Real World

Meta CEO and founder — and Next Reality 50 member —Meron Gribetz unveiled a new operating environment for augmented reality called Meta Workspace for the audience at the Augmented World Expo (AWE) in Santa Clara, California, today. Gribetz demonstrated several features of the ...more

If you're a tech enthusiast, there's no way you're not watching HBO's Silicon Valley. So you surely know the Pied Piper crew's latest shenanigans involve an app that uses a phone's camera to find facts about food items — a sort of Shazaam for food, if you may. What originally ...more

Prepare yourself for a trip back to the days when a Sega Genesis was your gateway to premium gaming. The mid-nineties classic, Comix Zone, has been soft-launched in the Philippines, and while it's not officially available for gamers in the states, you can install it right now ...more

Intel launched their Advanced Vehicle Lab in Silicon Valley this week, and the tech giant is now on the hunt for potential partners. This isn't Intel's first venture into the driverless arena. Their new self-driving garage — once home to Altera, which Intel acquired in 2015 — ...more

Everyone feels a little safer with Android's security updates, which are welcome and often necessary protective measures. But what happens when the update that's supposed to safeguard your phone actually ends up wreaking havoc with its security system? Well, that's exactly wh ...more

In the nascent AR/VR race, any release news is big news. For augmented reality, those invested in the new technology eagerly await the release of Microsoft's Hololens and any inkling of information that comes with it. If you're one of those folks, you're in luck, as new inform ...more

Every Friday, Next Reality reviews the latest headlines from the financial side of augmented and mixed reality. This weekly Market Reality column covers funding announcements, mergers and acquisitions, market analysis, and the like. This week's column starts with a stock price ...more

During his opening address on April 18 at F8, Facebook's developer conference, CEO Mark Zuckerberg launched the company's augmented reality platform centered on artificial intelligence-powered cameras. The new AR platform will allow developers to display information, add digi ...more

Hackers are good at what they do—some can even use the way you move your phone to guess a 4-digit PIN in five attempts or less. That's why most of us with compatible hones use the fingerprint scanner. It's just much more secure. Or is it? Researchers from Michigan State Unive ...more

Apple is combining internal and external talent in an effort to give them in edge in the augmented reality market, though we still don't know what form their foray into alternative realities will actually take. Rumors have been spreading for years about Apple's interest in au ...more

Merge VR, a company mostly known for its virtual reality experiences, is moving into and creating an augmented reality experience that combines an iPhone or Android smartphone, a set of goggles to put your phone in, and a box about the size of a Rubik's Cube which looks more a ...more

Here at NextReality, we talk a lot about the many different ways of controlling holograms in the HoloLens and other augmented and mixed reality devices; New and creative ways are coming more and more every day. Most recently is something called the HoloSuit. In the 25-second c ...more

Most popular virtual reality headsets, like the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift, require a tethered connection to the computer and that imposes some obvious restrictions on how much we can move in our space. We'd all prefer a simpler, untethered option, and Intel wants to provide jus ...more

We're inching closer towards the singularity—that point where technology advances to the steepest slope of the logistic function S-curve and simply skyrockets at a rate we've never seen before. Somewhere along the way, the line between humans and the tech we rely on will becom ...more

The HTC Vive and Valve's SteamVR make for one of the more compelling virtual reality experiences, mixing in real-world motion tracking with the immersive headset. But third-party manufacturers couldn't tap into the Vive's full potential and make creative new peripherals—until ...more

We're already glimpsing the future when we look at mixed reality through a headset, but is the real evolution of this technology something that will exist as part of our bodies? As intense as that may sound, TechCrunch's Jay Donovan offers compelling reasons why it's not such ...more

Virtual reality and horror were meant for each other. You'll get all the positive aspects of experiencing a terrifying situation such as excitement and an adrenaline rush, without any of the real-life consequences, like being ripped to shreds by a herd of flesh-eating monsters ...more

The most anticipated of the Android Wear devices—the Mote 360—was not only officially unveiled, it's also available to buy right now, for the low price of $249.99. Let's get this out of the way right now—you're not going to find a better looking Android Wear device anytime so ...more

At a time when virtually everyone has a cell phone, it's almost inconceivable to think of a time when we're without them. At work, in bed, and even in the bathroom; we're always with our smartphones. I mean, hell, someone even designed a way to bring your smartphone into the f ...more

There are very, very few things better than a solid Hobbit songI mean, I was almost brought to tears when Pippin busted out this one in The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. Video: . Seriously, if that was on iTunes, I would definitely throw down a buck for it. Oh wait, ...more

As if you needed another reason to lock down your Facebook profile, the company's sketchy new partnership with data mining firm Datalogix is geared towards giving advertisers more information on what you're doing—even when you're not online. It's just not enough that they can ...more

Among the various components of the emerging augmented reality space, the most lucrative is the advertising market. The prospect of turning every object, every location, ever signpost in the real world into a discount code or virtual transaction interface is why AR will ultima ...more

Snapchat may trail Facebook and Instagram in terms of daily active users, but a new partnership with Samsung may get those innovative AR Lenses onto the mobile devices of a lot more users. Non-fungible tokens, perhaps the hottest segment of the blockchain tech industry at the ...more

Unlike the realm of virtual reality, augmented reality is less about losing yourself in some fantasy environment, and more about getting things done in the real world. So while we've seen some great games that capture the imagination on devices like the Magic Leap One and the ...more

Whether it's a short road trip or an 18-hour flight, our phones are now essential travel companions. No longer do we need a GPS unit, maps, cameras, camcorders, or even boarding passes. However, not all phones are created equal in this regard. Some are more suited for travelin ...more

The Power of One is one of those books that I really should have read years ago. I’ve certainly meant to read it for a long time so this was a satisfying title to cross off my list. It’s stunning that this was Bryce Courtenay’s first novel. I look forward to reading his others ...more

I loved The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay for so many reasons. For its fantastical sense of adventure, set against the real world action and tragedy of the Jews in Europe during World War Two. I loved the opening chapters of Josef in Prague – a city I spent several m ...more

Searching for some new new in Augmented Reality Apps I came across Augmented GeoTravel. I would have loved to have this app when I went to Europe. Being able to travel and hold up the camera & get more information on cool places I was seeing would have been awesome. It is like ...more

We had a blast during last week's social engineering calls. One of our attending social engineers was so clever that she convinced several people on Craigslist that lost items were hers, even if it seemed she couldn't be trusted. But females are better social engineers, natura ...more

At Kaplan University, our main focus in developing our online MBA programs is career development. We believe the time and effort that is required to obtain a master’s degree online should be apparent the first day the student begins their new career. Earning an MBA could be a ...more

Tower defense games have taught us little. We already knew that defending castles from baddies was fun and that legions of weenies are the key to success in most real-time strategy situations. What other insights have they to offer? How about a lesson in sweatshop economics? ...more

Note: Little Brother is available as a free ebook download. Warnings I read Boing Boing a lot, which means that I know just about everything about Cory Doctorow's politics and opinions. So, knowing his politics definitely colors my perceptions of this novel. My review will i ...more

A Russian augmented reality startup wants the next frontier in real estate to be augmented reality estate. Arcona, a blockchain-based augmented reality platform proposed by Piligrim XXI, maps out a grid of "Digital Land" over real locations across the world where digital cont ...more

Occasionally, a not-so-great movie also does something so right that you have to forgive some of its sins and give it a little love. Such is the case with the latest film from Keanu Reeves, Replicas, which takes a HoloLens-style device and gives us a look at how future researc ...more

While augmented reality made more of a cameo appearance during Samsung's official grand unveiling of the Galaxy S10 line-up on Wednesday, it's the company's move into 5G connectivity that has huge implications for AR. After the 2018 edition of Samsung Unpacked cast augmented ...more

Pokémon GO's augmented reality journey is continuing with Apple's newly announced ARKit. It's no surprise considering Pokémon GO is the largest mainstream augmented reality game, with 500 million downloads. Apple mentioned Pokémon GO specifically during WWDC event last week, ...more

A development duo has concocted an iPhone app that displays related tweets based on objects recognized by the device's camera. Or Fleisher and Anastasis Germanidis compiled the experiment, dubbed Twit.AR, using Apple's CoreML machine learning platform and Google's Inception v ...more

The game wizards at Insomniac take pride in diving deep when it comes to world-building, and the same is true for the studio's latest title for Magic Leap One called Seedling. Revealed on Wednesday at the L.E.A.P. conference in Los Angeles, the Magic Leap One-based title is l ...more

A Series B round of funding, totaling $30 million, will enable Helsinki-based startup Varjo to launch its industrial-grade augmented and virtual reality headset capable of "human-eye resolution" before the end of the year. The investment will fund an expansion of Varjo's hard ...more

Forget what you know about controlling augmented reality experiences. "Scroll" lets you interact with augmented reality using a much more subtle approach: A ring. It looks like an ordinary ring on your finger. It's black, sleek, and attractive, which is a huge plus. Scroll re ...more

The USB Rubber Ducky is a well-known hacking device in the cybersecurity industry, but it needs to be preprogrammed before it can be used. That means it's not easy to issue commands to a target computer since you can't interact with it from afar after plugging it in. And if yo ...more

CEO (and NR50 member) Tim Cook and Apple unveiled the long-awaited lineup of next-generation iPhones today on stage of the Steve Jobs Theater, packed with hardware improvements to facilitate AR experiences from ARKit, which will arrive with the iOS 11 on Sept. 19. The new iPh ...more

For some time now, there has been quite a bit of speculation as to when the selection of augmented and mixed reality head-mounted displays would begin to trickle out to the public. Pricing, availability, and software selection are all issues that will have to be addressed befo ...more

We're a few weeks away from the fireworks associated with New Year's celebrations, but that doesn't mean you can't start a little early — in augmented reality. The team at Weta Workshop, recently released a small immersive game called Boosters that they created for a little o ...more

Norway-based production tools company Vizrt is putting the real into augmented reality with its broadcast AR solution that's designed to keep sports fans (and other audiences) watching. A couple of weeks ago, Chris Black, the head of content and communications at Vizrt, demoe ...more

Learning Chinese is hard, but it can be a lot easier with the help of a few great apps. As a native English speaker who's currently living in China, this is a process I've recently gone through. After playing the field, here are the three apps I personally think will help you ...more

The era of smartglasses designed for consumers has officially begun, as shipments of North Focals began arriving at its stores this week. And the company now has plans to expand its retail footprint. Meanwhile, a new player is emerging in the 3D content creation market, curre ...more

The premise of Jurassic World revolves around splicing genes to create new dinosaurs, so it is fitting that the location-based AR game is a clone of Pokémon GO merged with the DNA of the Jurassic Park franchise. Hatching now in the App Store and Google Play, Jurassic World Al ...more

Alongside the usual collection of holiday-themed Lenses, Snapchatters received an extra-special treat from Snapchat over the weekend—a world-spanning Easter egg hunt. Like a highly-simplified version of Pokémon GO, The Great Snapchat Egg Hunt challenged Snapchat users to retr ...more

In less than a month, WWDC, Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference, will reveal the company's plans for the upcoming iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 software updates. But we already know what accessibility features will be hitting iPhones and iPads later this year, and many of them will ...more

When you see foreign words on a sign, unfamiliar currencies on a dinner menu, or a recipe using a different measurement system, there's a good chance you google it for a translation or conversion. Your iPhone's Translate app comes in handy for real-world language translations, ...more

Google Lens has easily been one of the more useful AR apps and a tantalizing tease of life with smartglasses in the not-so-distant future. Now, Apple has its own version of Lens, dubbed Live Text, built right into iOS 15 and iPadOS 15. Like Lens, Live Text can copy text from ...more

For the average consumer, augmented reality is a fun way of dressing up photos and videos for social media. However, AR is also gaining momentum as a medium for storytelling, particularly in sharing powerful messages. In light of the protests stemming from the death of George ...more

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a frenzy for news and information that is nearly unprecedented in the smartphone era, with a major side effect of misinformation. Now, major tech companies are making it easier to ask for advice about novel coronavirus from their respective di ...more

Alongside Sesame Street, the Dr. Seuss universe has been a constant presence in the formative years of several generations of children in the US. Now, Dr. Seuss's creations are continuing to maintain relevance with today's youth via augmented reality, just as the Sesame Stree ...more

While the automotive industry is moving towards adopting AR displays in future models, BMW is already shifting into the next gear with its vision of the technology. During the climax of its presentation at this week's CES 2020 in Las Vegas, the automaker unveiled its BMW i In ...more

The Unity 3D engine is not only responsible for facilitating the creation of 60% of AR and VR content but it also plays a significant role in producing the immersive stories that increasingly push the boundaries of cinema. Some of these daring new immersive works will now be ...more

In his famous 1996 "Content is King" essay, Bill Gates predicted that content is where tech companies will make money on the Internet. The adage clearly holds true in the current phase of augmented reality experience. For example, Magic Leap, Snapchat, Facebook, Google, 8th W ...more

The newly enhanced focus from Magic Leap on enterprise, announced on Tuesday, also came with a few companies opting to weigh in with their experiences developing for the platform. One of those companies is Obsess, an app that allows Magic Leap users to create customized immer ...more

The next phase of the holographic display is upon us, and Looking Glass is aggressively making sure that it's at the tip of the spear when it comes to leading that charge. On Tuesday, the Brooklyn, New York, and Hong Kong-based startup unveiled the latest in its product line, ...more