[One of these days I need to visit Philadelphia’s City Hall to experience the spatial and social presence provided by the Portal installation that connects people in different cities; this story from The Philadelphia Inquirer via MSN describes a novel use of multiple Portals for real-time international chess matches. See the original stories for four more images and see the Portals website for much more information. By the way, a February 2025 episode of the television series Elsbeth featured a fictional version of the Portal – see Screen Rant for details. –Matthew] [Image: The Vlaming and Van Voorn families stop…

[This abridged version of a thoughtful and thought-provoking essay in the New Yorker considers both the important benefits and potential dangers of using artificial intelligence-based chatbots, and the medium-as-social-actor presence they evoke, to counteract loneliness. –Matthew] [Image: Illustration by Lourenço Providencia] A.I. Is About to Solve Loneliness. That’s a Problem The discomfort of loneliness shapes us in ways we don’t recognize—and we may not like what we become without it. By Paul BloomJuly 14, 2025 These days, everyone seems to have an opinion about A.I. companions. Last year, I found myself joining the debate, publishing a paper—co-written with two fellow…

[This short BBC News story captures some of the both positive and negative consequences of the rapidly improving ability of artificial intelligence to mimic humans and thereby evoke medium-as-social-actor presence. Efforts to train voice-based AI on more complete and representative voice samples for dialects spoken by people in particular regions and cultures can lead to more effective human-machine communication and a greater sense of inclusion and recognition for the users, along with the preservation of endangered languages. On the other hand, using AI to remove specific accents can prevent “accent discrimination” but further threaten the survival of regional dialects. And…

[Most people dislike advertisements (e.g., see results from a 2023 UK survey) and many of us try to avoid encountering them, especially as they’ve become more common and arguably intrusive and thus more likely to ‘break’ presence during our media experiences. Although there are still limited options for linear TV, streaming, games and virtual reality, we can use widely available free ad blocker software for the web, or we can pay to avoid ads. But as Interesting Engineering notes, “You can pay for YouTube Premium to avoid watching ads during your sacred food-with-YouTube ritual, or pay for Spotify to not…

[As described in this story from The Debrief, researchers have developed a new type of skin for robots that has strong potential to enhance human-robot interactions, including (though it doesn’t use the term), medium-as-social-actor presence. Although this story doesn’t mention it, the researchers are from both Cambridge University and University College London (UCL’s news coverage is titled, “Improved electronic skin gives robots the human touch”). For more information, see coverage in Live Science as well as a webpage on lead author David Hardman’s website that has additional links, including to a 2:27 minute video on YouTube. –Matthew] Robots that “Feel”:…

[It’s early days, but this story from Government Technology describes a potentially life-saving approach to training firefighters and other disaster first responders using presence-evoking augmented reality and artificial intelligence. See the original version of the story (or YouTube) for the mentioned 4:16 minute video. –Matthew] [Image: A man practices extinguishing a fire through AI-augmented training. Credit: George Mason University] Could Augmented Reality Paired With AI Save First Responder Lives? Training poses deadly risks for firefighters. Researchers are experimenting with new augmented and virtual reality technologies to allow first responders to learn life-saving skills without risking their own. By Nikki DavidsonJuly…

[CNN provides this cautiously optimistic link-filled assessment about the long-expected mainstreaming of presence-evoking virtual, augmented and mixed reality technologies for entertainment. See the original version of this story for four more images. –Matthew] [Image: A woman plays a video game with the Oculus Rift VR headset at a video arcade dedicated to virtual reality in Paris, France on December 5, 2016. Credit: Benoit Tessier/Reuters] Tech promised virtual reality would revolutionize entertainment. That moment might finally be closer than we think. By Liam Reilly, CNNJuly 12, 2025 Virtual reality was supposed to transform entertainment. At least, that was the expectation roughly…

[This story from Virginia Tech describes how a professor teaching a computer science course there is using a Global Learning Course Grant to take her students to Egyptian (and soon other) heritage sites via virtual reality and then build databases for real-world clients to use as they work to preserve endangered monuments at those sites. See the original version of the story for six more images and the five mentioned videos. –Matthew] [Image: Students in Sally Hamouda’s database course were able to “tour” endangered Egyptian monuments from their Blacksburg classroom by using virtual reality headsets, purchased through a Global Education…

[This short press release from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Germany (also available via EurekAlert!) provides an update on work exploring the potential positive impacts of using media technologies to evoke a sense of being present in natural settings, in this case a forest. See ISPR Presence News posts from June 2023 and April 2020 for more on this topic. –Matthew] Virtual forest bathing alleviates stress Multisensory vs. unisensory nature experiences in Virtual Reality increase sense of wellbeing and connectedness to nature July 2, 2025 A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development…

[In this blog post by from Telehealth.org, a psychologist describes her experience using – and useful insights about when and how to use- shared and playful immersive experiences to enhance family therapy. See the original version for a second image. –Matthew] How VR Games Help Heal Family Dysfunction By Jessica Stone, Ph.D., RPT-S [Bio at end below]July 7, 2025 There’s shouting, laughter, strategy, and the occasional squeal of triumph. “I’ve got the acorn – block me!” one yells, while another calls out, “Distract the tree!” The tree–often me, the therapist–is swinging wildly, trying to block the squirrels as they work…

[Interesting Engineering carried this story about a new development in teleoperation, the use of a humanoid robot to cook food from over a thousand miles away. The story is followed by additional details from coverage by Tech In Asia. The Interesting Engineering story includes a 1:54 minute video about the robot but neither source features or links to the full version of the recent demonstration video directly; instead, you can see parts of the demonstration in videos on YouTube from PEARL (also known as Cultural Lingnan) and South Korea’s ETNews (Electronic Times News), and there are many more related videos…

[The author of this breezy first-person report from What Hi-Fi? describes some of the unfortunate factors that increasingly prevent or break presence-experiences in physical movie theaters and then some of the logistical and presence-related benefits of watching films instead in a virtual cinema via the popular Meta Quest VR headset. See the original version of the report for two more images and two videos. See the app website for more on the Skybox VR Player. –Matthew] [Image: Gloriously empty, I have this entire (virtual) cinema all to myself. Credit: Future] I watched Dune: Part Two in a virtual reality cinema,…