Jennifer is a 36-year-old woman who lives in a suburb outside of New York City. She is a senior manager in customer service for the Visiting Nurses Association. During the day she works to help match elderly people in need of medical and household care at home. She works hard to match the customer’s personality and needs to one of the association’s fine nurses. Though her main office is based in New York, Jennifer often travels to the various VNA offices throughout the country to give lectures, attend corporate meetings, and to lead workshops and orientations for new staff members. On the weekends, Jennifer leads the choir at St. Ephrem’s Church in Brooklyn.
Despite her career and creative endeavors, Jennifer’s most important roles are as wife and mother. Her husband, Daniel, works as a physical therapist and runs his own practice in Staten Island. Jennifer and Daniel also have a six-year-old daughter named Abigail, or Abby for short. When Jennifer found out she was pregnant, she left her job and made the decision to be a stay-at-home mom. Since Daniel worked in sales during the day and went to school at night, Jennifer spent a lot of time at home with the baby. Jennifer would frequently watch television while at home, and soon enough, Abby became a television fan herself. She loved shows like The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Backyardigans, and Wonder Pets. As Abby grew older, Jennifer began watching some of her favorite childhood films with her daughter. Soon enough, Abby became enamored with Disney movies such as Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and Mary Poppins. Now, every night before her bedtime, Jennifer, Daniel and Abby watch a Disney movie, and this bonds the family together as they relax and unwind from long days at work and school.
When Jennifer travels, she always misses her family. Every night after dinnertime, she often wishes she could be transported back home for a few hours to her living room, where she could watch a Disney movie with her husband and daughter. She particularly misses hearing Abby sing along with the well-known songs of the movies. There is something really captivating and heart-warming in hearing her daughter sing as she is immersed into the story and the context of each song. One night, Daniel said he thinks she sings because she “feels the magic and needs to express it somehow.” Being a life-long Disney fan herself, Jennifer can’t help but agree. She even thinks back at her own childhood and remembers hearing herself sing along with Belle, Ariel, and all the other Disney princesses. Perhaps hearing Abby sing reminds her of how she was inspired by the “magic” of these movies, and therefore she misses experiencing the innocence and “magic” of her childhood through her daughter.
While Jennifer was on a business trip in Phoenix, she was talking about her family’s nightly movie event to Agnes, another customer service representative from Chicago, while they were at dinner. Agnes, who is also a film buff, told her about an online application called “Your Virtual Living Room” that she uses whenever she’s away on a business trip. With “Your VLR,” as it is called in short, users can connect and talk to one another online as they watch a movie or TV show together. The application hosts a wide variety of content from sites like Hulu, Netflix, and Disney Movies Online. This excites Jennifer, and when she gets back to her hotel room, she immediately calls Daniel and tells him about the application. He says it sounds like fun, and he and Jennifer make plans to use it the following night and have a magical “Family Movie Night” over the span of 2,500 miles.
The next night, Jennifer takes out her laptop and enters the site’s url into her browser’s address bar. She is quickly brought to the content page, and clicks on the category called “Disney.” This links her to all the content available through Disney Movies Online. Since Disney Movies Online is a paid service, she must pay a small fee to rent the movie. Jennifer enters her credit card information in the form, and then clicks “Submit.” She is then given a unique link to her own “Virtual Living Room,” which she can share with the people with whom she’ll watch the movie. She copies the link and pastes it into an email addressed to Daniel. She then calls her husband’s cell phone. He answers and enthusiastically tells her that he’s hooked up his computer to their television set through an HDMI cable. He’s also connected an external microphone to the computer and has set it on the coffee table near the couch. Jennifer tells him that she’s emailed him the link to the movie.
After they hang up, Jennifer clicks the “Go to Film” button at the bottom of the screen. A video player with movie already loaded comes on the screen. A small notification fades on the top that says, “For best experience, use headphones.” Since Jennifer will be watching along through her computer, she grabs her iPod headphones and plugs them into her laptop. Another notification fades in from the bottom, telling her that when everyone has entered the room, she can press play to begin the movie. Shortly after this, one more notification fades in on the top. This time, it alerts Jennifer that “Daniel and Abby” have entered the room. She immediately hears Abby’s laugh from the other side and quickly shouts, “Hi!” They both enthusiastically greet her back. Instantly, Jennifer feels back at home as if they are all sitting in the living room together waiting to start a movie. They all slip back into their routine pre-movie conversation. Jennifer asks Daniel how his day went, and when he is finished talking, he asks her the same question and she answers. After a few minutes (and right on que!) Abby, who is clearly tired of all the grown-up talk, asks if they can start the movie now. Jennifer and Daniel apologize and agree that it’s time to watch the film. As per the ritual, Jennifer playfully asks Abby if she’s ready to watch the movie, and Abby shouts an emphatic “YES!” at the top of her lungs. Jennifer’s face lights up as she hears her daughter’s thunderously squeaky voice, and she is so happy that she’s learned of “Your VLR.” She then presses the “Play” button on the video player bar, and the movie starts playing on both her laptop screen and the computer Daniel and Abby are using at home.
The “Lion King” starts, and the family is magically transported into the mystical and exotic African world of the film. The first song, “The Circle of Life” begins, and Jennifer’s heart melts (as it always does) when she hears Abby sing the emphatic and uplifting chorus. Jennifer soon chimes in, and it seems the boundaries of geography no longer apply. Through this application, she realizes her wish is granted. She has been transported to the living room with her. At this point, she fully realizes the depth of the applications’ name, “Your Virtual Living Room.” Even though they are not physically in each other’s presence, Jennifer feels this transcendent connection to her family in New York. It almost feels as if the movie has transported her out of her body and placed her within a room along with her husband and child. She genuinely feels as if they are all in a “virtual living room” together, and it is the movie itself that is bringing them together and maintaining this connection.
Throughout the movie, the family sings, laughs, and cries together as Simba goes through his powerful and memorable journey from orphan prince to the king of the jungle. Daniel, the residential goofball of the family, repeats funny quotes by imitating the voices of the characters. These moments make Abby burst out with laughter, and that laughter quickly becomes infectious as it would if they were all in the living room at home. When the film has ended, Abby begs for her parents to let her watch another movie. As she does every night, Jennifer sternly tells Abby she must go to bed. Abby throws a bit of a huff, but knowing she won’t win, quickly goes to her room to get changed. While she is gone, Daniel and Jennifer start talking about their experience using the application. Both enthusiastically agree that the experience was tremendously powerful, and they feel closer to one another than they ever have over the phone. Jennifer expresses how this experience felt more like “a gift” than daily effort to keep in touch. Abby soon skips into the room and greets her mom again. Jennifer tells Abby she loves her and sends her off to bed. Daniel says goodbye to Jennifer, and they make plans to do the same thing tomorrow night. They all go back to the “Films” page and choose a movie to watch the next night. Already everyone becomes excited, and Jennifer secretly wishes it was tomorrow.
She says goodbye to her family, and selects the “X” at the top of the screen. She then selects the option to “Leave the Room,” and is then brought back to the home page of the application. When this happens, Jennifer suddenly is struck with the realization of where she is. For the past two hours, she’d forgotten she was in a hotel room in Phoenix. Instead, she felt as if she was with her family at home, in their living room, watching a film and creating a new experience from it. As they do every night, they made their own story as they watched the one on screen, and this produced another truly memorable experience that she’ll remember and treasure for a long time. And all of this was possible with the Internet, a good movie, and an application that made the story come alive for all of those connected to it.