Daily Archives: May 20, 2017

CNBC

Why Virtual Reality Will Never Be a Mainstream Entertainment Platform Variety Virtual reality makes for a fantastic demo, and it's become an au courant accoutrement at film fests. At the Cannes Film Festival this week, Alejandro G. Irritu is showing his VR documentary on illegal immigration. The director said virtual-reality ... Google's virtual reality chief Clay Bavor explains why 'comfort is so important in VR'CNBC Virtual Reality Has Yet To Make A Big ImpressionManufacturing Business Technology all 5 news articles »

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Why Virtual Reality Will Never Be a Mainstream Entertainment Platform - Variety

Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred on Thursday announced the leagues premier live-game streaming app MLB At Bat will launch a virtual reality experience for watching games.

The new app, MLB At Bat VR, will be available for download on June 1 for any device that supports Googles Daydream VR.

Also read: Facebook, MLB strike deal to stream 20 Friday-night baseball games

The experience doesnt transport viewers to the field for a live view of a game from behind second base. Instead the main screen shows the live game stream, just like youd see on TV, with either the home or away team feed. But the app makes its mark with the up-to-date stats and data it uses to fill the side panels and a strike zone box that pulls in data from each pitch and at bat.

The app was built by the gaming and VR team at MLB Advanced Media. MLBAM is the MLBs interactive media and internet company from which video streaming business BAMTech was spun off. BAMTech helped build Time Warner Inc.s TWX, +0.64% HBO Now streaming platform and is currently working on one for Walt Disney Co.s DIS, +0.79% ESPN.

Virtual reality has been heralded for years as the technology of the future for how people will consume and engage with entertainment content. The majority of virtual reality experiences to date have been for gaming, though, there are some applications used in film and TV.

In March, market research firm International Data Corporation said the global market for virtual and augmented reality headsets is expected to grow nearly 10-fold, to 99.4 million units shipped through 2021. Thats compared with 10.1 million headsets shipped in 2016.

Check out: Warner Bros., IMAX to create virtual reality experience for Justice League, Aquaman

Also see: Mark Zuckerberg sees augmented reality shaping Facebooks future

The MLB VR app itself is free and that alone will give users basic features like stats and scoreboards. A $3 a month At Bat premium membership offers full features, like highlights and 360 video, and the MLB game of the day. MLB TV premium members get everything plus a live stream for every game for $25 a month.

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Major League Baseball to launch virtual reality viewing experience - MarketWatch

For all of the overwrought promises about the futuristic technology connecting people, it's a pretty isolating experience. The hardware shuts out any view or sound of people physically near you, not many people own headsets yet, and interactions inside virtual settings are still limited.

Google (GOOG) is working on new features that could fix some of that. Unfortunately, it might involve hanging out in the VR version of a YouTube comments section.

The company announced the next steps for its virtual and augmented reality technology on Thursday at its annual I/O developers conference in Mountain View, California.

Google is releasing a major update to its virtual reality platform, Daydream. It's the software that will run on its own Daydream View goggles as well as the standalone headsets that third parties like Lenovo are creating later this year. Google also makes the Daydream View, a low-tech VR headset that uses a smartphone.

Related: Google is still trying to kill the Echo and Siri

In the new version of Daydream, called Euphrates, you can broadcast what you see in virtual reality to a regular TV over a Chromecast. That way any friends or family members hanging out in your home can see what you see. The popularity of services like Twitch, which live streams other people playing video games, has shown there's a demand for this type of sharing.

If no one's nearby, you can take a screenshot or record a video of what you see, like a level of a VR game. Post them on social media or share directly over text or email.

If you've alienated all your local friends by making them watch you play video games, there's a new option for hanging out with other VR users. YouTube is working on an update to its VR app that will let people watch the same videos together in virtual "shared rooms."

The feature will allow a limited number of people to view the same 360-degree videos simultaneously while speaking to each other over voice chat. You can also see what videos other people are watching and jump in. The rooms are public, so your customizable avatar is interacting with everyone else using the YouTube VR app. That makes it more like a spoken, virtual version of a YouTube comments section than a closed social app like Facebook's (FB, Tech30) Spaces. Google does plan to include safety features such as the ability to leave a group or block someone at anytime.

Google is also bringing other staples of the old fashioned 2D internet into VR. It's adding support for its Chrome web browser, so you can browse websites.

All the new features are coming later this year.

CNNMoney (San Francisco) First published May 18, 2017: 5:20 PM ET

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Can Google make virtual reality less lonely? - CNNMoney

Mashable

Virtual reality helps people empathize with women visiting Planned Parenthood Mashable That's why the nonprofit organization whose clinics see their share of anti-abortion rights protesters created a virtual reality film called Across the Line last year to simulate a trip to a women's health clinic punctuated by painful encounters ... Planned Parenthood to close four Iowa clinics after legislative defundingDesMoinesRegister.com all 160 news articles »

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Virtual reality helps people empathize with women visiting Planned Parenthood - Mashable

Escaping your everyday life to indulge in a little virtual reality romp is not so different from cheating on your partner, scientists have warned

IT may seem like youre spicing up your sex life when you strap on that virtual reality helmet to watch porn but its probably doing more harm than good.

Escaping your everyday life to indulge in a casual virtual romp is not so different from cheating on your partner, scientists have warned.

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They are also more likely to play outhighly explicit and violent fantasies because there are no consequences in the virtual reality (VR) world.

Experts are warning that this behaviour has the potential to become addictive and more extreme over time damaging relationships in the real world.

Dr Madeline Balaam, of Newcastle Universitys school of computing science, said: As a society we are always looking for new and novel experiences but the porn industry brings with it an added risk because of its sexist stance and exploitation of women.

We are already obsessed with body image and the digital industry is no different, creating the perfect virtual woman from Lara Croft to sex-robots. VR porn has the potential to escalate this.

Our research highlighted not only a drive for perfection, but also a crossover between reality and fantasy.

Some of our findings highlighted the potential for creating 3D models of real life people, raising questions over what consent means in VR experiences.

If a user created a VR version of their real life girlfriend, for example, would they do things to her that they knew she would refuse in the real world?

The moveto internet pornography from books and magazines has largely been associated with more explicit and perverse sexual content, particularly with more violent behaviour, the researchers said.

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They observed the behaviour of 45 participants using virtual reality porn to complete a characters story.

Some participants completed the perfect sexual experience that was as close to the real thing as they could get, but others went beyond what was acceptable in real life and even forced themselves upon women.

Lead author, Matthew Wood, said: But what VR offers for the first time is the opportunity to move from being simply an observer to being a participant and this changes the experience massively.

One of our findings suggested VR pornography could be something more like cheating on a partner because of the increasing reality of the VR experience.

We found that for most people the potential of a VR porn experience opened the doors to an apparently perfect sexual experience a scenario which in the real world no-one could live up to.

For others it meant pushing the boundaries, often with highly explicit and violent imagery, and we know from current research into pornography that exposure to this content has the potential to become addictive and more extreme over time.

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Dr Balaam warned that with the rise of social media life-like 3D images of a person created in VR porn could be used in revenge porn in the future.

She said: Pornography has been with us forever and is not going to go away.

But maybe virtual reality gives us the opportunity to influence pornography and introduce some new rules.

Imagine a scenario, for example where a male participant is made to assume the female role in the virtual game.

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Virtual reality porn is so realistic is makes people think it's okay to ... - The Sun

Researchers discover 'virtual reality porn' can improve couple's real life sex.

But they are warning about the dangers of 'virtual reality porn'....where some users think sex via a head set is 'better than the real thing'.

The latest technology allows gamers to become an active part of 'new' experiences through sex games on screen.

A research team from Newcastle University found the growing popularity of VR technologies opening up a whole new market in pornography.

Dr Madeline Balaam, co-author of the research, used 45 volunteers, 14 men, 18 women and three described as 'other', to find out how VR porn could be used.

She said: "I think it is a more first person rather than a third person experience. The sensory experience through this technology means you think you are playing a role in it, rather than watching it.

"I think people were writing these accounts, to attune technology to create their fictional desires, so the character looks exactly what you want them to look like and does exactly what you want them to do. It is the ultimate for users in that sense."

She added: "Some wrote stories about being caught using VR in their own lives. But instead of getting angry, their partner agreed to explore sexual fantasies played out on screen.

"Then they had an amazing sex life together. So this technology could also be used to improve your sex life."

Dangers include more violent fantasies, however, and using photos of a partner - or even a stranger - to create characters involved in VR sex on screen.

By the 19 th century, pornography was in books and art, before postcards introduced it to the masses.

Now, with 3D cameras, photos of real people may be used for on line sex games, rather than avatars, including nude photos of partners past or present, which is one of the risks posed by the use of new media.

Dr Balaam added: "We are already obsessed with body image and the digital industry is no different, creating the perfect virtual woman from Lara Croft to sex-robots. VR porn has the potential to escalate this.

"Our research highlighted not only a drive for perfection, but also a crossover between reality and fantasy. Some of our findings highlighted the potential for creating 3D models of real life people, raising questions over what consent means in VR experiences.

"If a user created a VR version of their real life girlfriend, for example, would they do things to her that they knew she would refuse in the real world?"

Researcher Matthew Wood told how VR offers the opportunity to move from being 'simply an observer to being a participant' for the first time.

"This changes the experience massively," he added. "Our findings suggest VR porn could be more like cheating on a partner because of the increasing reality of the VR experience.

"We found that for most people the potential of a VR porn experience opened the doors to an apparently perfect sexual experience - a scenario which in the real world no-one could live up to.

"For others it meant pushing boundaries, often with highly explicit imagery, and we know exposure to this can become addictive and more extreme over time."

Through headsets such as the Facebook owned Oculus Rift, the 'Playstation' style sex games are growing in use, and it could be seen in 'revenge porn' in future, according to the research.

It was presented at Computer Human Interaction conference last week.

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Researchers discover 'virtual reality porn' can improve couple's real life sex - Mirror.co.uk

While America broke, Donald Gloverthrived. His long-awaited sitcomAtlantawas an exalted take on the surrealism of blackness, he introduced Bad and Boujee to the Golden Globe bourgeoisie,Awaken, My Love!was a P-funk romp too charismatic to be written off as a derivative, and Redbone is still on the Hot 100. Hes been on a creative streak that encompasses multiple mediums, and sometimes, the ideas bled into each other.

Hence the virtual reality vinyl.On November 30, the Childish Gambino website revealedAwaken, My Love!would be available in that format, whatever it meant.The concept was about as wild as an invisible car, exceptit actually cost money. The normally articulate Childish Gambino fell into vaguedescriptors when he tried to explain what exactly $59.99 would get you. Its a vinyl that you play with virtual reality, he said. Do you get abducted into the vinyl grooves and take part in some hornyJumanji? Does a life-sized hologram of Black Justin Bieber spring up from the vinyl player as a bonus?

It turns out we didnt need to stretch our imaginations because a virtual reality vinyl is a bit of a misnomer. Its a cardboard pair of virtual reality glasses that work in conjunction with the PHAROS app; you get a vinyl disc, too.Awaken, My Love!s vinyledition finally drops today, and last night, Rough Trade NYC hosted brief previews for press and the general public. Inside the record store, general admission fans lined up in front of a vinyl display that included Neil Young, Bob Dylan, and the general pantheon of classic rock musicians that makewhite men in uncombedbeards smileand silently mutter, Mmm, thats good shit. (The attending fans were mostly college age, however.) While the past was put on sale, the futuristic VR experience was held in the windowed room on Rough Trades second floor.

The future, it turns out, comprises late-90s video gamegraphics and tribal creatures. When I walked in, the room already had one brother, seated and strapped into some black and shiny VR goggles. He was smiling as he watched, so I assumed it was good. Immediately, I was greeted by a pleasant Brit working the event. After asking me cursory questions about the night (Have you heard of the performance?), I sat down and wassoon within the Gambino experience.Scored by Gambinos PHAROS performance, the VR places you in a haunted ecosphere where the jungle leaves are colored in every tropical shade but green. Animated skeletons gathered in a kumbaya, kneeling and lounging in afterlifejoy.Gambino appeared as an apparition, boyishly singing the album closer Stand Tall.

The darkness that appeared as a subtle undertone on the album threwitself to the forefront; the results were jarring enough to elicit anxiety. At one point, a ghoul that looked like a deformed Grim Fandango suddenly appeareduncomfortablyclose to my periphery. I wanted to punch it, but because virtual reality exists beyond the reach of my fists, I wouldve ended up hitting a Glassnote Records representative. For the 10 seconds faux Fandango floated before me, I sat frightened and helpless.

The phantasmagoric imagery didnt really augmentAwaken, My Love!likean immersive experience ought to. Even within the 3D jungle nocturne, I was aware California sucked. And to that point, the VR reality experience is fine because the album is fine. But the inclusion of VR rarely seems to be as forward-thinking as their users purport; it largely seems like a perfunctory use of newfound resources.Dawn Richard dropped her interactive video for Lazarus and Love Under Lights last week, and I mainly remember being in a bad way for the rest of the daynot because the video blew me away, but because it caused my Mac to glitch out. People have this tendency to view the future as this self-fulfilling prophecy waiting to manifest. Its not; its simply a new thing to do.The college kids are here for now, but eventually theyll figure it out.

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We Finally Figured Out What Childish Gambino's "Virtual Reality Vinyl" Is All About - SPIN