I remember when people were thinking, "I don't see how windows and clicking on all this stuff to get things done will ever be more efficient than just using a clear and well defined set of command lines."

Yep.

You lose parallax, of course, but I'm pretty sure that in general it's possible to project an n-dimensional object down to n-1 dimensions in a useful fashion--that is, retaining all of the information that an observer capable of perceiving n-1 dimensions would have seen from that particular viewpoint. It's no more "eye candy" than the three-dimensional nature of the bottle of water I've got next to me is "eye candy" when I close one eye.

(Yes, there are other cues for depth, but most of them can be recreated)

That's an absurd argument. The GUI made functionality discoverable (in theory, in practice UI designers have managed to prevent that alarmingly often). It had a clear, obvious benefit.

~J

(bolded above)

Yes, that is the key...from a single viewpoint...

I don't understand your bottle of water argument though, as it really is a 3D object. Take a paper cutout of that bottle of water...sure, from one perspective there is no difference, but scoot your body 12 inches to the right or left, and you'll see a drastic difference.

Again, while I agree above a "dumbed-down" or cool looking interface has its place, don't try and tell me its 3D, because its not. It simulates 3D, sure, and from a certain perspective, you can't tell the difference, but that doesn't mean it is 3D. Its a simulator...cool as it may look and as easy as it may be, but don't try selling me on the 3D aspect...because its not!

Yeah, I remember VRML. Then-again, there's a time and place for everything. IIRC VRML was before the .com boom, in-fact I just checked and VRML came out about 1994 when the .com boom started at around 1995.

Sure, that's fairly close, but enthusiasm in something only needs to fade once before it's gone. 1 year is a long time for enthusiasm to fade, and that was only the start of the .com boom before companies had pulled all the lesser tricks.

It may sound like I'm putting a lot of significance into the .com boom, well that was really when people started putting big money into web sites. Without big money, things generally don't go far.

Nowadays 3d stuff is becoming more common on the web, with flash 9 approaching workable 3D content and Google's Google's SketchUp app getting some news time and a little push.

In short: I'd put my money on this web browser not amounting to much, but don't discount 3d web experiences just yet.

Perhaps, but I've seen people duck dinosaurs in Tomb Raider...

IE: It might not be VR yet, but it doesn't need to be as long as you have suspension of disbelief.

I suppose that once you have VR, the old interfaces and displays might not be good enough. Perhaps your imagination is exercised less, meaning it can't quite suspend the disbelief of a non-vr experience?

Hmm... That just gave me an idea for a character who really highly prises his imagination. Maybe even a mage-type with an imagination-themed tradition? Possibly Intuition or Charisma? Charisma vaguely makes sense if you say "I can think past your thoughts" equates to better astral damage, whilst Intuition has the Artisan skill and is used for evasion of astral attacks in a "I can think round your thoughts" sense.