysis
In contrast to PRESENCCIA, IPCity explicitly aims at
mixing real and virtual environments. Thus, by default,
the virtual reality elements are situated in a real-life
context, from which one cannot escape. This raises
a number of interesting issues both with regard to
research and practical applications. Given the very
appliednatureoftheproject,thereisalsoasignicant
overlap between research ethics and the broader
social implications.
14
2.1.2.2.1 Research Ethics
IPCity not only develops prototypes for mixed-
reality experiences, but also tests and evaluates
theseprototypesineldtrials,usinginterpretative-
ethnographic and quasi-experimental approaches.
While it has to ensure that research design and
execution adhere to the standards of the relevant
ethics boards, some issues are particularly noteworthy.
First of all, participants in IPCity trials used the mixed-
reality interfaces in real-life contexts. In the case of
TimeWarp, Illuminate, or CityWhisper, for instance,
users had to move around in the cities of Cologne
andBerlin,partiallyamonginner-citytrafcthat
usually requires the full attention of pedestrians. In
addition to wearing head-mounted displays, TimeWarp
participants were supposed to engage with vir tual
objects or even virtual characters in mixed realities.
Such arrangements can obviously lead to distraction.
Thereisariskthatparticipantsdonotpaysufcient
attention to the potentially physically dangerous
context around them. An obvious challenge for the
IPCity team was therefore to ensure the physical
safety of participants by closely monitoring their
movements and, if necessar y, inter vening.
This was especially important as the researchers not
onlyhadlimitedcontrolovertrafc,butalsoover
other participants. For example, some researchers
reported that on some occasions by-standers got
irritated and even aggressive at participants using
mixed-reality gear as they did not understand what
was going on. Even though such incidents were fully
taken into account and optimally managed by the
IPCity team, they point to the broader social issue of
clashes between people being engaged in partially
different and sometimes even contradictory mixed
realities sharing the same physical space.
More practical issues during the trials involved
compliance with legal rules concerning data privacy,
intellectual property, and content regulation. Regarding
data privacy, it had to be ensured that all par ticipants
in TimeWarp had given meaningful consent to being
video-recorded and tracked during the trials. Another
potential problem concerns the privacy of people
depicted in the shared content as solicited for instance
for Leo’s Adventures. In contrast to most professional
journalists, citizen contributors are not usually trained
in privacy-conscious reporting and may publish
their self-created material without the consent of
those covered. Fur ther, those IPCity services based
on user-generated content like CityWall, CoMedia,
Bärlin, or Leo’s Adventures are likely to face similar
problemsasotherpeer-to-peerle-sharingplatforms.
While the actual backend system for CityWall was
handled by Flickr and consequently governed by the
general Flickr user policy for mobile content, others
services may have encountered the problem of
anonymous users sharing and uploading potentially
infringing or harmful content for immediate display.
Depending on the applicable regulatory framework,
this may be content considered harmful to minors,
like the excessive display of violence or sexuality, hate
speech, or obscene comments or statements that
intentionally damage another person’s reputation.
These aspects could lead to further questions about
the legal and ethical liability of platform providers for
user-generated content. While these issues were not
immediately relevant in the trials, they are likely to
become more salient in future applications.
2.1.2.2.2 Social Implications
Mixed-reality technologies have a broad range of
practical applications with considerable social impact.
While the games and entertainment industr y has
already integrated simple versions of mixed reality into
their products, other areas comprise training-related,
industrial, as well as military applications. At any rate,
the increasing commercialization of mixed-reality
technologies predicted for the coming years is likely to
triggeranumberofdifcultsocialandethicalissuesin
addition to the abovementioned legal ones.
An important ethical problem concerns the issue of
deception in mixed-reality environments. By design,
mixed-reality environments are supposed to augment
reality with virtual elements. Deception is therefore
part of the experience and naturally opens the
door to new and subtle ways of manipulating user
perceptions. Scenarios are mostly hypothetical at the
moment,butnottoodifculttoimagine.Forexample,
localstoreownersmaytrytoinuencethemixed-
reality appearance of their shops in TimeWarp to
attract more customers and present them in a better
15
light than is warranted. Similarly, the operators of
StreetBeatmayfeaturespecicartistsorclubswithout
disclosing this intervention to the users. Issues like
these may partially be covered by the laws concerning
false advertising and product placement, which in
many countries require adequate disclosure of the
nature and origin of the content.
More generally, game designers may be tempted to
portray the urban reality of Cologne with a certain
bias, such as guiding players away from socially
problematic areas and thereby invoking an overly
positive perception of the city. Though this could
basically happen with every guided tour, the mixed
reality experience may be a special case in so far as
it immerses the player in an experience that is more
fundamental and manipulative than a tour in physical
reality only. Another issue of deception may be the
manipulation of content on installations like CityWall
by competing businesses or agents. For example, if
the wall should in fact develop into a popular point
of information for citizens and tourists, rival event
organizers may try to tweak the content in a way that
favours their own and diminishes their rivals’ events.
Even though severe cases of manipulation may be
dealtwithunderlaw,moresubtlewaysofinuencing
content on these platforms are likely to be much
moredifculttodetect.
In this regard, the Urban Renewal project poses
different issues as it is primarily aimed at professional
urbanplanningteams.Adifcultethicalissueisagain
the risk of deception. Especially in urban planning
projects, where the virtual is supposed to mimic
the experience of a future reality as the basis for
decision-making, projects may be visualized with a
certain agenda in mind. Again, this is generally an issue
with planning projects but seems to be particularly
acute when mixed-reality applications are used. On
a legal level, one can ask to what extent some of the
Urban Renewal applications could be used to improve
theefciencyofadministrativeplanningprocedures.
One of the key questions here is whether citizens
will in fact have a better understanding of the social
implications of the project. In a social sense, the
problem of the digital divide (the divide between
those who access to digital technologies and those
who do not) seems to be particularly relevant in this
case. As far as the Urban Sketcher or Colour Table are
used as tools for public participation in the planning
process, they would have be universally and easily
accessible.
An issue closely related to deception is that of fair
representation. If it matters how an entity is portrayed
and augmented in a mixed-reality environment, then
there is a question of how control is distributed over
the entity and its appearance. For example, should
a shop owner in Cologne city be able to intervene
if the entrance to her locale is “virtually blocked”
by an oversized Heinzelmaennchen? Such scenarios
are certain to raise a number of legal issues and will
have to be judged on a case-by-case basis according
to established principles of non-discrimination and
equality, fair competition and advertising rules, or the
protection of privacy and liability for defamation.
Another social issue may arise from the fact that
most applications in the sub-projects require a certain
amount of media literacy. Given the public-service
character of many of these applications, this may
lead to the undesired effect of privileging those who
already use networked information technologies
to inform themselves about events and cities while
excluding those who do not have access such tools
anyway, i.e. mostly elderly and socially disadvantaged
people. In order to not widen this digital divide,
the technologies would have to be designed with a
general focus on usability and ease of access also for
those who do not have extensive experience with
them. In any case, it may be possible to draw on the
experience with mobile phones, where similar issues
about the digital divide and access for different groups
have been raised.
Finally, there are a number of even broader social
issues that are likely to surface the more pervasive
and persistent mixed-reality applications become.
In other words, when Presence technologies are
mixed with the real world, there are added issues
about how to cope, for example, with the space
around the user (is it public or private? What kind
of freedom of expression exists in this space? And
the like.) For example, once users are immersed
in their mixed-reality experience, there may be a
need to guarantee a smooth transitioning between
reality and mixed-reality environments. Also, there
16
is an even more fundamental risk of people with
different or even incompatible mixed realities clashing.
If two people move in the same space with different
perceptions of realities, it is not clear how they
will handle this situation. Another aspect of such a
thought experiment concerns the situation when
mixed realities become persistent so that one user
will be able to adopt another user’s mixed reality. In
an even broader sense, pervasive use of mixed-reality
environments may raise concerns of alienation and
withdrawal from social relationships.
2.1.3 PASION
PASION is the acronym for “Psychologically
Augmented Social Interaction Over Networks” and
aimsatproviding“moreefcient,effectivegroup
interactions in mediated environments.”38 The project
is designed to achieve this goal by understanding
and tracking group behavior, providing appropriate
feedback services, and developing technological
substitutes for traditional ways of conveying
information in the context of computer-mediated
communication.39
2.1.3.1 Project Details
The project revolves around Shared Virtual
Environments (SVE) that can be accessed from
mobile terminals and partially also from desktops
and immersive environments. In order to understand
the strategies and patterns of interaction in large
persistent social groups, two main areas of application
were chosen: collaborative knowledge work and social
gaming. Findings in these areas are particularly suitable
for later commercialization in business models, which
is one of the longer-term goals of PASION.
Intherstareaofcollaborativeknowledgework,the
goalistounderstandthefactorsthatinuenceteam
performance in computer-mediated environments,
create applications that improve collaboration,
andmeasuretheirimpact.Oneoftherststudies
conducted in experimental settings was Virtual
Holiday. Groups of four had the task of collaboratively
organizing a vacation, using the web for information
and text chat for communication. Through careful
tracking and observation of participants’ behaviour,
it was possible to analyze group participation, group
performance, and patterns of interactions.
The second area focuses on mobile social gaming.
The primary goal here is to develop mobile games,
in which the emotional state of a user can be
communicated and manipulated. Through several
studies, the project aims to understand the interplay of
various social, technological, and cognitive factors that
inuencegameperformanceanddesignapplications
that facilitate these tasks, for instance, by providing
new channels for signalling moods and giving feedback.
As in the collaborative work projects, the impact on
performance will be measured, using both quantitative
andqualitativetools.Amongtherststudieswas
a treasure hunting game based on Crossre,40 an
adaptable multiplayer role-playing platform, on which
participants used instant messaging while looking for
hidden objects. One of the aspects analyzed here
were how the impact of additional feedback channels
and the availability of relational knowledge about
a person’s position within a network affected the
performance and dynamics of the group.
2.1.3.2 Analysis
Even more so than IPCity, PASION research is closely
aimed at real-life and commercial applications of
researchndings.Consequently,ethical,legal,andsocial
issues become a major topic in the research itself,
whichisexpressedintworeportsspecicallydesigned
to address ethical issues in PASION.41
38 PASION Website, http://www.ist-pasion.com/.
39 http://www.ist-pasion.com/.
40 See CrossFire Website, http://crossre.real-time.com/ (last visited June 28, 2008).
41 See Richard Walker et al., Ethical Documentation for Trials, Deliverable 1.4.2, Nov. 30, 2007; Andrea Miotto et al., Ethical Guidelines for
Pasion, Deliverable D 1.4.1, Dec. 16, 2006.
17
2.1.3.2.1 Research Ethics
As far as methods are concerned, PASION uses both
laboratoryexperimentsandeldtrials.Whiletheeld
trials have been progressing rather slowly because of
technicaldifculties,thefocushasbeenonsocio-
cognitive and behavioural experiments that involve
human subjects.
Besides the usual need for approval by institutional
ethics boards, the main issue raised by PASION’s
research design is informational privacy. At the heart
of the studies is the idea to augment conventional
computer-mediated communication with additional
information that has been previously gathered:
information on users’ emotional and cognitive states,
their context in terms of location, availability and
current activity, the users’ roles within their social
groups, and the overall dynamics of the group.42 Such
vastamountsofdatadenitelyqualifyaspersonal
information and are obviously socially delicate. The
particular richness and sensitivity of this information
puts high demands on researchers.
One of the main challenges for the project team
was therefore to ensure that each participant had
given meaningful informed consent before taking
part in the experiments and trials. This proved to be
particularlydifcultinthework-relatedpartofthe
project. Apparently, a lot of people refused to take
part in the trial in connection with their workplace
because of fears of negative consequences. This brings
upthedifcultquestiontowhatextenthierarchies
and power inequalities in the workplace may
fundamentally constrain the choices of employees
andpreventanymeaningfulconsentintherst
place. While some workers may categorically refuse
participation even though it would be both socially
andindividuallybenecial,otherworkersmayfeel
forced to follow the instructions of their superiors
and thus not be completely free in giving consent
to the comprehensive surveillance, recording, and
mining of behavioural data. The problem becomes
even more complex when considering that, in contrast
to social gaming and leisure situations, people in the
workplace cannot normally hide behind a pseudonym.
Similarly, employees may also be prevented from
exercising their legal rights to personal information
at a later point in time. In addition to these problems
in hierarchical work situations, informed consent
maybeevenmoredifculttoobtainwhen“negative
psychological consequences” were given as an explicit
reason to opt out. Reportedly, participants faced the
dilemma of either taking part in a trial and revealing
their psychological state, or not taking part and
thereby implicitly revealing their vulnerability, too.
Particular care is fur ther warranted with regard
to PASION’s extensive use of relational data in
the context of social network analysis (SNA). By
mining the data implicit in the relations between
actors, PASION researchers gain new insights into
the structure of a network. Social network analysis
therefore generates a new kind of second-order
personal information that is at least as sensitive as the
directly observed data: for example, aggregate power
hierarchies or factions in groups may be revealed
by this type of analysis, quite apart from data about
individuals. Most importantly, such relational meta-
data could make it possible to re-identify previously
anonymised participants just by their position in a
social network. The targeted production and use of
such data may not call for fundamentally different
ethical standards, but highlights the need for increased
awareness of risks to privacy in the context of large-
scale social network analysis.43 In PASION, the team
tried to counter that risk by only providing aggregate
indicator that summarize large amounts of social
network data. For example, instead of exposing the
exchangerelationshipsofaspecicuser,thesystem
just reveals the aggregate degree of reciprocity in a
group of people.
2.1.3.2.2 Social Implications
In a hands-on project like PASION, the social
implications are more or less directly related to
the ethical issues that occurred during the research
process. Applications for augmented communication
42 Richard Walker et al., Ethical Documentation for Trials, Deliverable 1.4.2, Nov. 30, 2007, at 9.
43 See Stephen P. Borgatti & José Luis Molina, Ethical and Strategic Issues in organizational Social Network Analysis, 39 JOURNAL OF
APPLIED BEHAVIORAL SCIENCE 337 (2003).
18
arenotonlythealreadymentionedeldsof
collaborative work and social gaming, but also medical
applications like psychotherapy (for example, if one
wanted to ‘cure’ the shyness or work-shyness of a
worker).
Once the systems are employed on a larger scale, the
possibility of negative psychological impacts is likely to
become much more urgent. For example, the situation
of a person already suffering from anxiety could be
worsened by the realization of one’s situation through
implicit data that would normally not be available.
An example would be an aggregate implicit measure
of one’s popularity that may reinforce a perception
of being unpopular. Another case of adverse impact
would be one that is caused by another person. For
example, people may randomly gang up on somebody
and start bullying the person. While such dynamics
may unfold in all kinds of environments, they may
be especially damaging in the context of socially
augmented communication that might reveal more
information about a particular person’s vulnerable
state than desired.
A more abstract but no less real risk concerns the
possibility of surveillance of employees by their own
companies. As mentioned above, the use of pervasive
and ubiquitous information technology enables
new forms of tracking and monitoring that may run
counter to fundamental values like privacy and human
dignity. 44 The moment work-related communication
shifts online, behavioural data starts accruing in the
systems. This opens up new possibilities of control and
potential abuse that are hard to monitor and control.
As the recent cases of systematic eavesdropping at
companies like Deutsche Telekom AG have shown,
organizations may be tempted to abuse ubiquitous
personal data about employees’ behaviour. 45 The
same is true for government agencies that may gain
access to sensitive personal data to an extent not
allowed by the law.
Afurtherquestionisinhowfarspeciconline
collaboration tools advantage or disadvantage certain
groups of people. For example, if text-based chat
tools become standard means of communication,
this may pose particular challenges to dyslexics
and their perceived performance in the workplace.
From a gender perspective, computer-mediated
work collaboration does not seem likely to have
a fundamental impact. One could argue that the
“deindividuated” nature of online exchanges may
mitigate gender-based discrimination to a certain
degree since gender features of team members
may not be immediately recognizable in their virtual
representations. On the other hand, collaboration
is not intended to be exclusively online but still be
embedded in the social networks and hierarchies of
thermsothatworkersarelikelytoknowthegender
of the other person. The question is therefore how
exactly the collaborative work environment has been
designedinspeciccasesandwhetherthisdesigncan
counter possible gender-related stereotypes and role
clichés in the team.46
Further, as already pointed out above, it will be
important to ensure informed consent especially
in unequal power relationships. Besides the already
mentioned work relationships, one could imagine
that especially children or elderly people may need
to be protected from inadvertently disclosing too
much personal information, not being able to assess
the consequences of their actions in an uncertain
environment. Finally, there may be a potential for
distraction and addiction in mobile social gaming.
Particularly children may not be aware of the costs of
participating through their mobile phones.
44 For an analysis of the implications of current and future workplace monitoring practices, see Jonathan Zittrain, Ubiquitous Human
Computing, June 2008, available at http://ssrn.com/abstract=1140445 (last visited June 24, 2008).
45 Der Spiegel, Did Deutsche Telekom Spy on Journalists and Board Members?, http://www.spiegel.de/international/
business/0,1518,555363,00.html (last visited June 28, 2008).
46 See Judy Wajcman, FEMINISM CONFRONTS TECHNOLOGY (1991).
19
2.1.4 IMMERSENCE
The goal of IMMERSENCE is “to enable people
to freely act and interact in highly realistic virtual
environments with their eyes, ears and hands”.47 The
emphasis is on a new level of immersion achieved
through integrating multi-modal human senses into a
single experience.
2.1.4.1 Project Details
The investigation focuses on the tactile dimension,
which still lags behind the work on visual and auditory
devices. Three scenarios have been developed to
addressthespecicaspectsofmanualoperations.First,
person-to-object interaction concerns the handling
of an object by a human. The main characteristic of
this scenario is the passivity of the interaction par tner,
which only reacts in a physically predictable manner.
At ETH Zurich, for example, progress has been made
in the area of visual recording and replay of objects.48
Second, person-to-person interaction involves two
people that, for instance, shake hands or dance
together. In this scenario, the interaction par tner is
no longer passive but reacts to stimuli herself. The
goal in this scenario based at the TU Munich is to
generate haptic feedback close to a real handshake.49
Third, person-object-person interaction refers to
complex collaborative interactions between two
people mediated by an object, such as two human
beings carrying a box together. This is the main focus
at the Université d’Evry, where AMELIF, an integrative
framework for interaction through an object, is being
developed.50
The main method employed is large-scale
interdisciplinary action in four major areas. In the
area of sensing and actuation technologies, efforts
center on the development and testing of equipment
like a “tactile sensing glove,” “haptic actuators based
on conducting polymer,” and a “sensing glove for
recognising hand postures.”51 As far as rendering
and display technologies are concerned, the project
focuses on the use of visual feedback in generating
virtual objects, the creation of a “tactile map of forces
applied in a human handshake,” and the modelling of
a human hand for object manipulation.52 With regard
to neurosciences, research has focused on topics
like “synchronising sensory stimuli from different
senses,” the phenomenon of “tactile suppression,”
and the question of how emotions are conveyed
in a handshake.”53 In the area of Presence measures,
ndingshavebeenrecordedintheformofforce
patterns as the basis of a haptic language, a so-called
“ground truth approach” that lets participants perform
the same task in different settings from completely
real to completely virtual. Another question
examined is that of how to measure haptic Presence
with subjective and objective measures, such as
questionnaires and heart rates.54 Besides the goal of
contributing to basic research, the project is expected
to have an impact especially in the area of medical
training and diagnosis.
47 IMMERSENCE Website, http://immersence.info/.
48 See IMMERSENCE Website, Subsection Results: Integrated multimodal interaction systems: Actual results and publications (WP5),
http://immersence.info/ (last visited May 25, 2008).
49 See id.
50 See id.
51 See IMMERSENCE Website, Subsection Results: Sensing and actuation technology: Actual results and publications (WP3), http://
immersence.info/ (last visited May 25, 2008). See IMMERSENCE Website, Subsection Results: Sensing and actuation technology:
Actual results and publications (WP3), http://immersence.info/ (last visited May 25, 2008).
52 See IMMERSENCE Website, Subsection Results: Modeling and Rendering: Actual results and publications (WP4), http://immersence.
info/ (last visited May 25, 2008).
53 See IMMERSENCE Website, Subsection Results: Neuroscientic basis for haptic interaction: Actual results and publications (WP2),
http://immersence.info/ (last visited May 25, 2008).
54 See IMMERSENCE Website, Subsection Results: Evaluation and presence measures: Actual results and publications (WP6), http://
immersence.info/ (last visited May 25, 2008).
20
2.1.4.2 Analysis
Unlike PASION and IPCity, IMMERSENCE focuses on
basic research.
2.1.4.2.1 Research Ethics
As far as methods are concerned, IMMERSENCE
primarily relies on laborator y experiments involving
human subjects. Researchers thus have to follow their
integrated ethics codes to protect the autonomy and
privacy of participants as has been pointed out for the
other projects.
Even though IMMERSENCE and PRESENCCIA
are closely related in their focus and approach,
IMMERSENCEexhibitssomespecicissuesthat
are rooted in the nature of haptics research. Most
importantly, haptic interfaces affect participants not
only on a mental, but also on a physical level. The risk
is thus that people may get hurt by malfunctioning
technology, abuse, or other unintended events. For
example,awronglyconguredarticialhandmay
not just press the participant’s hand as in a regular
handshake but actually squeeze it with brute force.
Experiments involving such devices require a “red
button” that allows the supervisor to stop the
procedure at any time. In addition to the ethics
approval required by the various home institutions,
some IMMERSENCE researchers reported that their
groups paid special attention to participants’ needs
and reactions during experiments and stopped
experiments immediately if required.
As far as more invasive techniques like brain
stimulation are concerned, researchers seem to
pursue different approaches. While some regard the
body as an essential entity in our experience of the
world, others posit that even an isolated brain could
experience a walk in the sun if stimulated accordingly.
The debates mirror the “brain in a vat” controversy in
55 See Wikipedia, Brain in a Vat, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_in_a_vat (last visited Aug. 4, 2008). The debate was initiated by Hilary
Putnam, REASON, TRUTH AND HISTORY (1981: CAMBRIDGE: CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS), pp.1-21.
56 See Barnaby J. Feder, Prepping Robots to Perform Surgery, NY TIMES, May 4, 2008, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/04/
business/04moll.html?ex=1367726400&en=e534281ebfeff20e&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink. For an example
of a manufacturer in this area, see DaVinci Surgery Website, http://www.davincisurgery.com/index.aspx (last visited Aug. 4, 2008).
57 Miriam Reiner, Presentation at the PEACH Summer School, Dubrovnik, July 2008.
philosophy (i.e. the question of whether the brain can
experience the world apar t from the body) and has
important consequences for an ethical assessment.55
2.1.4.2.2 Social Implications
While researchers seem to agree that the area of
haptics in Presence research is underdeveloped as
compared to other modalities of perception, there
areacoupleofareasinwhichndingscouldbe
applied on a broader scale. One obvious candidate
are games and entertainment technologies, some of
which already employ rudimentary haptic devices
in their latest consoles. Another area is training, like
aightsimulatorthatsimulatesthephysicalityof
yinginarealplanetoprepareprospectivepilotsfor
risky situations. More generally, haptic interfaces can
be applied everywhere where tasks are best done
remotely. This may involve activities that are unusually
risky such as dismantling a bomb. Another area are
activities that require an extraordinary degree of
precisionlikebrainsurgery.Sinceinalltheseeldsof
application, haptic interfaces mediate forces between
the human body and the environment, high safety
standards have to be met to provide the necessary
reliability and robustness. At the moment, however,
most of these applications are still in a rather early
stage.
An interesting illustration of a different set of issues
that may arise from the broader application of haptic
interfaces is the use of robot technology for minimally
invasive surgery. 56 Such technology allows surgeons
to use remotely controlled robot arms to conduct
surgery. Even though such techniques promise a much
higher degree of precision than conventional forms of
surgery, patients seem to be highly sceptical of surgical
robots. Studies reported a rather low level of trust of
patients in the performance of haptic technologies.57
People were sceptical of being operated on by a
“machine” instead of a real doctor, even though the
21
machine had a lower rate of error in the relevant
eld.Thiscasehighlightstheroleofsoftfactorsin
applications of Presence technologies.
2.2 Input from the Peach
Community
A further source of empirical data were the
various meetings of the Peach community. Over
the course of the project, the research team had
had the opportunity to facilitate and obser ve the
discourse among Presence researchers, the WinG
4 community, students, and industry representatives.
The meetings took place in Helsinki, Barcelona,
Oxford, and Dubrovnik. The approaches taken varied
from occasion to occasion. The Oxford meeting,
for example, focused primarily on the social, ethical,
and legal issues, and therefore provided a good
opportunity to solicit views, ideas, and feedback from
thePeachcommunityspecicallyoncertainissues.
On other occasions, the research team engaged more
passively in participant observation and took notes
of discussions on related topics that touched upon
social, ethical, and legal issues. What follows are brief
reports on the outcomes of these obser vations and
discussions.
2.2.1 Peach Meeting: (Networking session
ICT06), Helsinki, November 2006
The Information Society Technology meeting in
Helsinki focused on getting a broad sense of the
issues. During the meeting, Peach researchers and
practitioners were invited to post comments on
posters. Some of them are listed here:
Where do you draw the line between Presence
technologies and other technologies?
Are you for bits or matter? (me, bits)
Should discussion of ethical issues aim at researchers
– or at policy and the public?
What if I want to disappear?
Should ethical and social discussion aim at current
technology, or at future technologies?
Liability issues for VR content providers for real world
accidents connected to their use?
Making a VR [virtual reality] tool – who has to pay
for accident?
Is Mozart commercial – will his music disappear?
Concert music will disappear; people will make their
own music.
What about users with special needs?
As the comments show, the workshop provided
a lot of interesting discussion points, of which only
a few will be highlighted here. First, users with
specialneedswereidentiedasanimportantissue.
Although there are already dedicated conferences
on VR for special needs and disabilities, this concern
could also be interpreted in a much wider sense: are
there issues with Presence regarding people with
different needs? Or put the other way around: when
isastandardtechnologyorenvironmentsufcient,
and when does it have take into account the special
needs and preferences of certain groups of users? The
underlying tension here is that technologies are always
designed with an “ideal” user in mind and therefore
are necessarily “standardized.” From an ethical point of
view, this standardization may turn into discrimination
if people with certain characteristics are systematically
excluded. Traditionally, such differential treatment is
regarded as especially problematic when it is based
on categories, which cannot easily be altered like
gender, race, class, or disability. A common approach
in law and ethics to assess such situations is to apply
the equality principle, which demands that those who
are equal should be treated equally while the unequal
should be treated unequally. Presence researchers and
practitioners need to be aware of the problem and
balance the countervailing interests on a case-by-case
basis.
Liability for outcomes from VR technologies or
environments was another pressing issue raised in
the discussions. Who should be held accountable
under what conditions for harm occurring in the
context of Presence technologies? Questions of
liability for artefacts have long been debated in legal
contexts. Important factors for imposing legal liability
are the likelihood and extent of harm caused and
22
the ability of certain groups of people to prevent it.
Product liability regulations and tort laws, for instance,
tend to prescribe different standards of liability for
different products. 58 In the area of information and
communication technologies, the focus has been
on so-called “intermediary liability,” i.e. the question
of whether and to what extent the operators of
communications platforms can be held liable for
damage caused by third parties on their platforms. It
remains to be seen which liability regimes will be best
suited for different Presence technologies once they
are rolled out in a broader context.
A further concern raised in the discussions were
the implications of Presence technologies for
cultural production and consumption. Will Presence
technologies lead to the end of recorded culture, to
the end of “live” (face-to-face) performances, or to
users creating their own entertainment? Music is a
goodexample,lmandtheatrewouldbeothers.This
is a key question where Presence technologies shade
into other technologies. Recorded entertainments
and culture could be superseded by other forms of
performance, virtual events could replace real ones,
and “social networking” models of production could
crowd out industrial ones.
The question of “What if I want to disappear?” implies
a scenario where users spend a lot of time in a vir tual
environment – with possibly profound consequences
for their identities. This issue has been mostly raised in
the context of gaming and social spaces applications. It
may be interesting to apply this to applications other
than gaming and social spaces. Finally, there are many
other ethical and legal issues that could have been
raised – but were not.
2.2.2 Peach Meeting: (1st WinG
consultation), Barcelona, March 2007
The following is an elaborated summary of the
discussion at the Peach meeting in Barcelona. At this
meeting, the focus was on shared virtual environments
as enabled by commercial software like Second Life
or even immersive video-conferencing facilities. When
people spend a lot of time in massively multiplayer
online games or other computer-mediated social
spaces, they may develop a new set of relations and
even close friendships. Users may achieve a strong
sense of being attached to the virtual space and the
objects in it. This novel form of virtual experience
points to a number of social, ethical, and legal issues.
Again, a long list of questions was compiled and
analyzed for major social, ethical, and legal issues. While
the following summary is by no means exhaustive, it
identiesvesetsofconcernsthatwereconceivedof
as particularly pressing.
Arstsetofconcernsrevolvedaroundtheactual
and potential implications of virtual environments on
an individual and social level. As far as individuals are
concerned, participants pointed to a number of issues.
With regard to the physical well-being of users, some
researchers reported on the occurrence of motion
sickness caused by certain forms of immersion in
virtual environments. Others mentioned the possibility
of much more complex side-effects of research
uses, but also pointed out that these were still
largely unknown. It was proposed to be as open and
transparent as possible about these issues and share
experiencesinthisratherneweldofresearch.Some
alsoaskedwhethermedicalethicswerestillsufcient
to cope with these challenges given the novelty of the
eld.
Besides concerns with the physical integrity, a major
focus of the discussion was on the mental well-
being of Presence users and research participants.
The experience of virtual environments, it was
argued, posed a range of new problems to people’s
emotional and psychological states. How harmful is
the simulation of reality and its experience “as if” it
werereal?Attendeesfurtherpointedtothedifculty
of comparing virtual with conventional relationships
and also mentioned the potential for addiction: what
if Presence technologies achieve a level of immersion
that comes close the effects of some mind-expanding
drugs? But also more mundane settings like immersive
virtual worlds and video games were regarded
critically by some, who saw especially children at
58 See, e.g., the Council Directive 85/374/EEC of 25 July 1985 on the approximation of the laws, regulations and administrative
provisions of the Member States concerning liability for defective products.
23
risk of confusing what is real and what is virtual. This
brought up the question of whether there may be
a need in certain cases to keep people aware of
thearticialityoftheenvironmentstheyinteractin.
An important question is therefore whether there
should be limits to the generation and experience of
Presence under certain circumstances.
A related issue brought up in the meeting was the
question of learning and internalization. If users got
used to certain technologies, there is a risk that
they take their experience for granted. This seemed
alarming to some participants, who pointed to the
constant need for presence researchers to not
onlyreectonthebenets,butalsoharmsoftheir
creations. A fur ther point was made regarding the
possibility of differential impacts depending on the
context in which Presence technologies are employed.
It was asked, for example, to what extent company
and work settings pose different problems than
private and home settings.
Besides such implications for the individual user, some
researchers raised concerns with the broader social
implications of Presence technologies and applications.
For example, it was asked whether the use of virtual
conferencing or spending time in Second Life could
contribute to environmental sustainability, for instance,
by saving energy used for physical meetings. The
discussion further focused on identifying different
factors that may play a role in shaping the social
implications of Presence technologies:
Do the uses of VEs and Presence technology
raise different issues for research, commercial,
entertainment, and military applications?
How to categorize and classify the impacts of
different types of systems of Presence and related
technologies – for example, immersive versus
desktop, realistic versus abstract worlds?
What is the difference between routine uses of
virtual environments versus experimental ones – are
there different issues to consider?
Short-term versus long-term uses – what are the
differences regarding social implications?
A second set of concerns related to the potential
of manipulation, deception, and abuse in virtual
environments. It was pointed out that while some
people may want to look like their real selves, others
may choose a different appearance. One case
mentioned in this context was the impersonation of
one user by another through an avatar: what are the
social and ethical implications of this? Is it possible
tomanipulateexperienceandinuencebehaviour
in this way? Some attendees further mentioned the
possibility of stealing someone’s voice. With some
Presence technologies it has become feasible to
make one’s voice sound like that of another person
– what are the implications of this for deception? A
related issue here was the observation that in some
cases users may not even be aware the presence (or
absence) of other people in certain places.
Many of the issues around manipulation and deception
were discussed in the context of identity. For example,
it was asked how identity could best be understood
and dealt with in virtual environments, especially if it
was not clear whether there was a real person or an
electronic agent or algorithm behind an avatar. When
deciding whether there is a need to grant protection
to avatars, it was argued that the level of personal
investment of a player in her avatar should be taken
into account. This also triggered thought experiments
about how individuals might be affected if their avatar
“died.” Should this be considered “harm” to the
individual and her relationships? Finally, it was asked
whether, how, and to what extent the issues of identity
change and addiction might be related.
A third set of concerns focused on discrimination
and equality in virtual environments. Gender issues
played an important role here, asking how women are
represented in virtual worlds and whether this may
sustainorconateexistingstereotypes.Attendeesalso
pointed to the possibility that Presence technologies
may give an advantage mostly to men if these are
early adopters. It was further considered whether
women and men may experience Presence in
different ways and what, if any, the consequences of
this might be. More generally, it was asked whether
gender issues should be divided into gender in online
gaming on the one hand, and women in computing
ontheother.AsfarastheeldofPresenceresearch
was concerned, it was discussed how the participation
of women researchers could be promoted. Some
24
attendees also pondered whether there were actually
any truly novel gender issues in Presence technologies.
Other areas in which discrimination and equality were
argued to play an important role are gay and ethnic
issues. It was asked whether people from different
backgrounds may be treated differently or even more
respectfully in shared virtual environments. Further
concerns were raised about how to avoid exclusion,
for instance, of disabled persons. Attendees pointed
to well-known inequalities at the digital divide level
and were concerned how differences in media
literacyandaccessmayinuencethecommunicative
opportunities of users. Finally, it was mentioned that
also language barriers could play a role in shared
virtual environments – what if you can’t understand
others, if you get treated as a foreigner?
A fourth set of concerns focused on the nature of
data and its ethical treatment in virtual environments,
especially privacy and intellectual property. If a device
can sense what users are doing, it was asked, what are
the ethical issues involved? Participants were generally
concerned about the new possibilities of tracking,
recording and surveillance that come with the use of
Presence technologies. While it was not clear how
Presencetechnologiestintotheemergingregime
of electronic surveillance, the increasing traceability of
persons and personal data was considered a major
issuefortheeld.Amongotherthings,itwasasked
whether it would be useful to make a systematic
comparison between ethical and legal issues in video-
capture systems like CCTV and virtual environments.
A further issue that raised concerns was the possibility
to sell information about people’s Presence to
commercial or governmental actors. For example, with
a mobile phone in silent mode, it can be assumed its
owner is busy, while a person active in Second Life
may reveal personal preferences for certain goods or
hobbies – all information that can be of substantial
value to marketers or governments.
Besides privacy concerns, intellectual property was
also discussed. Referring to an emerging remix and
mash-up culture, some attendees asked who would
pay for the creation of certain types of content in the
future, while others raised the problem of whether
users should be granted (intellectual) proper ty
rights to certain digital objects they created. More
specically,attendeesdiscussedtheimplicationoflegal
ownership of virtual objects and avatar rights: whom
does a virtual building or t-shir t actually belong to?
Cutting through these discussions was a more
general question about the applicability and utility
of existing legal regimes in virtual environments.
New technologies usually challenge these normative
frameworks and lead to tensions and disruptions.
Some participants pointed to issues of liability and
security. One example discussed was the case of
mobile technologies as employed by the PASION
project. Another example comes from the IPCity
project: what if a user got hurt by being directed
intoheavytrafc,whowouldberesponsible:the
device manufacturer, the network or service provider,
or the user herself? Another issue mentioned was
data security for mobile users, who want to share
information across devices.
Afthsetofconcernsrelatestoquestionsof
governance of and in virtual environments. This
was perceived as not just a matter of state law
and regulation but of regimes of social norms
andconventionsthatemergedunderthespecic
conditions of virtual environments. Most generally, it
was asked which “laws” hold in a vir tual world like
Second Life and who controls them: who sets the
rules and enforces them, what kind of politics governs
these environments?
Among the potential problems discussed were the
possibility of unwanted activities or vigilante justice,
such as holding an alleged perpetrator for ransom.
Further, people mentioned ownership within and
across different online worlds, the issue of avatar
persistence, the macro dynamics of in-world
economies,conictsovervirtualcurrenciesand
trade, credit card fraud, vandalism or other outright
destructive behaviour.
In terms of approaches, it was asked whether and to
what extent ethical and legal responsibility should be
assigned to the avatar or the real person. Also markets
were mentioned in this regard, both as mechanisms
ofregulationandasinstitutionsthatbenetfrom
greater predictability and certainty generated by
stable governance regimes. Some attendees pointed
to the role of end-user license agreements (so-called
25
EULAs) in the governance online worlds, but also
reminded the audience that most users (and especially
children) cannot be expected to actually read and
understand these codes as guidelines for behaviour.
Generally, there was a sense that the exercise of
power may not always be transparent, given the
complex technological architectures involved. Finally,
a number of attendees were concerned about the
interaction among different governance regimes.
People wondered whether there might be a need to
“harmonize” these normative systems and whether
the traditional divide between private and public law
may hold in virtual worlds.
Analandsixthsetofconcernspointedtoa
number of rather broad questions that relate to our
understanding of social life in virtual environments
more generally. For example, it was mentioned that
the current uses of virtual environments, apart from
research, are mainly in visualization and practical
applications like therapy and training on the one
hand, and entertainment, gaming and socializing on
the other – what other like uses can be envisaged?
And would these require differential treatment
with regard to social, ethical, and legal issues? Can
we distinguish between ethical and social issues in
research as opposed to non-research applications?
How to distinguish issues in Presence versus Co-
Presence technologies – should they be kept separate
at all? Tackling these questions, it was argued, not
onlyrequiresreectionbyPresenceresearchersand
developers, but also input from the various other
audiences involved, including actual users, non-users,
and the general public. Some participants expressed
the idea that especially interdisciplinary work is
needed to fully appreciate the implications of social life
in virtual environments.
There is a further issue in relation to the different
capabilities for different types of systems: for example,
in terms of avatar embodiment and how the user is
tracked (some have only the position of their body
tracked, others the movement of their head and
arms, etc.), or in terms of what devices they have
(some may have a mouse, others a 3D wand, etc), the
extent to which they can change and interact with
environment, and other factors. Issues here include:
what if the world withdraws support (i.e. the world is
shut down), and there is little possibility to reproduce
the online relations? Or if there is violence or injury
orharm,iftheviolenceistakenofine?Whatabout
legal rights to one’s online places and the objects one
has developed, or ownership rights of one’s avatar?
In this case, it is important to distinguish: what should
be stopped for ethical reasons? What can be steered
socially, or socio-legal framework for? What can be
educated for? Do social issues become a bottleneck
for technology development, or vice versa? What
kind of devices should be developed and promoted,
and what kinds of economic or commercial issues
arise? This means that the social, ethical, and legal
implications of Presence research cannot be divorced
from the larger context of how Presence technologies
are being developed, how they are currently used, and
above all, the outlook for their uses.
2.2.3 Peach Meeting: (2nd WinG
consultation), Oxford, April 2008
The following is a summary of the WinG 4 session
on “Social and Ethical Issues” which was held on April
2, 2008 at the Oxford Internet Institute. The aim
of the meeting was to solicit input from the WinG
participants into the ethical, legal and gender issues of
Presence technologies, and how best to address these
in the Peach project.
Therstpartofthediscussionconcernedin-depth
discussion of three scenarios59:
Experiments carried out with Presence 1.
Technologies
Social Issues in Online Worlds2.
Training in Vir tual Worlds3.
Ad 1. Experiments carried out with
Presence Technologies
The most interesting case that was discussed was the
PASION project, which provides augmented cues
– tools that teams can use to enhance their feeling
of Co-Presence. This research takes place in a real
company (Telecom Italia). Since the communication
events are logged, the ethical issue that is raised is
what happens when the co-workers have concerns
59 These are also posted at http://www.starlab.info/peach/?q=forum/1 (last visited Sept. 12, 2008).
26
over the privacy issues that this monitoring involves.
Further, it is not clear how the information from this
logging will be used and what implications this might
have. It could be that people are distanced from the
groupiftheyndoutaboutcertaincharacteristicsof
the group such as to implicitly make the person aware
of their distance. When there are lots of people in a
social organization, there may not be good tools for
recognizing characteristics of groups that don’t cause
conictsofpotentialinterest.
Why should the standards of experiments be any
different from real world experiments?
If there is a negative effect of experiments, why should
that be viewed any different than the effect in real
world experiments? It was proposed that there were
different levels of immersion involved, with some VEs
offering a very real experience, others less. This needs
to be taken into account.
How do you know where the boundaries are unless
you do the experiment?
Guidelines on risk and ethics, and how they apply to
virtual worlds (such as the American Psychological
Association) need to be followed. But these also need
to be updated to take into account the realities of
virtual worlds
Ad 2. Social Issues in Online Worlds
There are emerging uses of Second Life (SL) for
telemedicine applications – facing critical ethical issues
regarding protecting patients data in SL. Even where
a private island has been purchased in SL, and that
portion of the island is closed for sensitive applications,
thismaynotbesufcient.Safetyhereisonly
according to the safety policy provided by SL. On the
other hand, providing facilities like SL for one’s own
purposes would require lots of customization and
work. Linden Labs, the company behind SL, could give
people interested in telemedicine applications a server.
Still,rst,thiswouldmeanLindenwouldneedtobe
trusted. Also, patients would need to be informed
about possible risks and provide signed consent. A
further issue could be if there are impostors in SL – I
may see the therapist, but it is not the therapist.
There are issues of property: you can own things and
you own your own person. There is a need here to
separate the legal issues and ethical issues. The role
of EULAs (End User License Agreements), which
often reserve all rights to the developers. The current
worlds are run by developers, which set the terms
for worlds. Finally, with augmented reality, you can
augment the knowledge of people and make new
knowledge that is not accessible in the real world.
Ad 3.Training in Virtual Worlds
Training in immersive vir tual environments: the
problem with responsibility is more of a legal issue,
ratherthanthersttwowhichweremoreinvolved
with ethical problems. For legal problems, you need
speciccasesandspecicdetails.
What is the solution for a product liability issue like
this? Disclaimer? Companies are hiring people to do
training, but there is nobody to certify these poorly
designed training sessions. These VEs should be treated
the same as drugs and medical devices if being used in
a health care setting.
Other training issues include: What are the success
metrics for training? What is a good training
environment? How to certify this product/service in
terms of quality? What are the standards in e-learning?
In addition to these three scenarios, some other issues
were raised but could not be discussed in depth due
to a lack of time. These mainly concerned the role
of identity and the question of whether people are
playing a role or are being themselves. It was asked
whether people actually want to know whether
they are talking to an avatar or an agent. Also, the
issue of impostors was brought up again that change
identities on a daily basis to trick or deceive others.
Closely related to this problem was a point raised
about the desirability of allowing multiple identities
in the same system. Other aspects mentioned were
a possible coupling of age and social obligations and
the implications of users performing multiple personas
simultaneously. There is also a tension with the idea
of role-playing as one of the main reasons for people
tojoinavirtualworldintherstplace.Afurther
issue was the possibility that data may be collected
under the guise of a game, but is actually being used
for marketing. Other issues mentioned were human
rights in online worlds, exclusion and the digital divide,
gender, race, and sexual identity, manipulation of
people through Presence technologies.
27
As technology evolves, the cultural distinction
between the real and the virtual may become less and
less clear. So what are the ethical implications as all the
ethical issues in real life move part and parcel into the
virtual world?
2.2.4 Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik,
July 2008
During the Peach Summer School in Dubrovnik, Ralph
Schroeder and Eric Meyer (OII) conducted a session
on the social, ethical and legal issues of Presence
Technologies. In order to ground the session in actual
research,veprojectsofsummerschoolparticipants
were selected for discussion and group analysis. What
follows is a brief description of each project and the
majorissuesthatwereidentiedduringthesession.
Further details on these projects can be found in the
summer school program.
Brain Controller: In this research, a controller is
used whereby the subject has their EEG recorded and
then, by focusing attention on something, he or she is
able to control something, e.g. turn on a TV.
Social issue: People that do not know •
how the system works may think that the
system is reading their thoughts. They need
to be informed that it only monitors their
specicinteraction.Thelargerissueofbeing
able to ‘read’ these thoughts also deserves
consideration.
Pasion project: This project, described elsewhere,
conducts experiments into augmented communication
in groups. The system uses social, emotional and
contextual cues with group structure and can identify
people’s roles.
Ethical Issue: privacy, people may not always •
want to share their mood or their emotional
state.
Social issue: Surveillance and the use of •
information: e.g. manager can see the emotional
statesofthestaffandpossiblyrethem.
Emotional Management Therapy: This
research is developing emotional management
in VR to help people with stress and emotional
management.
Social Issue: technologists will focus on •
technology, often ignoring existing practice for
therapy and for coping with emotions.
Social Issue: the content of environment is a •
relaxing environment, but is it good for the
person or will it make them feel uncomfortable?
Treating Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
(PTSD) in VR: This research is used, among other
applications, for treating soldiers coming home from
war.
Social Issue: How do we know if they are •
cured? Paper and pencil checklists are used to
assess level of being cured, but there are often
monetary and other incentives to repor ting
yourself as PTSD (other approaches use
physical cues)
Social Issue: the therapy may re-traumatise •
people, for example, using VR to move people
slowly enough through the experience, but not
so fast as to frighten them.
Social Issue: If the technology is used to treat •
people, the military may not want to admit
they are ill. VR may help de-stigmatise PTSD, for
better or worse.
Use of Second Life for Therapy: This
application is being developed, in research and
practice, at a number of institutions.
Ethical Issue: who is behind the avatar as •
therapist? The therapist and patient may be in
an established relationship, but in SL it may not
be possible to verify who is behind the screen.
Social Issue: the patient cannot be sure that the •
therapist is the only person watching the screen
Social Issue: All aspects of SL are recorded, even •
in private areas.
Besidesthesespeciccasesstudies,anumberofother
issues were raised during the session or submitted
via e-mail or text before and afterwards. Among
other things, participants were concerned with the
implications of Presence technologies for traditional
institutions like families, friendships, dating, or even
pet-human relationships. It was asked whether people
might change the way they interact because of new
technologies like virtual worlds, video conferences,
28
or mobile phones. Related concerns focused on
changes in identity and self-awareness or the relative
easeandlowcostofspoonganddeception.Itwas
mentioned that Presence technologies may create
a “false” perception of reality and that maybe not
all environments actually need to be as realistic as
possible to achieve their purpose.
Further concerns related to a “virtual divide”
and its potential distributional consequences. For
example, it was mentioned that if it is true that VR
technology helps people to get wiser, have more
memory, and in general be ahead of the crowd, it
might unfair if only some people had access to this
technology. Other participants were worried about a
possible “disconnection” between humans and their
environment if more and more activities become
mediated by Presence technologies. A scenario
mentioned was that of using Presence technologies in
military contexts and “virtual warfare,” where people
may be deprived of their ability to empathize with
others or make ethical decisions. Broadly related to
this aspect were more general questions about the
nature of individual autonomy and free will under
conditions of intermediated experiences of Presence.
Also governance issues were on participants’ minds.
People raised questions about the governance regimes
that will emerge in a world with multiple realities. For
example, it was asked how violence may be treated
when it is directed against virtual representations
of people instead of real bodies. One participant
mentioned the possibility of “post-humans” as a
consequence of the increasingly pervasive use of
Presence technologies.
With regard to research, a lot of discussion centred
on the role of informed consent. Participants
reported problems they faced in their own project
suchasthedifcultyofobtainingconsentinreal-
life experiments in virtual worlds and other public
virtual spaces. Others mentioned similar problems
when working with mentally impaired patients.
Further concerns were raised regarding experimental
research using invasive techniques. While this is
generally mostly accepted with regard to animals,
theeldofbrainstimulationwasexpectedtopose
similar ethical problems with regard to humans in the
future. Participants emphasized the need to carefully
study potential health risks as far as possible before
conducting the experiments. It was also mentioned
that VR technologies may under certain circumstances
even be a way to conduct these studies with lower
risk for humans.
Analpointwasmadeaboutthehyperbolethatis
said to occur around new Presence technologies.
Often new technologies were presented in an
exaggerated way, giving rise to both unrealistic fears or
hopes. Many people were said to make associations
with popular movies like “The Matrix” when they hear
about Presence technologies. Some participants even
speculated that such hyperbole could also be fostered
by developers, who have a strong economic interest
in publicity. It was therefore asked how researchers in
particular can tr y to resist exaggerated arguments and
claims about new technologies.
29
3 Synthesis and Scenarios
While the previous sections have provided a rich
overview of social, ethical, and legal issues in Presence
research and applications, this section will extract
the cross-cutting issues from the data and map them
along key dimensions. This will not only make it
easier to grasp the complex implications of Presence
technologies, but also provide the basis for thinking
about possible responses.
3.1 Key Dimensions
Based on the preceding sections, we can distinguish
a number of dimensions that are useful for thinking
about the social, ethical, and legal challenges.
3.1.1 Context of Use: Presence Research
vs. Applications
TherstdimensiondistinguishesbetweenPresence
research and Presence applications. This distinction
seems useful because different considerations apply. In
Presence research, technologies are used in the more
or less controlled environments of research projects.
Mostly, these take place in laboratories at universities
and independent research institutions, where
researchers have full control over the conditions and
procedures under which Presence technologies are
used by human beings. The focus here is consequently
on the role of the researcher in preventing human
subjects from physical or psychological harm while
producing reliable and methodologically sound
scienticknowledge.
In the area of Presence applications, in contrast,
Presence technologies are usually applied on a much
broader scale in uncontrolled and uncontrollable
environments. Relevant areas are not only the already
popular gaming and entertainment applications, but
also medical, military, and industrial applications. The
focus here is on uncovering existing and likely future
implications of the widespread use and non-use of
Presence technologies. All products have to meet
the standards of product safety stipulated by the
law and self-regulatory institutions with their codes
of conduct. As opposed to laborator y applications,
mass-marketing Presence technologies is obviously
guided by commercial considerations. In other words,
the areas of Presence research and applications pose
different problems with different communities and
stakeholders so that it seems reasonable to treat them
separately for analytical purposes.
3.1.2 Degree of Uncertainty: Existing vs.
Future Issues
A further dimension distinguishes between existing
and future issues. As we have seen in the analysis
above, in both Presence research and application a
numberofissueshavealreadybeenidentiedandare
open to scrutiny and careful consideration. However,
as the scenarios have shown, this is only the beginning.
Presence technologies are expected to be used in a
much broader range of social and economic contexts
and are bound to have considerable consequences,
which are virtually impossible to predict.
From a social science point of view, existing and
future issues therefore differ in important ways. While
existing issues are open to empirical analysis and
political response, future issues can only be prepared
for and therefore require different methods to be
tackled. This applies to a cer tain degree to Presence
research, where new areas and methods of inquiry
may pose hitherto unknown ethical problems. An
30
example could be the more widespread exploration
of brain stimulation in the future that may make “mind
control” possible. It seems even more relevant in the
area of Presence applications, were the contingencies
of large-scale impacts of Presence technologies in
real-life situations are virtually impossible to simulate
in advance.
3.1.3 Level of Immersion: Types of
Technologies
Another dimension that seems useful for
understanding issues is the level of immersion. From
a social science perspective, immersion is closely
relatedtoawarenessoftheinuenceofPresence
technologies on the mediation of perception and
action. The more immersed a person in Presence
technologies, the less she is aware of their existence.
As the case studies have shown, Presence
technologies can mediate human perception and
action in different ways. At one end of the spectrum,
wecanndapplicationsonmobilephonesthat
provide simple tools for signalling Presence, such as
the mood messages and status updates as employed
in the PASION project. While such representations
can have a considerable impact on human behaviour,
the information revealed is rather scarce and the
level of immersion on part of the user low. This is
different if one moves on from small displays to larger
computer screens and software applications like
Second Life. These vir tual environments with extensive
graphic animations and sound effects provide a more
immersive environment for players. A next level of
immersion can be achieved through technologies that
more directly relate to different senses. One example
are haptic devices as analyzed and developed in the
IMMERSENCE project, e.g. when the pitch elevator
(the mechanism which changes the angle of a plane’s
ightbychangingitspitch)inanairplanecockpit
electronicallysimulateswindowsandphysical
pressures. Another example are head-mounted
displays as used in IPCity, which provide immersion at
an audiovisual level creating what the researchers have
called “shared virtual reality.” In laboratory settings,
researchers have experimented with even more
immersive CAVE, sometimes including elements of
motionlikeelectronicallycontrolledmovingoors.60
Applications of these techniques are currently most
commonly used in training. According to repor ts by
pilots,contemporaryightsimulatorsasemployed
by civil and military aviation training centres provide
aclose-to-perfectillusionofyingarealplane.Finally,
wecanndtechnologiesthatdirectlyinterfacewith
our brain functions and nervous system. As described
in the PRESENCCIA case study, BCIs can not only
translate brainwaves into control signals, but also
stimulate brain activity via brain implants. The latter
option is not only intrusive, but also immersive in the
sensethatitisincreasinglydifculttolocatetheorigin
and nature of perceptions and their relations with
events.
3.2 Synthesis of Issue
Analysis
The following table (Figure 0-1) summarizes the main
issues from the empirical analysis in the previous
subsection. It is structured according to the context
of use, i.e. research–related and application-related
issues. The case studies, in which the issues occurred,
are indicated by codes: (1) PRESENCCIA, (2) IPCity,
(3) IMMERSENCE, (4) PASION, (5) Peach Meeting
(Networking session ICT06), Helsinki, November
2006, (6) Peach Meeting (1st WinG consultation),
Barcelona, March 2007, (7) Peach Meeting (2nd
WinG consultation), Oxford, April 2008, (8) Peach
Summer School, Dubrovnik, July 2008. In addition, the
discussion is informed by the panel on social issues
arranged jointly by NU and OII at the Presence
2007 conference, and the 3rd WinG consultation in
Edinburgh April 2009 (which are not numbered, but
included in the discussion in subsequent sections.
60 Link to the video at http://www.cyberwalk-project.org/ (last visited 29.3.2009).
31
issue description case
study
research-related (focus on experimental research in laboratory context)
ethical vs. legal aspects in review
procedures
awareness of ethical issues is not a one-time exercise to
avoidlegalliability,butrequiresongoingreectiononthe
implications of research for human participants and beyond;
especially important in the case of Presence technologies,
where impact is often highly uncertain
(3) (7)
ethical advantages in virtual vs.
non-virtual contexts
use of Presence technologies for experiments that would
otherwise be not admissible under ethical considerations (e.g.
Virtual Milgram)
(1)
multidisciplinary research divergent traditions in multidisciplinary projects regarding
sensitivity to ethical issues among researchers (e.g. computer
science vs. neuroscience)
(1)
informed consent informed consent may not be meaningful if obtained in
settings with strong hierarchies and pressures on participants
(e.g. workplace)
(4)
invasive techniques experimental research using invasive techniques like brain
implants may trigger more fundamental debate about limits of
“engineering” human perception
(8)
application-related (focus on large-scale applications in everyday life)
robustness and reliability of
technology
Presence technologies most likely to be used in contexts
wherehumanperceptionisnotsufcientandtechnologycan
be employed as an extension of perception and/or action: e.g.
enabling a tetraplegic to steer a wheelchair via BCI, minimally
invasive surgery, controlling the pitch of an airplane, controlling
a prosthetic; these tasks are mostly critical and malfunction
can cause considerable damage
(1) (3)
risk of physical harm to
participants
unknown long-term effects of invasive technologies like brain
implants
(1)
distraction through virtual elements in mixed-reality
environments
(2)
motion sickness and “simulation sickness” (8)
risk of psychological harm to
participants
anxiety because of perception of permanent surveillance (5)
connection between virtual representation and human being (6)
broader implications for social
interaction
people may experience different realities, which may lead to
diverging interpretations and misunderstandings; in case of
mixed-realities, “by-standers” are “users,” too
(2) (5)
users may become alienated or withdraw from non-mediated
relationships
(2)
prevent harm from non-users (1)
32
governance of large-scale interactions, like Second Life (6)
human dignity brain stimulation as a fundamental ethical question (1)
privacy technologies usually continuously track and mine personal
data from interactions; tracking may even be mandated for
safety reasons
(1) (2) (4)
people may inadvertently disclose sensitive information about
their friends by revealing relational data
(2)
except for online virtual worlds, it is generally not possible to
hide behind pseudonyms
(4)
possibility of surveillance in workplace (4)
safe data sharing among users, e.g. on mobile devices (6)
users may experience processing of personal data by
machines as breach of privacy
(6)
protection of users with special
needs
children may need special protection as users of Presence
technologies. e.g. informed consent may be problematic; often
parallels to the Matrix are drawn
(4)
disabled users may need special functionalities (5)
technophobia, barriers to
adoption
people may fear or distrust Presence technology, e.g. being
treated with technology rather than directly by surgeon
(3)
some researchers reported that virtual relationships are not
perceived as good as non-virtual relationships
(6)
manipulation/deception brain stimulation may be (ab)used for marketing, fraudsters,
political regimes
(1)
difculttodrawthelinebetweenlegitimatestrategicbehavior
anddeception,e.g.whenstoreownerstrytoinuencethe
virtual appearance of their shops or people are guided away
from problematic areas in mixed-reality environments
(2)
how much control over one’s appearance in these realities? (2)
impostors in virtual worlds, i.e. people who adopt an identity
known to their audience
(7)
equality and discrimination access to technology may decide on social opportunities;
generally media literacy presupposed
(2)
common attributes like ethnicity and sources of prejudices
may be less visible and overcome traditional prejudices
(4)
Presence technologies can produce characteristics of group,
lead to exclusion
(7)
transition and adaptation experience of having thoughts directly translated into action
(BCI)
(1)
entry/exit: need to adapt interpretive repertoire – even if goal
is to just substitute reality
(5)
33
impact on children in learning stage: need to know what is real
and what not
(6)
new technologies advantage men as early adopters (6)
addiction (gaming) (6)
transition between virtual and non-virtual environments
needs to be managed
(2)
legal issues legal liability of platform provider, access provider, or
manufacturerforharminictedduringuseofPresence
technology
(5) (6)
legal personhood may be invoked for avatars and other
representations of people
public/private divide challenged (6)
intellectual property: user-generated content in virtual
environments may cause similar problems as seen in peer-to-
peerle-sharing
(2)
shifts in production new modes of production, like music or other collaboration
across time and space?
(5)
rules for Presence technologies can enable markets by
reducing uncertainty
(6)
Figure 1: Overview of Social, Ethical and Legal Issues
34
The table shows that Presence technologies pose a
rich and complex set of social, ethical, and legal issues
along the three dimensions sketched above. As far
as research-related issues are concerned, Presence
technologies do not so much indicate fundamentally
new problems, but rather add new qualities to existing
ones. For example, while a concern with informed
consent is hardly novel for scientists, Presence
technologies are particularly critical here because the
alteration of perception (which, depending on one’s
normative assessment, can also be called deception)
is an integral part of the Presence project. Similarly,
invasive techniques like brain implants may well be
usedinotherareasofneuroscienticresearch,butare
likely to become especially prominent in Presence-
related contexts. An additional issue likely to cause
ongoing debate are the potentially different ethical
assessments of experiments conducted in more or
less immersive virtual environments as opposed to
conventional laboratory setups. The Virtual Milgram
case provided a good reference point for discussing
these issues.
With regard to application-related issues, the situation
is more complex. Presence technologies touch
upon a wide variety of interactions in different social
contexts. While the nature and sensitivity of the
issues can therefore differ substantially and requires
a careful case-by-case evaluation, some overarching
concernscanbeidentied.Tobeginwith,concerns
for the physical and mental well-being of participants
play an important role. Presence technologies can
have immediate implications for the people using
them, such as motion sickness, disorientation, or
anxiety. These issues are not only relevant from
the perspective of affected individuals, but also
for third parties. For example, technophobia may
well constitute a barrier to the broader adoption
of Presence technologies and would have to be
taken seriously. Also privacy concerns are likely to
become increasingly important since most Presence
technologies process and record information
commonly considered “personal.” Another aspect are
transitions between different experiences of Presence,
which may well develop into a serious challenge for
real-life applications. Finally, there is the issue of more
diffuse and long-term implications, which are virtually
impossible to predict and thus pose one of the biggest
challengesintheeld.
A further dimension of complexity is added by
issues related to social interaction with regard to
Presence technologies. The cases have shown that
Presence technologies do not just affect the individual
using them, but also the wider social network, in
which the individual user is embedded. In shaping
perceptions, Presence technologies also shape social
roles and behaviour towards others. These changes
may be regarded as both desirable and undesirable.
While Presence technologies may help overcome
stereotypes, disadvantages, and disabilities, they also
provide a considerable potential for deception and
manipulation. For example, brain stimulation may
be a fundamental improvement for people with
certain diseases, but can turn into an instrument of
abuse and control in the hands of the wrong people.
Otherinstancesidentiedinthecasestudiesinclude
impostors in virtual worlds or neuro-marketing in
mixed-reality applications like IPCity. These social and
ethical issues around “being there together” remind us
that in evaluating Presence technologies, we not only
have to take into account users, but also non-users as
the IPCity project impressively demonstrated.
From a legal perspective, questions about the liability
of operators of Presence technologies seemed
most prominent. In a much broader sense, Presence
technologies may challenge assumptions that are at
the heart of many legal doctrines, such as the concept
of personhood with regard to avatars and digital
representations or the public-private distinction, which
still is a conceptual hallmark of the legal systems of the
European member states.
3.3 Scenarios for Future
Applications
Based on the synthesis in the preceding section, it is
possible to develop a number of scenarios. The goal
of this section is therefore to extend the issue analysis
above and illustrate the possible paths of development
Presence technologies can take.
The scenarios vary in the detail that they are treated,
but that should not be taken as an indication of
35
their importance, but simply of the space needed to
explicate the key points. Each scenario is divided in
background and setting, social issues, and potential
solutions.
3.3.1 Scenario 1 – Online Virtual Worlds,
Their Governance and Impacts
3.3.1.1 Background and Setting
People spend a lot of time in online virtual worlds,
either for gaming or for socializing. These are Presence
technologies insofar as, via 3D graphics and either
text or voice communication, they provide a sense of
‘being there together’. Examples include Second Life,
World of Warcraft, the Sims Online, and others. This is
perhaps the most commonly used form of Presence
technology, and it raises a host of questions such as
the impact of spending a lot of time in another reality,
the rules which should govern these places, and
consequences of one’s online identity for one’s online
andofineself.
3.3.1.2 Social Issues
This can be called the online virtual worlds scenario
because the VE in this case is precisely that; a social
world, again, whether for playing or socializing. One
question that arises in this case is to what extent
these worlds should or can be governed by ethical
and social rules that apply in the real world.
In this case it is necessary to take a step back and to
consider how this case is publicly perceived: there is
no systematic research on this topic, but (anecdotally,
and from media treatments of the topic), when this
topic is discussed, this scenario is typically treated as
something of a joke, i.e., get a real life, or it’s only a
virtual death, etc. Note however that this is more of
areectionofthenoveltyofthistechnologyrather
than a serious attempt to grapple with the problem
since there are real issues here: if people spend a lot
of time in these worlds, surely the issue of whether
they provide a space that is enriching or the opposite
is one that should be treated as important (although it
is true that the virtual world matters less, for example,
if one loses virtual money or dies in the vir tual world,
theconsequencesarenotthesameasintheofine
world).
Still, this inability to grapple with new technologies
has happened with other technologies (for example,
jokes are made about genetically engineering hybrids
between humans and other animals), but again, in this
case, the issue is raised in this joking way because we
have problems grappling with the notion of alternative
worlds or identities other than our real ones. There
are several key considerations for online virtual
worlds: One is whether the user (player, socialiser)
forms attachments that affect him or her – online
orofine.Anotheristheethicalandsocialrulesthat
govern or should govern these worlds. It is important
to register here that what has happened so far in
online virtual worlds is between two extremes: users
have tried to implement utopian societies on the
other hand, or replicated or imported real world
practices into the virtual world. Note also that this
is bound to be unresolved: interaction in virtual
worlds will replicate or follow the real world or it will
depart from it. This makes it fascinating to watch the
development of these worlds, though not a great deal
hinges on this because both socializing and gaming
worlds are mainly used for recreation, so again, it is a
question of enriching our lives or impoverishing it.
The impact of spending a lot of time in online VEs
can be related to the videogames and violence
or ‘addiction’ issue.61 Theconictingevidenceor
unresolved nature of the debate perhaps points
to the fact that the issue must be seen in a larger
context, and not just in terms of the evidence from
psychological experiments. Similarly with addiction: is
it appropriate to see this as a psychological condition,
or should it not be framed, again, in terms of whether
shared VEs enrich or impoverish our lives?
It is important to note that this highlights that these
issues relate to the multi-user scenario: how I appear
in a single-user world does not matter since people’s
self-perception matters mainly in relation to other’s
perceive them. The question of avatar appearance
61 See most recently, the essays in Peter Vorderer & Jennings Bryant (eds.), PLAYING VIDEO GAMES (LAWRENCE ERLBAUM
ASSOCIATES: MAHWAH, NJ 2006).
36
and the avatar’s capabilities for interacting matter
in relation to others. This is also why the issues that
have been raised in section 2 deserve attention:
avatar deception and appearance and the like are not
important per se, but because people spend so much
time with others online.
It is thus misleading to treat the ‘excessive’
disappearing into or socializing in virtual worlds
as somehow being unreal or an ‘Ersatz’ real life.
Rather, the question should be: how enriching or
impoverishing are the interactions in virtual worlds
with avatars?
3.3.1.3 Potential Solutions
There are a myriad of ethical, legal and gender
issues in this scenario, but the key question should
be to consider the quality of time spent ‘being there
together’. This is a wide-ranging social issue, but an
important misunderstanding can be avoided by not
treating these worlds as completely liberating (these
worlds have their own constraints and possibilities) or
as being a poor substitute for real life.62 In this sense,
these relationships should not be treated as inferior to
face-to-face relationships.
3.3.2 Scenario 2 – Online and Ofine
Presences in Everyday Life
3.3.2.1 Background and Setting
VEshavebeendenedcarefullyhere,asenvironments
in which the user(s) experience a sense of being in
a place other than the one they are physically in and
interacting with it. But the line between VE technology
and other technologies which afford a sense of
Presence is blurring.
There is a range of devices which also afford Presence
or something approximating it (Schroeder 2006b); for
example Instant messaging, videoconferencing, sensors
which relay our Presence, and mobile phones which
include the user’s geographical position in virtual and
real worlds. This scenario can be extended further:
it is becoming common to talk about the user’s web
‘Presence’ (their identity online); for example, an
academic’sproleoftheirresearchandinterests,ora
teenager’s online web space in social networking sites.
3.3.2.2 Social Issues
In this case there are two main issues: the boundaries
between the virtual and real worlds may be blurred,
and the user’s identity may become unclear.
Users can be tracked through their online Presences.
For example, we will increasingly want to know: where
istheotherperson,onlineorofine?Andwhoisthe
other person, what are their characteristics? To do this,
we are increasingly able to track the user’s online and
ofinelocationthroughawareness:theotherperson
is available online – through their avatar, via text, via
video or voice – or they are currently in a real place
because I know that they can be reached by, for
example, stationary telephone, or they are at home or
their workplace or are travelling something.
Note that in this case the absence of a person may
denetheirPresence(‘thepersonisawayfromtheir
desk, so they must travelling, or they are preoccupied
in their online virtual world’). Note too that this is
not just, as it is often portrayed, a question of identity
deception (deliberately misleading others about
one’s characteristics or whereabouts) or multiple
identities,63 but more a question of misinformation or
an overabundance of information which makes for a
dangerous level of surveillance, not just by authorities
and commercial actors but also by other people.
In video- or virtual conferencing situation, should a
person be able to misrepresent that they are present
(for example, leaving their video-image or avatar
switched on while they are stepping outside into the
real world for a break)? It is quite likely that sensors
will be able to sense our Presence, but both enabling
62 As has been shown in a similar context, people put a lot more into themselves and their relations with others online, or in the context
of missing social cues – they develop ‘hyperpersonal’ relations. See Joseph B. Walther, Computer-Mediated Communication: Impersonal,
Interpersonal, and Hyperpersonal Interaction, 23 COMMUNIC ATION RESEARCH 3 (1996).
63 This may be described as the play with a number of identities that Sherry Turkle analyzed many years ago. See Sherry Turkle, LIFE ON
THE SCREEN (Simon & Schuster: New York 1995).
37
them to do this regardless of whether we have
switched them on and the opposite (requiring manual
switching off and on) will be desirable in certain
situations.
3.3.2.3 Potential Solutions
One solution would be to restrict the user’s identity
to a single valid representation of themselves and
to being in a single place, real or virtual. This may be
necessary for legal reasons, but it will not be feasible
in many instances. Another solution, to allow the
user of VEs to set their own level of transparency (ie.
what they want known about themselves and their
location), is desirable, but also has to be put into
practice: is it feasible to force online spaces to reveal
if they allow ‘lurkers’, people who are simply watching
a space in Second Life without making themselves
known? Is it possible to constantly monitor whether
your status of being online via instant messaging
webcam and a host of other devices is up-to-date as
whether they are switched on or off, or to monitor
the way you are represented on the web (perhaps
by ‘googling’ yourself)? In short, Presence in VEs
and related technologies will generate a host of
social issues, but in this case the issues go beyond
Presence technologies in the strict sense (being in
another place and interacting with it), and shade
into other technologies such as videoconferencing,
social networking, Presence on the Web, mobile
phones, instant messaging and the like. These digital
technologies which do things apart from VEs – making
others aware of us, conveying our location, creating a
digitalprole–gofarbeyondthescopeofPresence
and need to be seen in the wider context of digital
devices in society.
3.3.3 Scenario 3 – Training in VEs
3.3.3.1 Background and Setting
Among the scenarios that have taken place and
that can be envisaged are military training, driving
simulations, training for dangerous situations such
reghting,andthelike.Theseareimportantbecause
the sense of being in another place and interacting
with it will carry over into subsequent uses of this
training in the real world.
3.3.3.2 Social Issues
This is an issue that has been more widely discussed
than others, but it boils down to how to make the
link between the training and the real world situation
in which it is used – that is, whether there is effective
skills transfer.
3.3.3.3 Potential Solutions
Ensure that there is adequate testing of the transfer
of virtually acquired skills to the real world setting.
The liability of those providing and relying on the fact
that the training was adequate in the event that this is
notthecaseandthereisdamage(atrafcaccident,a
wrongful military killing) is bound to raise the question
whether this was a result of the virtual training or
some other factor. Nevertheless, the legal issue here
is comparable to others of equipment failure, and
perhaps the more important one is how useful the
VE’s are in this case.
3.3.4 Scenario 4 – Research in VEs with
Human Participants
3.3.4.1 Background and Setting
Researchers use a VE to do experiments involving
human participants that are more easily carried in a VE
or that could not be carried in a real world setting.
3.3.4.2 Social Issues
The basic issues here have been discussed extensively
in relation to the virtual Milgram experiment (see
http://www.peachbit.org/, keho issue 1). Even if in
thisspeciccase,theresearchethicscalledfortha
mixed response in the ensuing online debate among
researchers, it is important to widen the debate: As
we have seen in other scenarios, the advantage of VEs
is that we can do things that are not possible in the
real world.
Also, a number of variations of virtual Milgram can be
envisaged: for example, where consent has not been
obtained, where cruelty is not just between an avatar
and an agent but between two or more avatars. There
are many possibilities, for example, for using VEs as
38
laboratories for psychological and sociological studies
that could not be carried with real subjects face-to-
face or in physical social environments. 64
3.3.4.3 Potential Solutions
The solutions in this case will be provided in one
sense by research ethics committees, which will have
to be involved in research of this type. However, it
may also be important to have a wider debate among
researchers and society-at-large about the limits of
what is acceptable in a virtual setting.
64 See Ralph Schroeder & Jeremy N. Bailenson, Research Uses of Multi-user Virtual Environments, in R. Lee, N. Fielding & G. Blank (eds.),
THE HANDBOOK OF INTERNET RESEARCH (2008: London, Sage).
39
4 Characteristics and Challenges
The analysis of social, ethical, and legal issues in the
previous sections has shown that Presence research
and applications pose a number of distinct and
complex social, ethical, and legal issues. The goal of
thissectionistoeshoutthemaincharacteristics
of Presence technologies against this backdrop and
sketch the challenges for the actors involved.
4.1 Key Characteristics of
Presence Technologies
Based on the empirical analysis, it is possible to
identify a number of key characteristics of Presence
technologies that account for their role in society. A
better understanding of these characteristics will allow
us to think about possible solutions and approaches in
a more structured and forward-looking way.
4.1.1 Intermediation of Experience and
Action
ArstcharacteristicofPresencetechnologiesis
their role in transforming our experience of the
world. While function and designs of Presence
technologies are highly contingent on their local use,
the intermediation of experience is a feature central
to all current applications. Presence technologies have
the potential to enhance, amplify, distort, silence, or
converge the stream of data we absorb through our
traditional senses like sight, hearing, touch, smell, and
taste. As the case of brain stimulation has shown, even
new mechanisms of generating experience are being
explored.
The process of intermediation can take different
forms. Mood messages on mobile phones, for
example, have been found to play an important role
in how we perceive of others and cooperate in the
workplace or with friends and family. Computer-based
virtual worlds, head-mounted displays, or immersive
CAVES can generate a more profound experience
of being in a different place, time, or social context.
Technologies for brain stimulation aim at translating
external signals directly into brainwaves to trigger
sensations for medical purposes. In all these cases,
Presence technologies play an important role in
conguringthewaysinwhichweexperiencethe
world around us.
Slightly different from the abovementioned devices,
brain-computer interfaces point to a further level
of intermediation. As technologies for translating
brainwaves back into control signals, they transform
the way we act in – rather than experience of – the
world. Presence technologies do not only enable
the intermediation of experience but also the
intermediation of action.
Of course, these processes of intermediation are
closely related. For the way we experience the world
plays an important role for how we act upon it. Since
these actions do not take place in a vacuum, but a
network of relationships with other people, they
have considerable social consequences. Presence
technologies therefore have the potential not only to
transform our personal view of the world and how
we act, but also how we interact with other people.
Jeremy Bailenson has tried to capture this observation
in the notion of “Transformed Social Interaction”
and started to explore the social implications of
40
interactions that are at least partially mediated by
Presence technologies.65 In mediating experience and
action, Presence technologies therefore play a key role
inconguringtheeverydayinteractionsthatmakeup
society.
4.1.2 Emergence of Third Parties
One consequence of technological intermediation
of experience and action is the emergence of a
new channel for control. Technologies are usually
developed, designed, and implemented with a certain
purpose in mind. While they may achieve a certain
degree of automation and “autonomy,” there is
usuallyawaytoinuenceandtweaktheiroperations.
This may seem self-evident, but is an important
point to stress since it underlies many of the ethical,
legal and social issues that are being discussed here.
Presence technologies almost invariably mediate
human experience, and thus also offer new ways of
manipulating this experience. Put differently, Presence
technologies bring a third party to social interactions
thatcanhaveadirectinuenceonhumanperception.
As the numerous cases of actual and potential
manipulation have shown, Presence technologies are
bound to become a contested bottleneck that allows
a certain degree of “engineering” of experience.
While such engineering can be desirable to the
extent that it improves human interaction or helps
people with disabilities regain control over critical
body functions, it could also be instrumentalised
inthehopeofinuencingbehaviourinspecic
ways. Commercial entities could make use of such
techniques for marketing purposes, but also military
and entertainment applications are conceivable. In
other words, Presence technologies can be regarded
as a new bottleneck to human experience and action
and are therefore bound to become a part of critical
infrastructure of society.
4.1.3 Intrinsic Inconspicuousness
As the case studies have shown, Presence
technologies have the potential to operate in ways so
that users are not necessarily aware of their existence.
Interestingly, this obscurity is not just an unintended
side effect, but an integral part of the research
program. At least according to some researchers,
Presence technologies are supposed to let people
experience situations “as if they were real.” Hence, a
major criterion for judging research and applications
is whether they manage to make themselves invisible.
The lower the awareness of users, the more effective
and “successful” are the technologies considered.
Especially the Vir tual Milgram study has demonstrated
howdifcultitcanbetojudgewhichlevelof
awareness about the intermediation of experience is
desirable from a moral point of view. While a human
participant in the experiment may be aware of the
virtuality of her experience at one level, she may
beemotionallyimmersedinthespecicsituationat
another level. This is cer tainly an area in which more
research is needed. For the moment, however, it is
important to recognize its existence and think about
the social, ethical, and legal consequences.
Further, it seems that there is an inverse relationship
between immersion and awareness of the
intermediation of experience. The more immersive a
technology, the less the user is aware of the fact that
her experience is mediated. Especially in combination
with the potential for third-party control, this
characteristic can become impor tant with regard to
values like individual autonomy and human dignity.
4.1.4 Technological Complexity
But even to the extent that users are aware of the
intermediation of experience and action, it is not
necessarily easy to understand what is going on. Since
Presence technologies by design interface with highly
complex physiological processes, they usually reach
65 Jeremy N. Bailenson et al., Transformed Social Interaction: Decoupling Representation from Behavior and Form in Collaborative Virtual
Environments, 13 PRESENCE: TELEOPERATORS AND VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS (2004), pp. 428-441. Prof. Bailenson is a member
of the Peach community and took part in the 2nd Peach Summer School in Dubrovnik. More information about him can be found at
http://communication.stanford.edu/faculty/bailenson.html (last visited March 17, 2009).
41
a high level of complexity themselves. Already the
technology required to credibly simulate even simple
sensations like wind pressure in an electronically
controlled pitch control in an airplane cockpit is
considerable.
Understanding these complex relationships and
mechanisms is therefore likely to remain the privilege
of a small group of highly specialized experts in areas
like neuroscience, computer science, and experimental
psychology. Similar to many other areas in which highly
complex technologies pervade social interactions, lay
persons will depend on these experts for explanation,
guidance,andassistance.Thisnaturallymakesitdifcult
for the majority of users and non-users to understand
the consequences of their actions and make informed
decisions about whether and how to employ Presence
technologies.
4.1.5 Indeterminacy of Social Implications
Analcharacteristicreferstothealreadymentioned
indeterminacy of social implications. Research in the
studies of science and technology has shown that
use and development of technologies are highly
contingent processes that depends on a variety of
social and cultural factors. It is thus virtually impossible
to reliably predict the broader social and long-term
implications of Presence technologies. It may be
possible at least to a certain extent to assess the
risk of physical harm or damage to a person. Also,
some of the psychological consequences may be
inferred upfront. However, as far as the broader social
implications are concerned, researchers and decision-
makers run inevitably into problems of uncertainty
or indeterminacy. Again, the reason arguably is that
totheextentthatPresencetechnologiesrecongure
experience, they also affect how we act upon it.
Presence technologies are thus a prime candidate
for a process which often affects technological
development (though some technologies much more
than others), namely unintended consequences.
Social interaction is not only culturally and historically
contingent, but also highly depends on the local and
situational conditions. Presence technologies may
therefore often bring some unforeseen results.
4.2 Challenges
Based on these characteristics, it is possible to
identify a number of challenges for society, industry,
academia, and public policy with regard to Presence
technologies.
4.2.1 Balancing Countervailing Values
The key challenge is arguably to balance the broad
range of countervailing values that are involved
in any application of Presence technologies. On
the one hand, the case studies have shown that
Presence technologies have a considerable potential
to contribute to a number of important social
causes. Especially in the areas of medicine and
industrial engineering, Presence technologies can
enable experience in forms that have not been
possible before and increase social welfare. Also the
commercial potential is considerable and should not
be left untapped.
On the other hand, we have seen that Presence
technologies can pose a number of serious risks
to fundamental values. Especially privacy, safety, and
dignityconcernshaveguredprominentlyinthe
analysis. Any attempt at accompanying the future of
Presence from a societal perspective therefore has
to take into account the many trade-offs involved. As
the analysis has further shown, these trade-offs can
only be managed to a limited extent at the abstract
level of engineering and design. Rather, users, non-
users, designers, manufacturers, operators, and many
other people have to work together on a daily basis
to tackle the challenges when they occur and deal
responsibly with any problems that come up.
The overall goal must therefore be to minimize harm
to users and non-users while realizing the potential of
Presence technologies.
4.2.2 Managing Transitions Between
Experiences
Our experience of the world is something that we
donotnormallyreectupon.Rather,wetakeitfor
granted that things are the way we experience them. If
we see another person’s avatar crying, we assume she
42
is sad. If we feel resistance operating a pitch control
on a plane, we think there is in fact some form of
pressure on the wing and act accordingly. From our
past experience, we have learned how to make sense
and “read” the world around us.
Presence technologies alter this very process and
consequently require new strategies for understanding
and interpretation. This transition does not come
without consequences for the people involved.
While motion sickness as reported by par ticipants
in experiments is certainly among the more tangible
symptoms of this process, other consequences
may operate at a more subtle and less conspicuous
psychologicallevel.Actinginamodiedenvironment
requires us to update our interpretative repertoires
and understanding of the world.
In other words, a key challenge for managing Presence
technologies is to accompany this process of
transition and design it in a way that minimizes harm
to participants. This seems especially critical since
unjustiedfearoftechnologiesmayimpedeadoption
and development. Managing transitions not only
includesassistingusersbecomingprocientinanew
technology, but also facilitating exit and return to a
de-intermediated experience.
4.2.3 Accounting for Non-Users
A further challenge that has emerged from the
case studies is the need to take also into account
thedifferentandpotentiallyconictingexperiences
of non-users. Especially in the case of mixed-reality
applications, expectations can clash and lead to
unpleasant and sometimes even dangerous situations.
The IPCity project has shown that even though we
tend to identify non-users as “bystanders,” these
people are actually part of the social situation and
equally affected by the user of Presence technologies.
Inthisspeciccase,peoplegotirritatedandinone
case even attacked a human participant wearing a
head-mounted display. In other less dramatic cases,
the researchers had to make sure that participants did
not get distracted by the their experience of mixed
realities and “interact” with cars in quite consequential
waysbyjaywalkinginheavytrafc(inotherwords,
have an accident!). Thus, while non-users are often
overlooked in the development and design of new
technologies, these cases show that they deserve
heightened attention and have to be seen in close
connection with the actual users and the technologies
themselves.
4.2.4 Coping with Uncertainty and
Indeterminacy
Another challenge concerns the fact that the long-
term social implications of Presence technologies
are largely uncertain and indeterminate. Decision-
makersthereforeneedtondwaystocopewitha
situation that is only partially amenable to pre-emptive
planning. Common strategies include the monitoring
of the process as well as engaging in discussions with
stakeholders and affected citizens in order to identify
potential problems as early as possible and take
precautions. Other options include Delphi methods
or scenario building, which may provide some rough
guidance to those involved.
Amajordifcultyhereisthatcopingwithuncertainty
and indeterminacy will not just require close
observation of emerging trends and developments,
but also understanding them. This, however, seems
only possible through continuous debate with all
actors involved.
Finally, it was proposed in section in 4.1.1 that the
intermediation of experience and action is a common
underlying basis for many of the ethical, social, and
legal issues relating to presence technologies. This way
of thinking could be applied to a range of issues, and
during the 3rd WinG consultation meeting (Edinburgh
April 2009) this way of thinking was put to the test
in examining the ethical, social and legal challenges
in three domains: health and training, online vir tual
worlds, and brain computer-interfaces. It was found
that although the concept of intermediation did
notremovethecontingencyofdiscussingspecic
contexts and issues, the concept proved remarkably
useful for discussing these issues. So, for example, in
relation to health (online therapy) uses of presence
technologies, it was suggested that in relation to
problems of security and uncertainties that might
arise about the relationship with the therapist (both
43
‘intermediation’ issues), the solutions were increased
awareness and transparency about the technology and
potentially a mix of virtual and real sessions. In relation
to online spaces, to the challenge of a lack of trust
in relations, gathering data without users knowledge,
and uncertainty about identities and malice in relation
to identity deception (again, ‘intermediation’ issues),
it was proposed again that greater transparency
and consistency of online characters would need
to part of the solution. Finally, in relation to brain-
computer interfaces and the possibility of producing
misleading or inappropriate (for example, poor
quality) experiences (again, clearly an ‘intermediation’
of experience), it was suggested that a greater
understanding and awareness of the consequences
of the effects of these mediated experiences was
called for before rushing in to the use of these
technologies would be a major part of the solution.
In short, the concept of ‘intermediation’ proved very
useful in guiding and focusing the discussion and
proposing solutions. It also emerged that the solutions
suggested centered more on the social rather than
the technological side (in other words, they are not
technological‘xes’butmattersofsocialawareness
and policy).
44
5 Strategies and Directions
Presence research and applications are only slowly
entering the public sphere. Studies like the Virtual
Milgram experiment have received some media
coverage. But apart from that, the future of Presence
and its social, ethical, and legal implications are not
yet a mainstream concern. However, this is likely to
change when advances in Presence research will yield
more robust prototypes.
5.1 Existing Strategies
Currently, different stakeholders employ different
strategies in dealing with social, ethical and legal issues
in Presence research and applications. This subsection
will highlight some of the strategies observed in the
case studies and address their potential and limitations.
5.1.1 Ethical Research Practices at
Universities
Virtually all universities and research labs have
institutionalized some form of ethical review.
Applications for research projects and funding are
usually screened in advance for potential ethical and
legal problems and held accountable to ethics codes.
Most of these procedures take place at the university
level and are administered by specialized ethics
committeesthatcomefromeldslikepsychologyor
medicine.
A potential problem here is that ethical review
procedures are often regarded as a one-off
exercise the main purpose of which is “to meet the
requirements.” One reason for this attitude may
be the fact that the recent rise of ethical review
committees at universities has been largely motivated
by fear of legal liability. Ethics reviews and practices
are therefore often shaped by more or less legal
considerations, framing ethical considerations in terms
of formal obligations that can be checked of like the
requirement to obtain informed consent in writing
whenever possible. Not surprisingly, ethical reviews
are often perceived as bureaucratic and cumbersome
procedures.
While the legal dimension of these exercises is
without doubt important, the practice of conducting
just one formalized review at the beginning of the
project does not seem to do justice to the complex
ethicalquestions.Rather,asensitiveeldlikePresence
researchrequirescontinuousreectiononthewaysin
which the research process affects human participants
and the researchers themselves. As one inter viewee
reported, some research teams may even stop an
experiment if one of the researchers feels uneasy with
the situation. In one case, repor tedly, an experiment
was abandoned upon the request of a researcher
without a participant complaining. Such awareness,
however, seems rather rare, given the enormous
pressures on scientists to actually conduct studies
that have been set up with substantial investments of
money and time.
A further question here is to what extent researchers
should take into account the broader social
implications of their actions. Currently, the consensus
among the Presence community seems to be that
especially basic research should be conducted for the
sake of research only without considering broader or
even hypothetical social implications. On the other
hand, there were researchers who voiced concerns
and said they wanted to stay involved with the
broader societal and political discussions that follow
fromtheirndings.
45
5.1.2 Product Development and Design
Even more than for researchers, social, ethical, and
legal issues matter for developers and designers
inPresenceindustries.Newproductsintheeld
currently have to undergo the usual prototyping and
testing procedures for product safety and are subject
to the relevant legal frameworks. Given the limited
number of widely successful Presence applications
to date, it is hard to judge whether more immersive
and intrusive Presence applications require a more
targetedandtechnology-specicapproach.Inthe
past, such special arrangements have been considered
for particular technologies, which were regarded
as particularly risky, like nanotechnology or genetic
engineering.
In general, companies usually do have a strong
incentive to consider the social and ethical implications
oftheirproductsfromtherststagesofdevelopment.
For example, as the PASION project has shown,
privacy concerns have become a key issue throughout
the process and have been discussed by the project
team at various stages. The PASION team even had a
member dedicated to observing these issues. While
this may still be an exception in R&D departments, it
points to an important development that will become
more and more important when Presence research is
translated into mass-marketable devices.
5.1.3 Public Debate and Deliberation
Most of the issues outlined above are not yet
on the agenda of the general public. In contrast
to other technologies like genetic engineering or
nanotechnology, there is not yet widespread media
interest in the potential of Presence technologies –
apart from an (often sensationalist) interest in online
worlds like Second Life.66 The reason is arguably that
the consequences of Presence technologies are far
fromclearandverydifculttopredict.Inotherwords,
a major challenge is to communicate existing research
and develop scenarios, which can be understood by a
broad audience.
The Peach project has been active in generating
discussion in a number of ways. The website, for
instance, has attracted some debate in blog entries
and comments. Video inter views on the website are
available for everyone to download and listen to the
opinions of leading Presence researchers. The Peach
teams also have come up with a series of publicly
available publication that report in non-academic and
jargon-free language on the latest developments in
theeld.
5.2 Future Directions
While existing strategies for dealing with the social,
ethical, and legal aspects of Presence technologies
already appear to cover many of the most important
questions, both researchers and practitioners could
consider the wider and more long-term implications
of these developments.
5.3.1 Academia
As has been argued above, it is critical to foster ethical
reectionandconsiderationsthroughouttheresearch
process. Examples from the case studies indicate
that this is very much up to the individual Principal
Investigator and the culture of the team. Abandoning
an experiment that has already been set up is not
an easy decision that requires the support of project
leaders at the very least.
Onewaytoinitiatereectionforthewholeduration
of the process could be to put more emphasis on
thediscussionofethicalissuesinnalprojectreports
and publications. Such reporting requirements could
encourage researcher to continuously identify and
deal with ethical dilemmas. Also funding bodies can
play a key role in holding grant-holders to account not
only before but also after the project. Of course, the
challenge of such formalized and rather administrative
exercises is that the researcher may easily view this as
another formal hurdle and ignore it.
5.3.2 Industry
In a similar way, product development teams in
Presence-related industries need to be aware of the
social, ethical, and legal issues. As has been pointed out
66 The Virtual Milgram experiment was another instance, which received international media attention.
46
above, this is not just a morally rewarding exercise,
but a commercial necessity. Paying attention to issues
like privacy or safety pays off in the long term as it
prevents companies and manufacturers from negative
publicity and liability.
In the future, there may even be a point where
Presence industries may also consider setting up a
CodeofConductthatlaysdownspecicobligations
and best practices as they emerge from the more
widespread application of Presence technologies.
Examples for such initiatives can be found in the IT
industry, where companies have teamed up with non-
protorganizationsandacademicresearchcentresto
develop a code of conduct, which among other things
addresses the problem of doing business in countries
with oppressive regimes.67 A similar model may be
considered in the area of Presence once technologies
mature.
5.3.2 Public Policy
As far as public policy is concerned, a number of
initiativesseempossibleastheeldofPresence
research and applications develops. First, existing
regulatory agencies and policy-makers could take
responsibility for monitoring the evolution of the
eldofPresence.Sincestayinguptodatewiththe
latest developments is crucial for identifying risks, a
clearinghouse could be a good starting point. This task
couldevenbedelegatedtoanon-protassociation.
Some member countries have experiences with a
so-called“OfceofTechnologyAssessment”.Other
countries have established special ethics councils to
discuss emerging issues and give recommendations to
industry and public policy.
Second, public policy could take a role in facilitating
dialogue about recent developments in Presence
technologies and make sure that especially the
traditionally weak and diffused voices of citizens
and minorities are heard in the process. There is a
range of institutions that aims to better integrate civil
society and voice the concerns of often overheard
factions. One example is the model of consensus
conferences, originally developed in Denmark.68 In
these conferences, citizens are given a central role
in assessing the impacts of technology. Thus, people
withoutanypriorknowledgeoftheeldsharetheir
views, concerns, values, and personal experiences.
Such new and innovative methods have also been
employed at the EU level and in the U.S.69
67 For a discussion of this approach, see John Palfrey & Jonathan Zittrain, Perspective: Companies Need Guidance to Face Censors
Abroad, C.NET News, August 14, 2007, available at http://news.cnet.com/Companies-need-guidance-to-face-censors-abroad/2010-
1028_3-6202426.html?tag=item.
68 See The Consensus Conference, http://www.tekno.dk/subpage.php3?article=468&toppic=kategori12&language=uk (last visited Feb. 3,
2009).
69 See EU PID Consensus Conference, http://www.eupidconference.com/ (last visited Feb. 3, 2009); Broadband for All, http://www.
broadbandforall.org/ (last visited Feb. 3, 2009).
47
6 Conclusions
The experience of Presence is at the core of everyday
life and interactions. How we experience and make
sense of the world plays a crucial role for how we
think about and act upon it. Introducing technologies
tochange,augment,substitute,orrecongurethis
process is therefore bound to raise a number of
fundamental social, ethical, and legal issues.
To better understand the role of Presence
technologies in social interactions, the report engaged
in an in-depth analysis and discussion of the four
Integrated Projects (PRESENCCIA, IPCity, PASION,
and IMMERSENCE) and also reported on the state
of the debate in the Peach community. The analysis
revealed a rather diverse set of issues and concerns
that run along a number of dimensions, including
context of use, degree of uncertainty involved, and
level of immersion experienced by users. Mapping
the issues, we found that Presence technologies
not only raised new problems, but also added
new qualities to existing ones. Besides questions of
research ethics especially with regard to increasingly
invasive techniques, concerns revolved – among other
things – around the physical and mental well-being
of users, issues of identity, deception, manipulation,
and potential abuse, questions about privacy and
the treatment of large amounts of personal data,
thedifculttransitionbetweendifferentexperiences
of Presence, and the challenges to existing legal
frameworks.
While these cross-cutting themes emerged as abstract
problems over the course of the project, it has
becomeevidentthatthereisnosingleandnalset
of social, ethical, and legal issues that is identical in all
cases. Rather, the implications of Presence technologies
are highly contingent on their situated use and local
context, which requires us to carefully consider social,
ethical, and legal issues on a case-by-case basis.
Against this backdrop, it seemed useful to highlight
some key characteristics of Presence technologies,
including the intermediation of experience and action,
the possibility of third-party inter vention, the intrinsic
inconspicuousness of Presence, the technological
complexity, as well as the indeterminacy of social
implications. This led to a number of challenges for
the actors involved. Besides the need to continuously
reectonandbalanceabroadrangeofcountervailing
values, it seemed critical to manage transitions
between experiences and also take into account
those who may not have access to the technology
or to the right technology but are affected by it. With
Presence technologies likely to require continued
attention, a key question underlying many of the issues
is arguably how to best cope with the uncertainty and
indeterminacy surrounding Presence technologies.
Reviewing some of the existing strategies in academia,
industry, and public policy, this report discussed
options for coping with these and other challenges in
thefuture.Researchersarewelladvisedtoreectand
discuss the social, ethical, and legal implications of their
researchdesignsandndingsnotjustatthebeginning
of the project, but also on an ongoing basis. Further,
industry will have to cope with these issues since
many of the problems outlined above can jeopardize
the commercial and social success of Presence
applications. Finally, public policy is called for to not
onlymonitorandassessdevelopmentsintheeld,but
also maintain and stimulate a lively debate about the
social, ethical, and legal issues of Presence technologies.
48
7 Appendix
The following semi-structured interviews with
Presence experts were conducted mostly during
the Peach Summer School 2008 in Dubrovnik and
transcribed for analysis afterwards. In addition, a large
number of informal conversations and observations
havebeenrecordedineldnotesandintegratedinto
the report.
Interviewee Project Location & Date
Prof. Mel Slater Principal Investigator, PRESENCCIA Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik,
July 9, 2008
Dr. Rod McCall IPCity Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik,
July 10, 2008
Andreas Schweinberger Manager, IMMERSENCE Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik,
July 9, 2008
Prof. Miriam Reiner IMMERSENCE Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik,
July 11, 2008
Richard Walker PASION Telephone Inter view, July 18, 2008
Joan Llobera PhD Student, PRESENCCIA Peach Summer School, Dubrovnik,
July 9, 2008
Figure 2: Interviewed experts at the 2nd Peach summer
school
49
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51
This report constitutes the third and nal deliverable for the Peach
project on social, ethical and legal issues in Presence technologies.
It provides:
• an overview of these issues
• cases studies of four ongoing integrated projects (IPs) that
are doing research on presence technologies
• an analysis of a number of future scenarios in key domains
• an overview of key challenges and future strategies
• a set of recommendations to researchers and policy makers
Keywords:
Ethical, Legal, Social, Gender, Presence
52
