%1

"There is no There there,” said Gertrude Stein about Oakland, California. “There is a different there there,” say I, an Oaklandite by birth, about virtuality. “Virtual” presence differs from “real” presence in propinquity—time, place and relationship—as well as vividness and interactivity. The technology of virtual presence simulates “being there”; it holds out the promise of presence on demand—and thereby demands that we do some careful thinking about presence. Consider “virtual worship.”