[Here is another insightful essay from Mike Elgan in Computerworld. This one echoes classic social presence scholarship in arguing that we should base our decisions about which (if any) communication technologies to use on both the degree to which they evoke a sense of being physically together and the purpose and emotional tenor of the expected communication. Note especially the optimistic section below titled “Augmented or virtual meeting spaces?” –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Metamorworks / Getty Images] Kill meetings (before meetings kill your company) Meetings waste time, destroy solitary deep work and make a mockery of flex work and a globally…

[A new artificially intelligent robot is being used to teach school children in India, as reported is this story by New Indian Express. An excerpt from coverage in Interesting Engineering that follows provides optimistically framed context. The Times of India has a three minute video report (also available on YouTube). For a first-person report from the robot’s creator (and more pictures), see a story in Rediff.com (an excerpt about the origins of the robot’s name and responses to ‘her’ debut is also below). For more on the mentioned AI teacher Beatrice, see a story in Campus Technology. All of this…

[As this story from the University of Pittsburgh reports, Pharmacy students there are using an expanding variety of presence-evoking technologies to enhance learning, and a new dedicated Lab will open there this fall. In addition to the Anatomage Table pictured below, two images in the original version of the story feature the HoloLens 2 AR. –Matthew] [Image: James Coons watches his student explore life-sized cardiac and circulatory anatomy on an Anatomage Table. Credit: Lawrence Kobulinsky] Transforming Learning at Pitt Pharmacy with Augmented and Virtual Reality By Phoebe Ingraham Renda March 6, 2024 From Oculus gaming systems to Apple’s Vision Pro,…

[This essay from Medium makes the case for when designers should, and should not, give AI-powered digital humans the characteristics that will evoke medium-as-social-actor presence. See the original version for a second image. –Matthew] [Image: UneeQ’s Sophie is a flesh-and-bones digital human. Credit/Source: Digital Humans] Digital humans: Do we really need this? Anthropomorphic AI assistants promise the best interaction experience. But only because it’s technically possible to create digital humans and make them work online 24/7 doesn’t mean we should. By Ilja Naumenko, UX Collective April 2, 2024 The promise of human-like interaction with computers We need to admit that…

[This story from NorthJersey.com describes how a New Jersey school is using virtual reality and presence to prepare students with autism for the stress of preparing for a flight at an airport. See the original version for a 16-image photo gallery. –Matthew] [Image: Mar 27, 2024; Nutley, N.J., United States; The Phoenix Center is using VR to desensitize kids on the autism spectrum before they travel for spring break. Kaito M. uses the VR headset to simulate an experience at the airport. Credit: Anne-Marie Caruso-NorthJersey.com] How NJ school uses virtual reality to help kids with autism prepare for airport stress…

[This EurekAlert! press release from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale De Lausanne or EPFL) describes new research that explores an intriguing type of presence illusion (or hallucination). In this illusion, which occurs outside the context of media use, the person perceives another human or other social entity who is not actually there (this has been labelled “para-presence”). The researchers found support for the idea that the illusion is connected to the common tendency to “overcount potentially harmful agents and predators.” Because heightened experience of the illusion is a marker for Parkinson’s disease, the researchers developed a…

[This link-filled essay from CNN argues that a series of recent technological advancements make it more likely that we’re living in a “computer generated” reality, the ultimate collective presence illusion. Whether we are or not, the increasingly common notion suggests the importance of, and concern about, simulations and deception in our society. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Warner Bros./Village Roadshow Pictures/Groucho Film Partnership] Opinion: 25 years later, ‘The Matrix’ is less sci-fi than tech reality By Rizwan Virk, who founded Play Labs @ MIT and is the author of ”The Simulation Hypothesis: An MIT Computer Scientist Shows Why AI, Quantum Physics and…

[The original version of this story from the U.S. Argonne National Laboratory about a new, sophisticated teleoperation system developed for the remote clean-up of hazardous materials highlights the importance of presence with a prominent repetition of this quote from later in the text: “Our first aim in telerobotic system design is to facilitate a ‘telepresence,’ to make the operator feel as though they are present within the hot cell, able to manipulate the objects with both hands, and to experience multimodal sensory feedback in a direct, natural way.” – Young Soo Park, leader, Argonne’s Robotics and Remote Systems Program in…

[According to this story from The Guardian, a new 40-minute virtual reality experience at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris was meticulously researched and designed to take visitors back to the time and place of the birth of Impressionist art. See the original version of the story for a second image. –Matthew] [Image: Visitors take part in a virtual reality experience at the exhibition Paris 1874 Inventing Impressionism at the Musée d’Orsay. Credit: Miguel Medina/AFP/Getty Images] Historic meeting of French impressionists recreated in Paris exhibition Immersive tour at Musée d’Orsay takes visitors back to 15 April 1874 – the moment that…

[This story from the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney describes the origins and positive impacts of a presence-evoking artificially intelligent companion for people with dementia. See the original version for a second image; for more information, listen to and/or read the transcript of a 6:41 minute audio report from SBS News. –Matthew] [Image: Viv – an AI character who embodies a range of symptoms and experiences associated with dementia – is based on a ground-breaking collaboration between artists and psychologists. She is pictured here with Professor Jill Bennett and Dr Gail Kenning of the fEEL ARC Laureate Lab…

[Here’s an entertaining ‘review’ of the fictional presence-evoking technology in a new Netflix adaptation of the Liu Cixin science fiction trilogy 3 Body Problem. It’s from The Verge, where the original includes a short trailer (also available on YouTube). You can find critic and audience reviews here. –Matthew] 3 Body Problem VR headset review: Magical tech in need of more apps The device is far more advanced than an Apple Vision Pro, but it needs more than one game to justify the purchase (once you can actually purchase one, that is). By Andrew Webster March 23, 2024 Arthur C.…

[As Phillyvoice, reports, Netflix is planning to open large brick-and-mortar venues that combine permanent immersive experiences based on its film and television properties with dining, retail and other activities. The first tentative announced location is in the King of Prussia mall in Philadelphia (the third largest mall in the U.S.). The Bloomberg story linked in this report is behind a paywall, but Smithsonian Magazine has similar details and includes this: “We’ve seen how much fans love to immerse themselves in the world of our movies and TV shows, and we’ve been thinking a lot about how we take that to…