[Others have used marketing campaigns, in some cases including presence-evoking technologies like VR, to bring audience members into the world (or ‘universe’) of a film or TV series, but as the Sound & Vision story below explains, Netflix has created a particularly clever cross-media campaign that brings audiences into the dystopian reality portrayed in “Joan is Awful,” the first episode of the latest season of Black Mirror. A story in LADbible describes how some audience members have had their name and picture used in real-world billboards for the campaign; and a story in DesignTAXI that includes more pictures of the…

[What psychological, ethical and other differences are there between pornographic images or videos that feature fictional rather than real people? This story from Rolling Stone raises lots of thought-provoking questions about the use of presence-evoking technologies in the context of sexuality. Despite the certainty expressed here regarding sexual deepfake videos featuring real people, see also the Wired essay “Deepfake porn reveals a ‘pervert’s dilemma’: What’s the moral difference between indulging in a sexual fantasy about someone and watching a deepfake of them?” –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Photo illustration uses photograph by Svetlana Fedoseeva/Adobe Stock] They’re Selling Nudes of Imaginary Women on…

[This MIT Technology Review story describes new evidence for another positive application of presence, the use of a virtual forest setting to produce some of the same benefits as does spending time in an actual forest. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Lukáš Hejtmánek] “Forest bathing” might work in virtual reality too Could electronic forests elicit the same physiological responses as real ones? By Charlie Metcalfe June 26, 2023 The Japanese concept of “forest bathing,” or shinrin-­yoku (森林浴), has long been acclaimed for its supposed health benefits. Hundreds of scientific studies suggest that it can improve mental health and cognitive performance, reduce blood…

[The Glass Room, which began as a touring exhibition and is now an online “public intervention that provides an interactive, fun, and challenging experience, bringing to life the most pressing challenges facing people and the tech industry today,” features a four-minute video about deepfakes and how they can create alternate versions of different aspects of each of us (including versions that remain after we die). The video could be a useful resource for those who teach students about presence. The text below accompanies the video. See also the Deepfake Lab website, where “researchers take you behind the scenes to reveal…

[A new and improved tool from Meta called Voicebox AI that generates and modifies human-sounding voices could help those with vocal cord damage speak, produce natural sounding translations across many languages, make non-player gaming characters (NPCs) and digital assistants more convincing, and allow us to listen to written messages in the voice of the sender. Unfortunately, it also has significant potential for abuse (e.g., in deepfake scams). The story below from Engadget provides some of the details and for more information see the Meta AI blog (and go to the bottom for links to the research paper and additional demos).…

[Vice’s Motherboard reports on recent cases in which people used AI and other technologies to create “clones” of real people, in one prominent case their girlfriend and another themself. This seems likely to be an increasingly common phenomenon and raises lots of presence-related questions, some of which are explored in a new essay in The Conversation titled “AI clones made from user data pose uncanny risks”; here’s how that essay begins: “Imagine, if you will, a digital doppelgänger. A clone that looks, talks and behaves just like you, created from the depths of artificial intelligence, reflecting your every mannerism with…