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  • The Immersive Wire - 14 August 2022 (Sunday edition)

The Immersive Wire - 14 August 2022 (Sunday edition)

The Immersive Wire - 14 August 2022 (Sunday edition)

August 14, 2022

14 August 2022 //

by Tom Ffiske

Metaverse and VR/AR analysis every Wednesday and Sunday

Now in Greece, reading and relaxing. Also transitioned from reading Mistborn to Shadows of the Gods - a fantasy series based in the frozen and frigid fjords, and a major difference from sunny Kalymnos. See you all soon! Also, I will be at SXSW if you wish to vote on

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🌴 Time for a holiday: The Immersive Wire will be on a break, until 31 August. I'll still be active on

and

, so feel free to say hi! In the meantime, time to rest up â›±

TOP STORYGetting some perspective 

A summer break is a great time to relax and take stock of everything. With all the running and writing, it gets difficult to take a step back and scope out the land. What genuinely matters when it comes to reporting on the metaverse and immersive technologies? Where should the focus lie, and how can I help to bring people together? 2022 has already been a wild year, from launching a book in February to speaking at a few events. Throughout the journey, I have met some excellent people, and now I have an itch to bring people together more. The launch of The Metaverse: A Professional Guide and The Marketer's Guide to the Metaverse made me think that there is a lot of potential in bringing great people together, and its something I wish to look into for the second half of the year. My 'last' piece is a Drum article that looks at Chief Metaverse Officers - more on this soon. 

If you have your own thoughts on how to improve the newsletter, feel free to pop me an email - and otherwise, I will be loitering on Twitter and LinkedIn (links in the yellow box above). See you all soon!Anyway, here are a series of stories that are worth highlighting: 

  • Blippar has made its no-code AR creation platform, Blippbuilder, free for use.

  • DVRSTY is hosting open office hours on 31 August to connect diverse women founders in Europe to investors. 

    • This is a fantastic initiative. Even if this does not apply to you, please consider sharing it with someone who may benefit. 

  • FitXR announced its new mobile companion app, which will allow users to peruse FitXR’s classes before loading their headset.

  • FundamentalVR raised $20m in funding.

  • Japan is 'digitising' Tokyo and the International Space station for the sake of tourism. 

  • Lenovo teased its Legion VR700 headset, using Qualcomm specs.

  • Meta showed off its 'Starburst' prototype. 

  • Project Dastaan provided a VR experience where Partition survivors can cross the India-Pakistan border 

  • PwC and Igloo Vision are hosting an event about the metaverse, both inside and outside headsets. 

  • VictoryXR announced that it has released The King’s Labyrinth for free on Meta’s App Labs, for use on the Quest 2 headset. 

How do you normally treat holidays? Join the discussion and meet like-minded professionals on the

The Economist's Metaverse Summit 2022 will help senior leaders define and build mixed-reality experiences that will add economic and social value. The event will take place on October 26-27th, consisting of an in-person experience on October 26th in San Jose and one day in the metaverse on October 27th. Be in the room where enterprises will build a better Web3 future and understand where the metaverse meets NFTs, gaming, crypto and blockchain to create value.  Register free here

Q&AArt and XR

Chloe Alexandra Thompson and Matthew Edwards, House of Moiré 

What is your background?Chloe Alexandra Thompson: I am an artist working primarily with sound; have shown sculpture and performance works in the past; worked as a Curator - as well as a Director of IT; and have produced poetry.Matthew Edwards: I am an artist working primarily with 3D visuals, but have a background as a performing musician and installation artist.What are you working on, and what’s a key learning that you’ve had from it? Chloe Alexandra Thompson: I have been working on House of Moiré, a VR project with Matthew Edwards for MUTEK’s inaugural Immersive Collection over the past year, as well as a new series of spatialized performance, and a few other projects. I have learned so much from working with Matt and MUTEK around this piece, and have felt so activated through working with the expanse (as well as restraints) of this technology. It’s a very intimate experience to build something for one person to experience at a time.Matthew Edwards: Working on House of Moiré alongside Chloe has taught me that the depth and complexity of an immersive artwork is often the result of a longform, iterative process.If you had to give one piece of advice, what would you give? Chloe Alexandra Thompson: To work with any emerging technologies, one needs to practice persistence. Sometimes things seem frustrating, even impossible, but there is always an ability to change the approach to get closer to the results being sought. If you self-educate, ask questions and continue on, the answer will come / the next step will become obvious (eventually!).Matthew Edwards: Artists and experience creators who wish to publish to any of the major platforms such as Steam or Meta’s store should factor in significant time toward optimization and meeting requirements of the online marketplaces. It can be a lot for individuals and small teams. We were very fortunate to have MUTEK’s support throughout the process.   If you want to learn more, check out the 

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That's all for this week! Want to have a chat, let me know about a news story, or talk business? Either reply to this email, or contact tom (at) immersivewire (dot) com. Have an excellent day!