[NPR’s WUWM in Milwaukee, Wisconsin reports on a new simulation tool designed to help anyone learn to identify and treat a potential concussion. Visit the original version of this story to listen to a 12:11 minute interview with Dr. Cindy Fenske of the Center for Simulation and Innovation at Concordia University and to watch a one-minute video (also available on YouTube). –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Center For Simulation & Innovation / Concordia University] Field Assessment Simulator uses virtual & augmented reality to help identify, treat concussions By Audrey Nowakowski and Robert Larry October 24, 2023 No matter how you interact with…

[A new decision by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is set to expand the opportunities for a wide variety of presence experiences, as reported in this story from CNBC. The press release is on the FCC website. –Matthew] [Image: Man wearing Meta Quest 3 VR headset. Credit: Todd Haselton / CNBC] Meta, Apple and Google cheer FCC ruling that could pave the way for new AR and VR applications By Lauren Feiner October 19, 2023 The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday agreed to open a band of spectrum for some devices in a move that could help pave the…

[As reported by The Register, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is working to protect military users of virtual and mixed reality technologies from ‘cognitive attacks.’ As outlined in more detail by Sociable, “Such attacks can include information flooding to increase equipment latency and induce physical illness, planting real-world objects to overwhelm displays, subverting a personal area network to sow confusion, injecting virtual data to distract personnel, using objects to overwhelm a user with confusing false alarms, assessing user status through an eye tracker, and other potential attacks. Apart from military applications, DARPA’s new ICS program could provide…

[A potentially useful introduction to lessons and discussions about presence, this opinion piece from The Hill provides a big-picture perspective on the history and future of immersive technologies and their significant benefits and dangers. –Matthew] A new era of virtual reality brings many promises for the future — and perils By Roger Cochetti, an Opinion Contributor who has served as a senior executive with COMSAT, IBM, VeriSign and CompTIA. A former U.S. government official, he has helped found a number of nonprofits in the tech sector and is the author of textbooks on the history of satellite communications. October 10,…

[More research is needed to demonstrate its efficacy but in a clever application of presence-evoking technology, a small Stanford Medicine study suggests that the use of virtual reality simulations of decluttering has the potential to improve treatment for hoarding disorder.  –Matthew] [Image: A virtual reality simulation of a patient’s home. Credit: Carolyn Rodriguez Lab] Virtual reality helps people with hoarding disorder practice decluttering A first-of-its-kind study by Stanford Medicine researchers lets patients practice letting go of treasured objects in simulations of their own homes. By Nina Bai, a science writer in the Office of Communications October 17, 2023 Many people…

[In a world of more and increasingly convincing presence illusions, incidents like the one reported in the Business Insider story below are likely to become more common. Coverage by Inside Edition includes a 2:02 minute video report and begins this way: “Americans have always been told that if we ‘see something, say something,’ and one New York resident did exactly that when he saw what he thought was an apartment on fire. Kieran Murry was looking outside of his window when he thought he saw out-of-control flames in a Manhattan high-rise across the street. ‘I used my smartphone to zoom…