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December 23, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig

There’s no shortage of quality XR news this week. Which is good, because ARExperience is taking a break for the holidays next week. So, soak in all of this week’s quality content, and we’ll see you in 2022.

  • The XR Research Awards announced that they have received an “incredibly overwhelming” eighty-nine proposals but that they expect to announce winners within the week. The organization provides funding and support to researchers studying the intersection of XR and human behavior.
  • FIFA began testing “Video Assistant Referees” or “VAR.” The software tracks players on the field and uses augmented reality to help referees make more accurate calls on the field. A similar system is used in sports to illustrate calls that have already been made, but using the system to make the initial call is a new move.
  • The AltspaceVR comedy show Failed to Render announced a special holiday show featuring Israel Garcia and Al Gonzales as well as host Kyle Render. The show, “Polar Wonderland” is taking place live in AltspaceVR from 10 p.m.EST to midnight on Christmas night.
VR Platform Rec Room closed a $145 million funding round. (Rec Room)
VR Platform Rec Room closed a $145 million funding round. (Rec Room)
  • Video calling app Rakuten Viber has released analysis of the use of their AR lens feature since it was launched in partnership with Snap earlier this year. The analysis consists of information amalgamated from the 7.3M users that have experimented with lenses since June. Among the findings:

    • Women are more likely to use AR, making up 56% of Lens users despite being only 46% of Viber users. Female users were also slightly more likely to capture and send media within the app than male users.

    • While app use generally, and AR use in particular, will often be associated with younger users, the demographics using Viber AR effects turn this on its head with the largest number of users being 30-40 (23%) followed by 40-60 (18%) followed by the under-17 crowd (13%).

The major takeaway this week is that almost all of the news is strictly based around social experiences. No big hardware, no pure tech plays. Snap, Rakuten Viber, Rec Room, Meta, AltspaceVR, all social apps doing what they do best.

That’s not to overlook the first two articles on our list this week. Both of these points highlight how XR is working its way into age-old institutions like sports and education. We tend to look at XR as something entirely new. In many ways it is, but in most ways it is only empowering us to do the things that already make us human.

December 23, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig There’s no shortage of quality XR news this week. Which is good, because ARExperience is taking a break for the holidays next week. So, soak in all of this week’s quality content, and we’ll see you in 2022. The XR Research Awards announced that they have received an “incredibly overwhelming” eighty-nine proposals but that they expect

December 16, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig MyWebAR has added a Ready Player Me plugin allowing users to incorporate their own personalized 3D characters into their free, no-code AR experience. Ready Player Me also has its own news: the cross-platform avatar creation tool rolled out some fun and festive holiday clothing items for all of your virtual humans. Speaking of virtual humans, ICONIQ is

December 9, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig Nreal Light consumer AR glasses began selling online through Verizon and in select Verizon retail locations throughout the United States last week and subsequently sold out within days. While U.S. consumers cannot currently find Nreal through Verizon, they can still place orders through the Nreal website, linked above. VR development studio Gleechi announced the release of

December 2, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig Epic Games has acquired Rockband maker Harmonix. Epic is widely hailed as a leading metaverse company despite limited XR offerings – an area in which Harmonix is more accomplished. Yet to come into play: Epic CEO Tim Sweeney’s stated but as-yet stagnant interest in blockchain-based games. In other blockchain gaming news, Jadu has announced Hoverboards going

November 24, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig Reality Labs, the XR research branch within Welcome to Meta | Meta (facebook.com), released a report on some of their research into advanced haptic wearables. Following the report, HaptX founder and CEO Jake Rubin posted an open letter asserting that “the core components of this prototype … appear to be substantively identical to HaptX’s patented technology.”

November 18, 2021 by Jon Jaehnig XR expert and promotor Stephen Black is trying to bring Bubiko Foodtour to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade through augmented reality. Bubiko Foodtour is an AR character used in Black’s educational content often focusing around cultural foods from around the world. You can learn more about Black’s project and support it here. Full Sail University announced