[This post from the Microsoft Research Blog is featured in new press coverage of the company’s DreamWalker system as well as other innovations. DreamWalker uses VR to substitute the experience of walking through a real world environment with a parallel walk through a virtual one (which of course raises some important safety concerns). See the original blog post for several more images and 3 videos. –Matthew] [Image: Source: VentureBeat] A new era of spatial computing brings fresh challenges—and solutions—to VR October 21, 2019 By Microsoft blog editor Virtual reality (VR) has continually pushed the boundaries of how we perceive, from its…

[Products featured on home shopping channels, and various other objects in other genres, will be entering TV viewers’ living rooms thanks to LG and Eyecandylab, as described in this story from Next Reality. See the original version for 3 more pictures and a 1:46 minute video; for more information see the press release via PR Newswire. –Matthew] LG Enhances South Korean TV Sets with Shoppable Augmented Reality Ads By Cristina Brooks October 21, 2019 Best known for its mobile phones and television sets, South Korea’s LG has had a quieter presence in the US compared to the country’s homegrown efforts.…

[This is a wonderfully vivid description of what it might be like for both the biological and simulated versions of a person when technology allows digital duplication of minds and the presence after death that that suggests. The story is from The Guardian, where the original includes 4 more pictures. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: James Melaugh] What happens if your mind lives for ever on the internet? It may be some way off, but mind uploading, the digital duplication of your mental essence, could expand human experience into a virtual afterlife Michael Graziano, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Princeton University…

[The Verge reports on an important development in the history of presence-evoking technologies, the failure of smartphone-based virtual reality (the good news is that more compelling, convenient and cost-effective VR is supplanting the phone-based headsets). –Matthew] Phone-based VR is officially over By Adi Robertson October 16, 2019 Mobile virtual reality headsets helped millions of people try out VR, but as of yesterday, they’re all but officially a thing of the past. Oculus CTO John Carmack offered a “eulogy” last month for the phone-powered Gear VR mobile headset, saying that the headset’s days were numbered. And Google just revealed that it’s…

[Road to VR reports on a new, very large lab for presence experiences at Colorado State University. See the original version for two more pictures and for more information see a CSU story from April 2019 and the University’s Virtual Reality Initiative webpages. –Matthew] Colorado State University Has Deployed a 100 Headset VR Lab for Biomedical Education By Ben Lang October 10, 2019 Colorado State University has deployed a new VR lab; designed to accommodate up to 100 students simultaneously, the lab’s headsets run custom software which allow students to visualize life-sized virtual cadavers and medical imagery in a shared…

[SlashGear is among those reporting on the latest vision for the future of ‘travel’ via telepresence by Japan’s All Nippon Airways (ANA). See the original story for three images. A three-part video from the CEATEC 2019 demonstrations is available from The Japan Times via YouTube here, here and here. And see ANA websites for a press release and vivid descriptions of Avatar-in, ANA-Avatar and the $10 million Avatar XPRIZE. –Matthew] [Image: A diagram shows how ANA’s concept envisions connecting an avatar and its operator. Credit: ANA Holdings Inc. Source: GeekWire] ANA Avatar-in lets you “teleport” to places using robots JC…