I can't help but make this comment...

If all it takes is the collapse of the federal government, the combining of the CIA and the LOC, the privatizing of every industry in the country (including national defense), and the outsourcing of everything we're good at aside from music, flicks, and code, then I'm all for the Metaverse existing.

Because, er, really, who wouldn't want a holodeck they can just goggle into?

Slightly more on topic, *slightly*, when kids today are going home and turning onto livejournal and World of Warcraft, instead of into the Disney Channel's Afterschool Homophobia Feel-Good Love-Your-Parents Brainwashing Marathon, I can't help but feel that maybe, just maybe, this generation is going to be a little less closed minded and ignorant than those before them.

Then I watch my friend logon to World of Warcraft and get called a 'n00b fag' or 'gimp nigger' (yes, actually happened) for PvPing some guy when his health was low. What? You're on a PvP server and you're complaining when some rogue kills you easily because you were out soloing and your health was low? A rogue you then challenge to a duel and *lose* because you aren't that good?

Yeah, ignorance and fear. I suppose it just finds new ways to perpetuate itself.