[The Imperial College London Business School demonstrated a new presence-evoking technology in a transatlantic discussion panel last week. Details about the technology and plans for its wider use are in the story below from BBC News, where it includes other images and a video. Coverage by Imperial College London News includes a 0:45 minute video of the event (also available via YouTube). A short interview with David Lefevre, director of Imperial’s Edtech Lab, is available from Sputnik News. –Matthew] ‘Hologram’ lecturers to teach students at Imperial College London University classes are set to be given a futuristic spin by letting lecturers…

[Sexuality remains a fascinating context for exploring presence. It creates a variety of complex challenges to replicate deeply human, embodied experiences using technology, challenges that while rarely met successfully can teach us a lot about the many factors that evoke and limit different forms of presence. And it highlights a variety of ethical questions and controversies for designers, researchers, consumers and others. The story below from Metro UK is a good example; it’s the only coverage of the Autoblow A.I. product that I found that didn’t include explicit or crass language and/or juvenile puns. A story in Motherboard describes the…

[The ultimate presence technology that many of us grew up watching dramatized in Star Trek is apparently one step closer, as reported in this story from VentureBeat (where the original includes three more images). For more details see the Light Field Lab website, including the press release on the News page. –Matthew] Light Field Lab and Otoy team up to make Star Trek’s Holodeck a reality Dean Takahashi October 22, 2018 Holographic display maker Light Field Lab and graphics software firm Otoy have teamed up to turn the Star Trek Holodeck into a reality. The Holodeck, which Star Trek movies…

[The good work of David Parker and Wishplay includes a mediated presence experience of Halloween for children too ill to participate directly. This story is from Digital Trends and for more on the individual experiences of the children see coverage in The Globe and Mail; for details on the prerecorded and livestream trick-or-treating available tonight (Halloween 2018), see the Wishplay website. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Jeremy Thompson] Wishplay’s virtual Halloween delivers a treat to terminally ill children Simon Cohen October 30, 2018 If you or someone you love has ever spent any time as a patient in a hospital, you know how…

[The new app described in this story from Forbes is called Spatial but what makes it compelling is the combination of spatial and social presence. The original story includes more images and a 2:15 minute video. For first person reports on a recent demonstration of the product see coverage in Fast Company and Engadget, and for information about how it was inspired by fictional user interfaces in Minority Report and other films see coverage in Variety. –Matthew] Spatial Bursts Out Of Stealth With Cash And XR Telepresence Charlie Fink, Contributor October 24, 2018 After two years in stealth, Spatial is…

[More potential Halloween presence is planned for this week’s holiday, as detailed in this story from Business Insider, where the original includes more images. The 2:17 minute trailer for the project is available on the project’s Twitter page. –Matthew] [Image: A scene from the trailer for “BeeMe,” an MIT Media Lab social experiment. Credit: BeeMe/MIT Media Lab.] MIT is giving you control of a real person on Halloween in a dystopian game that sounds like an episode of ‘Black Mirror’ Dave Mosher Oct. 27, 2018 This Halloween, the creepiest event to attend might be a mass online social experiment hosted…