Free Republic

Trees are believed to have originated hundreds of millions of years ago. Ever since, evidence of these ancient plant sentinels has been in short supply. Now, a new discovery of uniquely 3D tree fossils has opened a window into what the world was like when the planet’s early forests were beginning to evolve, expanding our understanding of the architecture of trees throughout Earth’s history.

You probably don’t remember the Humane Pin, despite its dominating the tech-news cycle a few months ago. It’s an elegant AI-powered square that sticks to your lapel and can send messages, search for information and tell you about what you’re seeing, all through voice commands. The Humane company raised more than $230 million in venture backing, and its rollout included a runway appearance at Paris Fashion Week, a TED talk and a chic announcement video where the pin repeatedly misinformed its user. According to the pin, almonds have far more protein than they do, and April’s solar eclipse would have...

Table of contents 1. VR Is Cheaper Than Ever 2. Major Improvements in VR Experiences 3. VR Games Lead the Way to the Metaverse 4. VR Games Follow Monetization Trends 5. Mixed Reality Experiences 6. Standalone Headsets 7. VR Cloud Gaming 8. Better and More Engaging VR Content 9. Adventure, Shooter, and Simulation Genres Are the Most Popular 10. VR Is Extending Beyond Gaming VR Game Trends: A SummaryThe VR games market is evolving and maturing. It's predicted to almost double in size in 2024 and grow at a CAGR of 42%. (Newzoo) That's thanks to key developments in VR...

Seventy-one percent of global executives say that the metaverse will be good for businesses, according to a new survey. Several of the biggest names in both business and woke politics, including World Economic Forum and Disney, are rushing to stake their virtual claim in the metaverse. The globalist World Economic Forum (WEF) shared details from the Accenture survey on how some business executives see the future of the digital universe or "metaverse." An Accenture report identified four tech trends, one of which is the "the next version of the physical world—the programmable world." Accenture also conducted a survey showing that...

The start-up is working on a metaverse wristband to be used alongside a VR headset. The wristband aims to allow users to move around in the virtual world but feel sensations like pain and the weight of objects. It works by electrically stimulating a wearers arm muscles. A user is said to be able to feel sensations like their skin being pinched or a weight in their hands. Emi Tamaki, the CEO of H2L Technologies...told the FT: "Feeling pain enables us to turn the metaverse world into a real [world], with increased feelings of presence and immersion." Tamaki is a...

The state of the metaverse, says Forrester, is that there isn't one. Yet. In a report out now, the analyst house concluded hype, and corporate fears over being left out, are the only elements of the metaverse that have actually emerged. At the same time, Forrester also warned businesses to be ready just in case this thing takes off: "Technology vendors are racing to build the metaverse, and brands are looking to exploit it." The metaverse is a fairly nebulous concept. It's supposed to be a galaxy of connected 3D virtual-reality worlds in which people can communicate, work, and play:...

Governor Jeb Bush visit with our Optima Domi Team to share a few words in the metaverse.

Medics say repeated strenuous movements wore down one of the vertebrae in his neck, and causing it to finally crack. Experts at the University of Leipzig Hospital, who treated the man, believe this is the world's first documented of VR-related stress fracture. Detailing the case in a medical journal, the team wrote the unidentified man's injury resembled ones seen in runners and soldiers. The man went to the hospital after experiencing a sharp pain in his shoulders while playing a game. Doctors did not reveal what game he was playing, but said it required him to move his body to...

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP) — The final frontier has rarely seemed closer than this — at least virtually. Researchers at one of Switzerland’s top universities are releasing open-source beta software on Tuesday that allows for virtual visits through the cosmos including up to the International Space Station, past the Moon, Saturn or exoplanets, over galaxies and well beyond.... ...VIRUP is accessible to everyone for free — though it does require at least a computer and is best visualized with VR equipment or 3D capabilities.... ...To be sure, VR games and representations already exist...But the EPFL team says VIRUP goes much farther...

Set designers were finally able to draw fans into their vivid dream without the constraints of Newtonian physics. Yet virtual reality isn't all wonder.Pandemic lockdowns crushed the concert industry, but things are finally starting to move again. Many of us are optimistic that dense crowds might gather regularly by mid-autumn. The process is already starting in red states. Once everybody who’s anybody “takes the jab,” mass events should spread slowly across the country.All over the world, people are dying for another taste of what Émile Durkheim called “collective effervescence”: the intense thrill we get from a mass gathering with a...

Image courtesy of HTC VIVE Arts

(Virtual) pints?When Kav opened her calendar on Thursday morning, she saw a day packed with social events from start to finish. Coffee, a lunch date, work drinks, and a pub quiz were taking over her diary, leaving her wondering when she would even be able to get any work done in between. The only thing is, by this point, Kav was five days into quarantining and had no plans to step foot beyond her front door. This was her social schedule to be conducted entirely through video calls – all of which were organised by her workplace. Kav is one...

The great Wallace Stegner once called America’s national parks “the best idea we ever had,” and we couldn’t agree more. Equal parts meditative and mind-blowing, these magnificent wildlands somehow make us feel our most humbly—and gratefully—human. They’re our gift to ourselves and our truest escape, whether for a solitary hike or an eight-person family vacation. And though, for now, we may not be able to visit them in person, we can remember past trips and look forward to future visits with these breathtaking virtual tours, some led by rangers—others self-guided. So set aside your puzzle-making and your Netflix queue and...

[R]esearchers discovered how to trigger the body ownership illusion using visual cues alone. They did this by tracking the subject’s body movements in microfine detail, the level of hand and finger movements. They then reproduced these movements exactly in the virtual body. ...work focuses on three types of virtual bodies—a four-legged animal in the form of a tiger, a flying animal in the form of a bat, and a creature with an entirely different exoskeleton in the form of a spider. Their goal is to explore the limits of body ownership with challenging examples that differ from human bodies in...

Games reach an incredibly diverse set of people across national, linguistic, and social barriers, and that goes for religion, too. Last week, we noted that Ninja was taking meals off-screen out of respect for Ramadan, and it should be little surprise to see religious groups taking up residence inside virtual spaces. One Christian pastor now holds church in VRChat, and that even includes baptisms – no matter how ridiculous a person’s avatar. Pastor D.J. Soto is the subject of a new video from YouTuber Syrmor (via Polygon), and the whole process is equal parts earnest and absurd. Soto describes his...

Study recruited young men over Craigslist and Grindr The National Institutes of Health is spending over $1.7 million on a virtual reality game for young men who have sex with men. "Tough Talks" is a virtual simulation that allows young gay men to practice how to tell their partner they have HIV, using virtual reality technology. A technology training company—Georgia-based Virtually Better, Inc.—as well as the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Southern California Institute for Creative Technologies are creating the game. Sixty-seven percent of young gay men do not disclose their HIV status to...

Through virtual reality (VR), students from the Northwest University in Xi'an, capital of China's Shaanxi Province, can "visit" archaeological sites while sitting in the classroom. Supported by a foundation, the university set up a VR teaching lab where the excavation sites can be reconstructed and the students can observe the features of various ruins and grasp the basic procedures and methods of archaeological investigation and excavation. VR technologies simulate a virtual environment that resembles reality. Wearing equipment such as helmets and glasses, users feel as if they are actually in the location that is being simulated. According to Ma Jian,...

"According to preliminary information, the man was moving around his apartment in virtual reality goggles and fell on a glass table, as a result of which he was injured and died from loss of blood at the scene," the spokesperson said according to the state news agency. The Ukranian Russian language website Korrespondent.net reported that the virtual reality game had not been properly mapped to the dimensions of the man’s apartment, possibly causing the accident. His body was reportedly discovered by his mother when she came to the apartment to visit. Further investigations into the circumstances of the man’s death...

UNDERSTANDING EACH OTHER   In an era marked by ubiquitous technology, the idea of teaching empathy through video games holds a certain appeal. But can gaming really improve understanding? “Dys4ia” isn’t your typical video game. There are no bosses to defeat or weapons to supe-up. On their face, the challenges are even more simple than the game’s pixelated graphics: Try to squeeze into an ill-fitting shirt; Find an empty stall in the women’s restroom. And unlike most games, “Dys4ia” cannot really be won. That’s because “Dys4ia” is more than a game. It’s an autobiographical depiction of a transgender woman’s journey...

At about noon on Thursday, I lowered a headset over my eyes and, for the first time in my life, stepped into Microsoft Windows. I was invited to attend an Acer event in New York where the company primarily discussed its VR and gaming ambitions. But I had one mission: to finally see what Microsoft's "mixed reality" experience is all about. What the heck is mixed reality? First, let's talk a bit about the differences between mixed reality, virtual reality and augmented reality. Virtual reality is what Oculus and Facebook are doing, allowing users to step out of this world...