[Following the coverage of OpenAI’s Sora software, which lets users generate realistic video from text prompts, the AI voice company ElevenLabs announced new software that adds realistic sound effects to accompany the video, surely enhancing the presence experience of viewers/listeners. This story from New Atlas includes the details and a one-minute video demonstration (also available via YouTube). –Matthew] [Image: “What if you could describe a sound and generate it with AI?” teases ElevenLabs as AI-generated sound effects and dialog are added to video footage generated by Sora from OpenAI. Credit: ElevenLabs.] Stunning new AI adds realistic sound effects to any…

[Sora, a new tool from OpenAI, produces impressively convincing videos from text prompts. This story from Computerworld provides some of the details and raises some frequently mentioned concerns, as well as a more novel one from Dan Faggella of Emerj Artificial Intelligence. See the original version of the story for two more images and two video examples. For related coverage, see stories from Gizmodo and CBS News. The Decoder reports that “Meta’s chief AI researcher says OpenAI’s ‘world simulator’ Sora is a dead end,” and that he says Meta has a better approach. In any case, presence-evoking technology is advancing…

[One of the many aspects of interactions with media technologies that can ‘break’ presence is lag, the delay between the user’s action and the technology’s response. In a February 20, 2024 essay in Stratechery, Matthew Ball explains the need for reducing lag in interactions with AI: “[T]he closer an AI comes to being human, the more grating and ultimately gating are the little inconveniences that get in the way of actually interacting with said AI. It is one thing to have to walk to your desk to use a PC, or even reach into your pocket for a smartphone: you…

[The story below from the University of Southern California’s Viterbi School of Engineering reports on the latest efforts to make arguably the ultimate presence-evoking technology, Star Trek’s holodecks, a reality; see the original version of the story for three more pictures and three videos. –Matthew] [Image: USC researchers led by Shahram Ghandeharizadeh and Heather Culbertson (Center) are inching closer to creating a real-world holodeck, using swarms of tiny drones to create 3D objects. Credit: Cooper Brown.] International Conference on Holodecks: Five Key Takeaways Immersive technology researchers at USC and beyond are bringing us one step closer to making Star Trek-like…

[I’ve read, and posted, several encouraging stories over the years about how individuals have discovered, and formed organizations to utilize, the power of presence-evoking technologies to create new empathy and understanding, and hopefully behavior change, that counters harmful biases. The story below about Equity Commons is from Davidson College in North Carolina; the original version contains three more pictures, and there’s more information on the Equity Commons website. –Matthew] [Image: Aubrey J. Grant ’10, M.D.] Radical Empathy Through Virtual Reality: Tech Has Power to Transform the Patient Experience By Jay Pfeifer February 19, 2024 You are Tracy. You are a…

[This story from New Atlas makes a detailed and compelling case for the use of robots to serve in the valuable role of seeing eye dogs, with characteristics of the robots likely evoking medium-as-social-actor presence for their blind or sight-limited users. See the original version of the story for eight more images and three videos. –Matthew] [Image: The University of Glasgow has been working with the Unitree G01 platform for quite some time now, specifically to develop guide dogs for blind and partially sighted people. Credit: Glasgow University] The Seeing Eye Dog V2.0 is shaping up as a gamechanger By…