[Several of the innovative design concepts in the new Ikea project described in this story from Fast Company involve presence. Follow the links for much more information and many images and videos. –Matthew] [Image: Source: designboom] Ikea imagines home life post-COVID-19, and it’s wild Ikea sees an opportunity to rethink the home By Mark Wilson June 25, 2020 If sheltering in place has taught us one thing, it’s that your home has to be more than a place to sleep. It’s where we live a lot of our lives—and even work and teach school—and so spending on indoor and outdoor…

[A new NIH-funded project will develop the use of virtual reality to produce both spatial and social presence to train teams of operating room doctors and nurses, all of whom can be in different remote locations. This story from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) describes the project; see the original version for a 1:06 minute video (also available on YouTube). –Matthew] $2.3 Million Grant Will Support Development of Virtual Operating Room Team Training Shared virtual system will provide new opportunities for clinical team training June 24, 2020 By Torie Wells TROY, N.Y. — A surgeon makes an incision on a virtual…

[The company OVR Technology is introducing a new platform for adding scents to virtual reality experiences, with the explicit goal of enhancing presence. This interview with the CEO from the AWE (Augmented World Expo) blog provides a lot of interesting details. For more information, see a January 2020 story in Seven Days and the company’s website. –Matthew] [Image: Source: OVR Technology via Twitter] What Is Olfactory VR? Interview with OVR’s Aaron Wisniewski 20 May 2020 Emily Friedman He’s been described as the “Indiana Jones of scent.” Self-described mad scientist, artist and olfactory evangelist Aaron Wisniewski is the CEO of OVR…

[Artificial intelligence and augmented reality could provide a valuable way to perceive, and maintain, social distancing. The Amazon blog post below describes the company’s new “Distance Assistant” technology and includes a 32 second demonstration video. If AR-capable glasses were common, this technology could provide a first person view that evokes greater presence and would be even more useful. Coverage in TechCrunch makes a similar point: “It’s not exactly immediate feedback that technology might be able to provide with, say, a haptic wearable. Instead, it’s designed to serve as a visual reminder for workers to keep their circles green by maintaining…

[Ideal for a world in various stages of lockdown during a pandemic, the design project called “Feel the Conversation” features telephones that translate speech into simple haptic signals that create social presence. This story is from dezeen, where it includes five different pictures and a 0:14 minute video. For more information, pictures and a 0:44 minute video, see Xian-Zhi Zhang’s website. –Matthew] [Image: Source: Xian-Zhi Zhang’s website] RCA students design licking phones that turn speech into physical sensations Natashah Hitti 27 May 2020 Royal College of Art students Sandeep Hoonjan and Xianzhi Zhang have designed a pair of devices that…

[This very short post from the Arduino blog, and the 4:20 minute video titled “We Built a Telepresence Robot (To Survive the Quarantine)” in the original version (and on YouTube), demonstrate how even basic DIY technology can be used to evoke presence. For more details see the project’s Hackaday page. –Matthew] Meet TELEBOT, the terrifying telepresence robot June 1, 2020 Arduino Team The Internet has been perhaps more important than ever to keep us connected these days. Available technology, however, apparently wasn’t good enough for brothers Hunter and Josh Irving, who built their own telepresence robot using parts on-hand during…

[Musician Jean-Michel Jarre will host an innovative concert in virtual reality on Sunday June 21, 2020, as described in this press release from VRrOOm (where it includes two more pictures). Coverage from AFP via Yahoo! News add this: Jarre said the concert will be one step beyond the lockdown concert performed by the US rapper Travis Scott inside the shooter game Fortnite in April, which was watched by more than 12 million players. “Everything will be done live,” Jarre told AFP, whereas with “Fortnite it was pre-recorded in a universe that already existed. Here it will be total immersion in…

[A new study comparing exercise combined with music, virtual reality, both, and neither, and measuring a variety of effects, provides more evidence for the benefits of presence. This story is from Forbes, where the original includes a second image; follow the link to the study for more details. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Photo by Amy E. Price/FilmMagic] Virtual Reality Makes Exercise More Enjoyable And Less Tiring, Study Finds Simon Chandler, Contributor June 16, 2020 Virtual reality makes exercise more enjoyable and less difficult, according to a new study published in the British Journal of Health Psychology. Authored by researchers from Brunel…

[This press release from XPRIZE and All Nippon Airways via Business Wire provides details about and links to a new 25-story archive of short stories about telepresence, including the winner of a contest judged by a large panel of science fiction experts. The stories provide more interesting material for the Telepresence in Media Environments project. –Matthew] [Image: Anya Ow’s “Life in Achar” awarded Top Prize in Avatars Inc Short Story Competition. Credit: Illustration by Mathis Burmeister.] XPRIZE Announces Winner of Global Short Story Contest to Imagine the Future of Telepresence Technologies Nearly 500 stories were submitted by writers in 33…

[While video games (and TV shows, books, etc.) provide valuable escape and distraction these days, this story describes how “gentle games” like Animal Crossing are providing an important sense of connection (social presence), along with safety, normalcy and control. The original version from MIT Technology Review includes several social media posts. –Matthew] Why games like Animal Crossing are the new social media of the coronavirus era Gentle, comforting games like Nintendo’s latest hit are perfect escapist entertainment, but they’re also helping us to connect in these strange times. by Tanya Basu April 16, 2020 If you’d told Areeba Imam a…

[This story from Oregon State University reports on an interesting new study comparing both student and instructor perceptions of a university class experienced in person, via distance learning and via telepresence robot. See the original version for two different images and for many more details see the published study. -Matthew] [Image: Fig. 3 from “Are We There Yet? Comparing Remote Learning Technologies in the University Classroom.” Participant responses to the post-class survey questions, separated by condition. The bars show the mean response for each grouping, and the error bars illustrate +/- one standard deviation. Starred lines above the bars indicate…

[A newly granted Apple patent would allow people in the same or different locations to create (and later modify) group selfie photos automatically, an intriguing way to manipulate perceptions of reality especially during social distancing. 9to5Mac is among the many publications covering the development; follow the link at the end of this story for more details and images. –Matthew] [Image: Source: KnowTechie] Apple patent would let you create virtual group selfies with social distancing Ben Lovejoy June 8, 2020 An Apple patent first filed almost two years ago looks rather prescient today: it allows you to create virtual group selfies…