[In this interview from News Medical, a pediatric surgeon describes new research that demonstrates the effectiveness of a social companion telepresence robot for providing emotional support to young patients. See the original version for two more images and a 2:35 minute video; for more information see the links at the end of the story below. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: UCLA Health] Improving children’s hospital experiences using a social robot Dr. Justin Wagner, Pediatric Surgeon, UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital Interview conducted by Emily Henderson, B.Sc. October 20, 2021 In this interview, News-Medical speaks to Dr. Justin Wagner about Robin, the social companion…

[Here’s a short first-person report from Inc. in which an experienced public speaker describes their first experience (including elements of presence) giving a keynote talk in virtual reality. –Matthew] I Gave a Keynote in Virtual Reality. Here’s What I Learned Live, onstage is the best, but this is better than a regular videoconference. For sure. By Suzanne Lucas, Freelance Writer October 25, 2021 Public speaking is my favorite part of my job, and the pandemic basically destroyed that, so when JobCon 2021 asked me to keynote its virtual event, I jumped at the chance. I figured it would be via…

[The New York Times Magazine interviewed seven people involved in different aspects of remote teaching during the pandemic. Many of them note the drawbacks of not being with students in person, but indirectly suggesting the power (and risks) of presence, the second person featured in the story describes how she was able to teach her young students about literature via Zoom by sharing with them the “rawness and vulnerability” of a very difficult personal experience in a way that wouldn’t have otherwise been possible.  –Matthew] [Image: Illustration by Sam Kerr] 7 True Stories From Virtual School Teachers, administrators and service providers…

[Based on this Los Angeles Times story the Velaslavasay Panorama has expanded and prospered since a July 2015 ISPR Presence News post during the 10th anniversary of the “strange and immersive” attraction, when the artic painting “Effulgence of the North” was on display. I hope to have the presence experiences it offers on my first post-pandemic trip home to L.A. this January. See the original version of the story below for seven more images. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Madeleine Hordinski / Los Angeles Times] Exploring weird L.A.: The strange, immersive art of the Velaslavasay Panorama By Deborah Netburn October 4, 2021…

[In this Wired story Lucy Sparrow, a PhD student in Computing and Information Systems at the University of Melbourne, Australia, suggests ways to use policies, practices and design techniques from gaming and the real (nonmediated) world to help make social interactions and experiences in virtual reality and other virtual environments more safe and accessible for everyone. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Photo-Illustration by Sam Whitney; Getty Images] How to Govern the Metaverse To build healthy communities in virtual reality, we must move beyond automated penalties toward proactive forms of governance. Games can show us how. By Lucy Sparrow October 19.2021 IT WAS…

[This short piece from Axios suggests that the pandemic motivated many media companies to offer new technology features designed to add a social component (and implicitly social presence) to what previously had been isolated media experiences, and that these changes are becoming permanent. –Matthew] [Image: Credit: Sarah Grillo/Axios] The living room is now a virtual hub By Sara Fischer, author of Media Trends October 18, 2021 Internet companies are leaning into new services that add a social component to the otherwise isolated experience of staying home in front of a screen. Why it matters: These options for virtual watch parties,…

[Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, or EPFL, reports on a new way for experts and the public to experience the known universe; see the original story (or a long read version) for videos and many more images. Coverage by the AP via the Chicago Sun-Times adds these details: “Imagine it as a sort of Google Earth — only for the entire universe. […] Strap on the VR goggles, and it’s a trippy feeling seeing the Moon — seemingly the size of a giant beach ball and floating close enough to hold — as the horizon rotates from the sunny side to…

[This detailed story from VentureBeat describes a new Facebook-led project with the potential to increase a wide variety of presence experiences; see the original story for four more images and a 5:26 minute video (also available via YouTube). –Matthew] Facebook introduces dataset and benchmarks to make AI more ‘egocentric’ By Kyle Wiggers October 14, 2021 Facebook today announced Ego4D, a long-term project aimed at solving AI research challenges in “egocentric perception,” or first-person views. The goal is to teach AI systems to comprehend and interact with the world like humans do as opposed to in the third-person, omniscient way that…

[Drawing on a longer July 2021 article in The New York Times, this story from DIYPhotography describes a popular location in rural China that recreates a “bygone gentle village atmosphere” that only some of its visitors realize is staged. The author notes that the main issue is transparency – “If I go to a place and take photographs I want to know that what I’m witnessing is either real or staged” – but that “Perhaps we are all guilty of this to a degree, nothing is as it seems, and we are all perhaps a little too intent on capturing the…

[This very short DesignTAXI story describes a prototype controller designed to enhance presence (note the last sentence). The original includes more images and a three-minute Microsoft Research video (also available via YouTube) and for more information see the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST) 2021 paper and 7:51 minute video presentation. –Matthew] Microsoft Showcases VR Controller That Adapts To Let You ‘Touch’ Items In Games By Ell Ko 13 October 2021 Microsoft Research has just developed an innovative new virtual reality (VR) controller that changes shape according to how it’s being held and used. Described as a…

[We’ve posted many stories over the years about attempts to add the sense of smell to mediated experiences and enhance presence. Although lacking some important details about how the technology works, Hypnos Virtual describes an ambitious and intriguing “scentscape” (similar to a soundscape) that would accompany a variety of mediated and nonmediated experiences. The description here is from CE Pro magazine and for more information including images, videos and charts, see a press release via PR Newswire, the company’s website (particularly the “learn more” page) and its Wefunder investment offering. –Matthew] Hypnos Virtual Looks to Infuse VR Experience with Personalized…

[Even without the introduction, this story from Slate is a long read, but it’s on the timely and under-reported topic of presence and children and includes extensive links to other stories and resources as well as interesting anecdotes and insightful quotes from experts. See the original story for the unabridged version. –Matthew] If Social Media Can Be Unsafe for Kids, What Happens in VR? Mark Zuckerberg recently predicted that Facebook will be a “metaverse company” in five years. What does that mean for kids? By Catherine Buni October 11, 2021 [snip] While it’s unclear whether Zuckerberg’s five-year metaverse prediction will…