Linden Lab Staffer Quits Virtual World to Make Virtual Food

I was enjoying a long, leisurely Memorial Day weekend brunch with my girlfriend when this New York Times article just about made me choke on my carnitas con huevos:

Boom times in Silicon Valley call for hard work, and hard work — at least in technology land — means that coders, engineers and venture capitalists are turning to liquid meals with names like Schmoylent, Soylent, Schmilk and People Chow... Soylent’s success has created opportunity for imitators, who are mixing and marketing their own powders. Alex C. Snyder, known on Internet forums as “Axcho,” quit his job at the software company Linden Lab last August to sell his own variants of Soylent, like Schmoylent and Schmilk. Many of his repeat customers in the San Francisco Bay Area work in technology.

So in other words:

Alex went from building virtual worlds to creating virtual food. And while I entirely understand the appeal of virtual worlds, I'm totally perplexed at the rising popularity of virtual food in the high tech industry. Used to be technology was promised to give us more time to value the things that make life worth living. Now, instead, we're seeing a distinct trend to virtualize life's greatest pleasures, too.

Please share this post:

Tweet

 

Comments

[Cube Republic]

nom http://tinyurl.com/mynqe3t

[Amanda Dallin]

You can't nom a liquid. It's more of a slurp. I think I"ll keep noming my own food.

[Kitty Revolver]

funny you say "virtual" food because that is so the right academic word to describe this article.

[Emilly Orr]

While I'm amused by the concept of 'virtual' food, the truth is that some people just want tailored nutrition. Eating is fine, but they want a single, meal-size dose that will contain that meal's complete proteins, minerals, vitamins, amino acids--there are companies who are even tailoring these food doses to gender, ethnicity and age. The idea is attractive, on occasion, but I thoroughly admit I'd miss the crunch of salads far too much. And coffee. Never ever ever giving up coffee.

[sirhc deSantis]

+1 to Cube Republic, you win:)

All dietary needs in one easy to take dose eh? So wheres my atomic flying car...

[Carlos Loff]

There is nothing Virtual about making a Meal liquid instead of solid, this guy just abandoned virtual worlds for the food industry, and although plastic or futuristic, is not virtual on any sense

[melponeme_k]

It never fails to amaze me how the techies love them some dystopia and wish to bring it into the real world.

Did the product really need to be named Soylent? It couldn't be something more upbeat and life affirming? Come on, these are reputedly intelligent people, they can come up with names for their product that having nothing to do with old, old, pop culture.

[Cube Republic]

This is how humanity evolves into A-sexual grey space aliens dependent on technology. They become slaves to the machines that we're meant to make their lives easier. Their mouths get smaller and toothless because there's no need to chew food. Body mass goes down as a result. The eyes are larger for staring at computer screens. Reproduction becomes automated, and we lose our genitalia.