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The Internet used to be a pimply adolescent – then the corporations woke up and Internet donned its business suit and leather briefcase. Vagrant Second Lifers and bloggers who flocked to the Internet in droves to escape the social pressures of the “real” encountered new pressures, further intensified by the aggressive Internet communities of information-thirsty mavens, uncontrolled cyber bullying, and social marketing gurus. Entering the equivalent of a virtual mid life crisis, Web 2.0 was teetering on the brink of knowledge and information overload, a warehouse-without-walls filled with unorganized virtual clutter.

Then, with seemingly no place to go, “virtual” broke the final boundary – reality.

Forget going “paperless”: the Internet, and technological trends, now base their designs on real world practicality – coined “augmented reality.” New applications are using virtual technology to directly influence how you perceive your surroundings. Have you heard of Foursquare, or smartphone “scanning” applications? You can now scan barcodes with your Iphone, Droid, or Blackberry, where your location will be posted on to a map – the most “checkins” and you become the “Mayor” of your location, earning special discounts and bragging rights. These applications transcend the limited function of physical shopping malls, adding a social and competitive element – a cigar is no longer just a cigar, and the making friends has become an XBOX Live achievement.

There are also endless applications geared towards the physical body: DistanceMeter utilizes GPS to track your movements, and will calculate the best workout depending on your weight, the time of day, the incline, etc. Calorie Check, featured in our newsletter, lets you access the calorie count of over 7,500 types of food. Zombies, Run is an Android application that transforms your streets into “zombie infested” routes (on a GPS map), and it is your task to avoid them, lest your brains be eaten.

What about technology? Phones are now merged with image projectors. You can virtually tour a house before you step foot in the front door while listening to a professionally recorded tour guide. Quadrocopters are being sold to consumers for a mere 600 dollars. Robots are serving ice cream. And to top it all off, the Internet now predicts your search before you finish typing – and it is usually right.

So, are we in the future? At the International Conference on Virtual Reality in Laval, France, a device called a “holocubetile” created a hologram of a statue, which could be manipulated through touching the sides of the cube – zoom, magnification, quality. According to techno-prophet and best selling author William Gibson, “every imagined future are obsolete, like an ice cream melting on the way back from the corner store,” but with all of these fascinating technologies only available through smartphones, the indies still lost in the crowd, will our futures be determined by a select few?

And what determines our generation’s current “likes” or “dislikes” in the real world – our own interests, or what search engines mark as their virtual “favorites?” To ask the age old question, are we following tweets, or are tweets following us?

Our thanks to Jeremy for a great post. When not guest blogging for us you can find Jeremy over at Holdcom, an audio production company that provides professional voice talent for Messages-On-Hold, voice technology, virtual tours, and more. Visit them at  www.holdcom.com