[Here’s a long but interesting story from TV News Check about how one veteran television meteorologist has “built and deployed avatars of herself that can analyze and present the weather” in local forecasts across the US and even “interact one-on-one with users for more personalized weather queries on her website.” As she notes at the end of the story, the presence-evoking technology is available and affordable, and using it can be empowering: “A meteorologist is not replaced by an avatar, … A meteorologist enhances the avatar.” See the original version of the story for a second image and a 4:00…

[The Dali Museum in Florida has again used presence-evoking technologies to explore the work and life Salvador Dali, this time making it possible (for a short time at least) for anyone to call a telephone number and have a conversation with an AI chatbot trained to replicate the Spanish surrealist who died in 1989. The short story below from DesignTAXI provides details and the original version includes a 32-second video (also on YouTube). For more on the mentioned AI trailer for the never-made film Giraffes on Horseback Salad, see coverage in Artsy and a (negative) review in ArtNet.…

[Interesting new research from Caltech and Toyohashi University of Technology suggests that distinct combinations of neurological traits and states can be linked to the experience of “flow” both within and across individuals. Because flow is a phenomenon often discussed with and related to the experience of presence, the research suggests at least the potential for new ways to measure and assess the distinct and overlapping causes and consequences of both phenomena together, by replicating the new research while adding standard self-report or other presence measures or even identifying neural signatures of both flow and presence simultaneously. See Neuroscience News and…

[This story from Virginia Tech describes the benefits of combining presence-evoking virtual reality with digital twin replicas of physical systems for training, in this case for workforce members who operate the Virginia Tech Electric power substation in Blacksburg. See the original version of the story for three different pictures and two short videos, and for more context listen to a 16-minute segment of the University’s “Curious Conversations” podcast from September 2023 about “The Metaverse, Digital Twins, and Green AI” with Walid Saad, a professor in the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. –Matthew] [Image: In the virtual reality training…

[This detailed report from VentureBeat highlights the serious damage that can result from having AI-based communication media technologies emulate, and be perceived as, social actors. Follow the links and see coverage from Yahoo! News for more information. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: VentureBeat made with Midjourney] OpenAI overrode concerns of expert testers to release sycophantic GPT-4o By Carl FranzenMay 2, 2025 It’s been a bit of a topsy-turvy week for the number one generative AI company in terms of users. OpenAI, creator of ChatGPT, released and then withdrew an updated version of the underlying multimodal (text, image, audio) large language model (LLM)…

[A new resource for businesses deploying AI-based chatbots turns recent scientific research into practical recommendations. While presence isn’t explicitly mentioned in this story from Knowledge at Wharton (“A business journal of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania”), the goal of the project is “to help firms build a better chatbot by understanding the psychological factors at play when customers interact with ‘a nonhuman agent.’” Visit the Wharton Blueprint for Effective Chatbots for detailed information. –Matthew] Tired of Chatbots? Here’s How They Could Improve AI-powered chatbots are being deployed by companies to handle everything from booking travel to helping…

[The film project described in this story from The Hollywood Reporter sounds like it’ll be of interest to those who study or create presence experiences (and anyone who, like me, is a fan of the Netflix series Russian Doll or the Peacock series Poker Face. More details from a story in Decrypt follow below and for more quotes from the principals, see coverage in IndieWire. –Matthew] [Image: Natasha Lyonne, Brit Marling, and Jaron Lanier. Source: IndieWire] Natasha Lyonne Set to Make Feature Directorial Debut With AI Film — With Help From Jaron Lanier (Exclusive) The actress and the tech pioneer…

[Although it may not ever become legal to send your AI lawyer to defend you in court, an early-days version of the presence-evoking technology is already available and, as this AP story reports, a plaintiff in New York has already made the attempt. You can watch what happened on YouTube. Note the links below to stories about related applications of presence in the legal context. –Matthew] [Image: This screenshot from a video labeled as a March 26, 2025 live stream video on the YouTube channel of the Appellate division of the First Judicial Department of the Supreme Court of the…

[This essay from SAPIENS describes a fascinating, important and inspiring application of presence by a team of curators, anthropologists, and heritage professionals who are “leveraging 3D and immersive technologies to enable Liberians to intimately experience and interpret Liberian cultural objects that have been dispersed around the world.” A Liberian educator and collaborator quoted near the end describes the project’s impact this way: “VR technology is not just a new experience but a theater of our sacred past… It brings our nearly forgotten cultural identity and images into the present.” See the original version of the essay for four more images.…

[A research team from Public University of Navarra (UPNA) in Spain has developed a 3D hologram system likely to evoke greater presence because it allows users to manipulate projected objects not with a 3D mouse but directly with their hands. The system is described in the story below from The Debrief, where the original version includes a second image and a 2:31 minute video (also available on YouTube). For more information, a longer video, and a link to the team’s open source paper, see the UPNA website. –Matthew] Video: Interactive 3D Hologram Allows Users to Manipulate Virtual Objects with Their…

[Presence-evoking technologies have frequently been used to simulate, and so help other people understand, what it’s like to have a variety of physical and mental health conditions. The story below from Prevention describes a novel project that uses generative artificial intelligence to help those with a group of rare blood cancers share their experiences. As is often the case, the company behind the project, and in this case the story, has a vested interest, but “The Unseen Journey” is of particular interest to me because I have one of the cancers, polycythemia vera (luckily, my symptoms so far have been…

[This essay from MIT Technology Review compares the appeal and potential dangers of algorithm-based social media that compete in the “attention economy,” to the even greater appeal and dangers of artificially intelligent companions that evoke medium-as-social-actor presence, arguing that lawmakers so far seem unprepared to effectively address the latter. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Photo Illustration by Sarah Rogers/MITTR | Photos Getty] AI companions are the final stage of digital addiction, and lawmakers are taking aim Designed to be the perfect person—always available, never critical—AI companions are hooking people deeper than social media ever could. They make the attention economy look like…