Whatever Happened to VRML?

Question

Back in the late 1990s, when I was at grad school VRML was going to take over the world. My peers and I built all manner of useful and interesting things with it by hooking it u

Answer 1

I think the idea was that people would enjoy using 3d interface to navigate information.

This proved incorrect. People use 3D interfaces pretty much exclusively for gaming (or for specialized purposes, such as architecture, engineering or medicine).

During the 90s there was a mini-explosion of technology based around this idea. I remember that Apple designed a 3D browsing system (the name escapes me) that never went off the ground.

In the end, it's far easier for humans to scan 2D representations for information and navigate that way.