My first experience on Periscope

periscope

pɛrɪskəʊp/

noun

noun: periscope: plural noun: persicopes

an apparatus consisting of a tube attached to a set of mirrors or prisms, by which an observer (typically in a submerged submarine or behind a high obstacle) can see things that are otherwise out of sight.

Ask anyone these days about periscope and I doubt the above explanation will be the first thing you will discuss.

Having heard about and having recently downloaded the app Periscope, last night I decided to investigate it further. 

I signed in with my Twitter account and then after a few preliminaries, proceeded with ease to the map feature which shows users online all over the world. 

Clicking on Europe I was offered a multitude of choices. I scrolled through the titles on my screen until one caught my eye - “Singing and piano”.  I clicked on it and was immediately right there with @Marc_Motzer as he broadcast live, his performance at his piano!

He was really good and I gathered that the other users online thought so too.  These users were making comments which Marc could see.  Requests started coming in and these proved no problem to Marc.  His reportoire appeared to be vast! 

I could see who the other people were that were watching him singing, and soon I touched my screen to add little colored hearts to the others that were floating on the side, to indicate I liked what I was watching. On the spot, I decided to follow him. 

This was fun. So off to America I went and clicked on New York. Within no time, I was accompanying a guy on his bicycle riding through Central Park. Central Park! In New York City! When I typed “Hi from Abu Dhabi!” and he immediately responded in a clear voice “Hi Abu Dhabi” I was in fits of laughter. The bumps and occasional swerves of the bicycle all made sense now.

After a short walk through a national park, my last visit landed me in a classroom where a young teenage girl was chatting to hundreds of followers and admirers! 

This was indeed a new world.  I suddenly remembered the first sms I received and how I could not believe that it was possible to receive a message from someone on a phone without actually speaking to them.  When was that? Centuries ago? 

Or how we figured out that if we were travelling we should investigate the existence of possible webcams in an area so that we could stand in front of one at a certain arranged time so that other family members could see us waving at them on their computer screens. 

Even my thoughts on Omnipresence in Cyberspace appeared to need updating, and this blog I wrote only just over one year ago. 

Anyone today, not only observers in a submarine or behind a high obstacle, is able to observe what is out of normal sight. With the app Periscope, you can 

Explore the world through someone else’s eyes.  Periscope

Now anyone, anywhere can share your view.

 

 Connections 

The fact that Periscope offers live video - video in real time - to anyone, anywhere in the world, is what makes it so appealing. 

Currently 10 million downloads of the app are reported. Brands, no doubt, will use it to show behind the scenes footage, have question and answer sessions, or create a sense of urgency in their buyers’ minds.  Celebrities I am sure will utilize it to the full.  The potential ways to use this app are manifold, and I believe that is what is making it so appealing.  The potential ways to use this app well will be what counts.  The wise and creative users will be the ones to find and the ones to follow. 

Users can “teleport” into countless vistas to find treasures or nightmares. Discernment is vital now if we are to make mindful use of the technology available to us. 

With talks in the air of 3D maps rising out of our screens, and the possibility to soon touch a loved one via augmented reality on our mobiles, there is much still coming our way. 

In PRT, Paternoster lifts, Cyberspace and Mindfulness I wrote that 

we are seeing the emergence of new and wonderful inventions connecting us to each other at incredible speeds. 

If we could teleport to the past, or he teleport to the future, I wonder what Johannes Gutenberg, renowned for his contribution to printing technology, would say about the app Periscope.

In 1430 Gutenberg marketed a kind of periscope which enabled pilgrims to see over the heads of the crowd at a religious festival in Germany.  I somehow think he would smile before popping off to listen to a fellow countryman singing and playing his piano.