Immersive spaces can be very immersive visually. But they can still sound pretty flat. This can disrupt immersion in games and social applications but in automotive, engineering, and construction (AEC), understanding how a space sounds can be crucial to the design process. That’s why Treble is working on realistic sound reproduction for virtual spaces.
We spoke with Treble CEO Finnur Pind about the opportunities and obstacles in believable immersive sound in enterprise and beyond.
Sound Simulation and Rendering
A conversation inside of a car can sound a lot different than a conversation in your living room. A conversation in your living room can sound a lot different than a conversation in an auditorium. If you’re trying to hear that conversation with an assistive device like hearing aids, the conversation can be even more complicated.
Right now, a conversation in any of those spaces recreated in a virtual environment probably sounds about the same. Designers can include environmental sound like water or wind or a crackling fire as they often do for games, but the sonic profile of the environment itself is difficult to replicate.
That’s because sound is caused by vibrations of the air. In different physical environments, the environment itself absorbs and reflects those vibrations in unique ways based on their physical properties. But, virtual environments don’t have physical properties and sound is conveyed electronically rather than acoustically.
The closest we’ve come to real immersive sound is “spatial audio.” Spatial audio represents where a sound is coming from and how far away it is from a listener by manipulating stereo volume but it still doesn’t account for environmental factors. That doesn’t mean spatial audio isn’t good enough. It does what it does and it plays a part in “sound simulation and rendering.”
Sound simulation and sound rendering are “two sides of the same coin,” according to Pind. The process, which has its roots in academia before Treble started in 2020, involves simulating acoustics and rendering the environment that produces them.
How Treble Rethinks Virtual Sound
“Solving the mathematics of sound has been developed for some time but it never found practice because it’s too computationally heavy,” said Pind. “What people have been doing until now is this kind of ray-tracing simulation. … It works up to a certain degree.”
Treble uses a “wave-based approach” that accounts for the source of the audio, as well as the geometry of the space and the physical properties of the building material. In the event that the virtual space includes fantastical or unspecified materials, the company assigns a set of physical characteristics from a known real-world material.
That kind of situation doesn’t arise often so far because, while Pind is open to Treble working with entertainment and consumer applications, the company is mainly focused on enhancing digital design models for the AEC industry.
“It’s not just seeing what your building will look like, but hearing what your building will sound like,” said Pind. “As long as you have a 3D building model … our platform connects directly, understands the geometry, building models, and sound sources.”
Pind says that the concept may one day have applications in augmented reality and mixed reality as well. Say in a platform like Microsoft Mesh or Varjo Reality Cloud where users are essentially sharing or exchanging surroundings via VR, recreating the real spaces of one user as the virtual space of the other user can greatly aid immersion and realism.
“Research has shown that having realistic sound in a VR environment improves the immersion,” said Pind. “In AR it’s more the idea of being in a real space but having sound augmented.”
Machine Learning, R&D, and Beyond
As strange as it may sound, this approach also works essentially backwards. Instead of recreating a physical environment, Treble can create sound profiles for physically-based spaces that may or may not exist – or ever exist. Why? To model how sound would behave in that environment. It’s an approach called “synthetic data generation.”
“AI is kind of the talk of the town these days and one of the major issues of training AI is a lack of data,” said Pind. Training AI to work with sound requires a lot of audio which, historically, had to be sourced from physical equipment transported and set up in physical environments. “Now they’re starting to come to us to synthetically generate it.”
This same approach is increasingly being used to test audio hardware ranging from hearing aids to XR headsets.
Sounds Pretty Good
Pind thinks that the idea of using sound simulation and rendering for things like immersive concerts is interesting, even though that’s not what Treble does right now. It’s another resource already in the hands of forward-thinking companies and potentially soon coming to an XR venue in your headset.
The UK government has pledged to invest £2.5bn in quantum computing over the next 10 years, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced today.
The programme forms part of the new Spring Budget, which aims to reduce inflation and the risk of a recession.
The British tech sector will play a central role in the plan. As part of a goal to make the UK a “science and technology superpower,” Hunt wants to build a world-leading “quantum-enabled economy” by 2023.
To create this, the government is more than doubling its previous funding commitment to the field. It aims to attract another £1 billion in private financing.
“The next step is for UK VC funding to dramatically increase.
The new programme aims to build on strong foundations. The UK currently ranks second in the world for both the number of quantum companies and private investment in the sector.
Andrew Scott, a founder partner at 7% Ventures, an early-stage fund that’s backed British quantum startups, said the new investment is “vital for future UK prosperity.”
Scott echoed the government’s call for further private sector financing.
“The next critical step to support the Prime Minister’s 10-year plan for the UK to become a ‘tech superpower’ is for UK VC funding to dramatically increase,” he told TNW.
In particular, Scott hopes for extensive growth in deeptech and later-stage Series A+ funding. To foster this, he wants regional pension funds to dedicate a percentage of their resources to deeptech VC investment.
“Someone like the British Business Bank could manage and deploy to VC funds, much as they already do via the ECF (Enterprise Capital Funds) and BPC (British Patient Capital) programmes,” Scott added.
Quantum Motion CEO James Palles-Dimmock (right) hopes the UK can attract top talent. Credit: Quantum Motion
The government has also been advised to proceed with patience. Sebastian Weidt, the CEO of Universal Quantum, a University of Sussex spinout, said the funding needs a long-term vision.
“Quantum computing is a marathon, not a sprint,” Weidt told TNW. “Therefore, we need to support the broad range of very promising approaches to quantum computing we have access to across the UK. And we should avoid focusing just on the short term.”
To support this, the government has made a variety of pledges around research and upskilling.
“I’m keen to see how we can continue to welcome the world’s best talent.
In addition, the plan contains a series of commitments to international collaboration. They include funding for R&D partnerships with other countries, as well as promises to attract and support talent and companies from overseas.
James Palles-Dimmock, CEO of Quantum Motion, which recently raised a UK-record £42 million, insists that the capacity to work across borders is essential to the sector.
“Manufacturing and talent are two key areas where the gains to be made from collaborative working significantly outweigh the risks,” he said. “And I will be keen to see how we can continue to welcome the best of the world’s talent to the UK to allow us to continue to accelerate the realisation of these enabling technologies.”
The maritime industry may have long replaced sails with engines, but a UK startup is betting that wind-powered ships still have a bright future.
Founded in 2014, Smart Green Shipping (SGS), has developed a new type of wind sail, called FastRig, that cuts carbon emissions. According to the company, it can be retrofitted to existing commercial vessels with available deck space, requiring no additional crew to operate it or port-side infrastructure changes. It’s also retractable to allow for standard loading and unloading operations, and it’s designed to be recyclable.
FastRig is paired with the startup’s software tool, TradeWind, which provides operational optimisation when the ships are in use. It uses weather forecasting along with big data from The Met Office on wind, waves, and currents, to predict when the propulsion can be provided by wind, suggest the most optimal route, and save fuel.
Here’s how it works:
Based on the company’s case studies using 3D modeling, FastRig installed on an Ultrabulk ship carrying biomass from Baton Rouge to Liverpool could save 20% of fuel every year.
Now, SGS is collaborating with the University of Southampton on a project called the Winds of Change, funded by the Department for Transport and Innovate UK in an effort to decarbonise the country’s maritime sector.
“While new wind-assist technologies are being developed, many are not ready for market and their predicted fuel savings have not been independently verified at sea, which is why UK-funded research projects like this are so important,” lead scientist Dr. Joseph Banks, from Southampton’s Marine and Maritime Institute, said in a statement.
3D impression of the FastRig sails fitted onto an Ultrabulk ship. Credit: Smart Green Shipping
As part of the two-year development programme, the university researchers will create new software tools that accurately predict how modern vessels perform on the ocean when retrofitted with SGS’s wing sails.
They will also test the impact of a retractable 20 metre-high FastRig fitted to a British 105 metre-long commercial vessel, the Pacific Grebe.
“This will require innovative numerical simulations backed up by experiments conducted in our highly instrumented 138 metre Boldrewood towing tank and RJ Mitchell wind tunnel,” Banks added.
Scientists from Southampton’s Marine and Maritime Institute hope their new tool, which predicts the fuel savings achieved by the wing-sails, will encourage further investment in the UK’s marine technology sector.
“It’s clear that shipping must rapidly reduce emissions in the short term,” SGS’s CEO Diane Gilpin said in a statement. “Wind power harnessed using sophisticated digital software and well-engineered equipment is at present the fastest way for the sector to reduce fuel consumption and related emissions.”
Arthur, an immersive virtual collaboration platform for enterprise, has recently rolled out its first major set of updates since its “Pro” version launched in 2021. The update brings solutions that are helpful in the platform but that VR in general has needed for a long time.
To learn more about the platform’s growth in the space and the technology coming of age in the enterprise sector, I met in the platform with Arthur Business Development Consultant Lakshman Lattipally. We also showed off our full-body avatars and explored the platform’s many features both old and new.
The Road So Far
Arthur was founded in 2016 but became publicly available in 2020. The platform rolled out its first major updates the following year, which is when ARPost first introduced our readers to the platform. At the time, the company was largely presented as a “virtual real estate company” before that language was adopted by consumer applications in the NFT space.
“We see ourselves as a virtual real estate company. We just provide the office,” Demand Manager Simon Berger told ARPost at the time.
At the time, the company seemed to be doing a new thing – just like everyone else. The main distinguishing feature between Arthur and other solutions in what has since been dubbed “the officeverse” were the avatars featuring a photo-realistic face on a poorly-matched and semi-corporeal frame.
Later that year, the platform’s professional version came out of beta. This version introduced more hosting tools, larger capacity spaces, screen sharing, and other productivity features, and – perhaps the largest differentiator – end-to-end session encryption. The free version still works and you can use it to explore the platform. You can also request a demo of the Pro version.
Recent Improvements
Some of Arthur’s most recent updates are completely new tools, while others are developments building on the platform’s existing tools and features. In either case, all of the updates are great advancements.
New Access Options
Arthur has long had desktop access – a website and an app. The website is a sort of back-end way to manage assets for and from the VR version, similar to an AltspaceVR profile. The app offered many of the conveniences of the website and some of the accessibility of the VR version, similar to the desktop version of ENGAGE.
This update brings an option for users to join virtual environments entirely via browser. There are pros and cons to a browser-based virtual collaboration space over an app. For example, the browser interface allows users to use the platform when they’re away from an office computer with the app installed. But, web users can’t join app sessions. At least, not directly.
One of the big updates that Lattipally showed me was the ability of a VR user to open an Arthur browser window and screen share it with VR users creating an entirely virtual version of a hybrid meeting. The solution was a little disorienting but entirely practical.
Of course, that browser window can be used for other things as well. While the pinboard and note features already provided on the platform can be used to create things like workflows and project management boards, your favorite dedicated tools can exist in-world through browser windows or in some cases through direct app integrations.
Display Updates
After all of the shade thrown on earlier iterations of avatars, they really have gotten a lot better in this most recent update. The avatar creation process still starts with a photograph, but that photograph is better mapped onto a better-proportioned head on a full body – complete with arms and legs. The more responsive faces are even compatible with eye tracking if you’ve got it.
My favorite update overall might be the MR desk – a feature that I’ve long wanted in every VR productivity app ever. The tool allows you to draw in your physical desktop to appear in your VR space. This process is similar to when you first set up the Quest’s seated play space. However, the desktop isn’t just an opaque rectangle, it’s a passthrough window to your actual desk.
Other users can’t see this desk, but you can turn it on and off when you need (or don’t need) to access your computer, notes, or anything else in the physical world while in VR. The obvious downside is that this feature is only as useful as your available passthrough. If you have a Quest 2 (review), this isn’t great. But, if you’re rocking a Quest Pro (info), word is it’s a lot better.
Everything Else Is Still Good
A lot of the quality features that Arthur had before are largely unchanged, and that’s okay. Spaces are still beautiful and easy to set up, complete with private audio zones. The larger main menu is still powerful and navigable, but the smaller menus for things like the notes feature and some basic in-world assets are even easier to use.
And, maybe this is just me, but I’m a big fan of the desktop user back-end. Taking screenshots in VR is a simple operation and those screenshots are easily accessible from the web profile. Further, user support is great if you need a helping hand.
The New and Improved Arthur
Arthur is holding its own in the developing world of enterprise VR solutions and remains one of the best offerings that I’ve seen in the space.
One of the most enlightening parts of my time in the platform with Lattipally was his stance on the maturity of the space as he says companies are moving from presence to productivity to complete virtual work environments. And Arthur is rising to that challenge.
PlayStation VR 2 launched late last month alongside more than 40 titles, which included games entirely new to the platform as well existing games from other platforms and upgraded PSVR titles. The headset’s first monthly top download chart has revealed a big shift in which games are taking an early lead in the headset’s growing library.
Taking the top spot across the US & Canada, the EU and Japan is Kayak VR: Mirage, a kayak racing sim initially released on SteamVR headsets in 2022 by Amsterdam-based indie studio Better Than Life.
In it, players race across lush, photorealistic environments including ice caves in Antarctica, tropical locales in Costa Rica, storm waters in Norway, and the stark canyons of Australia. The paddling movement mechanic is also something that works really well in VR too, which we hope more games will make use of thanks to just how immersive it can be.
Horizon Call of the Mountain, undoubtedly a product of sizable investment by Sony, only managed to eke out third place in the US/Canada and the EU, taking second place in Japan, which is probably more than a tad disappointing to the Sony-owned developers Guerilla Games and Firesprite.
Horizon Call of the Mountain is a single-player adventure that showcases some of the best graphics you’ll find anywhere in VR. Combat could be a bit more fluid and climbing could have more interesting challenges, although it certainly stacks up to Half-Life: Alyx in terms of immersion. Check out why we game it a respectable [8.5/10] in our review.
Granted, Horizon Call of the Mountain comes with a premium price tag of $60, which may explain why it underperforms in unit sales in comparison to the cheap and cheerful $25 team shooter Pavlov and $23 Kayak VR: Mirage. There’s also to consider that it was the subject of a hardware bundle, however that included a voucher code and not a physical disk. As the PlayStation blogpost states, the chart is counting downloads and not unit sales.
What’s more, it seems the era of Job Simulator (2016) ruling the PSVR top download charts has come to a definite end—despite it and sequel Vacation Simulator both offering PSVR 2 versions. Job Simulator has ruled the download charts nearly every month without fail since it launched on the original PSVR.
Take note: the February download chart only accounts for the headset’s first week in existence (Feb 22-28). March’s chart should be another fairly interesting read, as we see whether these top spots remain, or falter as more users pick up PSVR 2 headsets. Check out the chart below:
PSVR 2 Games
US & Canada
EU
Japan
1
Kayak VR: Mirage
Kayak VR: Mirage
Kayak VR: Mirage
2
Pavlov
Pavlov
Horizon Call of the Mountain
3
Horizon Call of the Mountain
Horizon Call of the Mountain
The Tale of Onogoro
4
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge
Dyschronia:Chronos Alternate Episode I
5
PISTOL WHIP
Moss: Book II
After the Fall – Complete Edition
6
Moss: Book II
PISTOL WHIP
Moss and Moss: Book II Bundle
7
Swordsman VR
Job Simulator
Puzzling Places
8
Drums Rock
Swordsman VR
Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge
9
NFL PRO ERA
Drums Rock
Drums Rock
10
The Light Brigade
After the Fall
Job Simulator
Update (12: 00PM ET): Horizon Call of the Mountain was also included in a hardware bundle, however that included a voucher code and not a physical disk. As the PlayStation blogpost states, the chart is counting downloads and not unit sales. We’ve included this information in the article above.
ZEISS, the German optical systems manufacturer, announced it’s acquired majority share of the joint venture Tooz Technologies, an AR/VR optics creator founded by Zeiss and Deutsche Telekom in 2018.
Zeiss and Deutsche Telekom previously had an even 50% stake in Tooz, which has functioned as a sort of AR optics skunkworks for the companies. Zeiss is now sole owner of the startup.
Zeiss says Tooz will continue to exist independently as it focuses on serial production and visual correction in its imaging systems, further calling Tooz its “AR/VR competence center.”
Image courtesy Tooz Technologies, ZEISS Group
Today, Tooz principally creates smart lenses that integrate curved, reflective waveguides and “invisible” combiners that can also be sandwiched into a vision correction layer.
“In the future, tooz will also equip optical systems from other manufacturers of AR/VR optics with prescription lenses to place products with an integrated prescription on the global markets,” the company say in a press statement.
“tooz covers specific competencies and technologies for design, engineering and manufacturing processes, which complement the existing capabilities at ZEISS quite well,” says Gerrit Schulte, Head of Zeiss Ventures. “tooz will benefit in particular from production and process know-how and the significant experience in the approval of medical optics, and is slated to be better positioned on the international market in the future.”
While Zeiss isn’t a household name is VR or AR headsets, the Oberkochen, Germany-based company has produced a number of head-mounted devices in the past, including its Zeiss VR One Plus created in the vein of Samsung Gear VR and Carl Zeiss Cinemizer multimedia glasses. Zeiss also creates aftermarket VR prescription lenses, sold through VR Optician.
If you lived in the 19th century and worked in manufacturing, you’d be looking at a working week of between 60 to 90 hours, according to research from the University of Groningen. These days, thankfully, things look a bit brighter. While working weeks differ across the EU—France famously has a 35-hour week—in general European staff can’t work more than 48 hours per week on average, including overtime.
This means that we are now working between 50% and 125% less than we would have been in the 1800s—and the better news is that workers’ conditions have continued to improve.
Weekly working hours took a dive following World War I, when US car manufacturer Henry Ford famously introduced the five-day, 40-hour work week in 1926. It caught on, and is the foundation upon which most contemporary workers have built their careers upon.
Now though, the times they are a-changin’—again.
Thanks to advocacy platforms such as 4-Day Week Global and think-tank Autonomy, and the sea change that has come about due to remote working during the pandemic, we could be looking at another radical shift in the way we work.
As far back as the 1930s, economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that technological advancements would eventually lead to a 15-hour work week. While his prediction hasn’t (yet) proven true, the results of the world’s largest four-day working week trial were recently published, and they revealed overwhelmingly positive outcomes.
The trial took place in the UK from June to December 2022 and saw 61 companies with approximately 2,900 workers adopt a four-day week adopting 4-Day Week Global’s 100-80-100 model—100% of the pay, for 80% of the time, in exchange for a commitment to delivering 100% of the output.
Definitely want to continue
The results speak for themselves: 92% of participating organisations are continuing with a four-day week, a further 4% are leaning towards continuing, and only 4% of participants are definitely not continuing. Additionally, 90% of employees said they definitely want to continue working four days a week.
Other successes included a revenue rise of 1.4% on average over the trial, and when compared to a similar period from previous years, organisations reported revenue increases of 35%, on average.
Additionally, the number of staff leaving fell by 57%, and 55% of workers reported an increase in their abilities at work. Fifteen percent said that no amount of money would make them accept a five-day schedule at their next job.
The UK-based Everledger, Evolution Money in Manchester, Kent-located Charity Bank and Liverpool’s Stellar Asset Management, all participated in the most recent trial. As part of a previous study in 2021, Atom Bank––a branch-free bank built for smartphones—was, at the time, the largest UK business and the first UK bank to trial a four day week.
The move saw Atom’s team switch to working 34 hours with no loss of pay. “It’s clear that it has been a huge success for our business and our people. We are extremely proud of how our employees have adapted and the benefit it has brought to many,” said Anne-Marie Lister, chief people officer at Atom bank.
Atom found that 91% of workers said they were able to get everything done within four days, and the bank also noticed that its operational productivity increased. It’s a good indicator for other companies who may follow suit. “We believe most organisations can move to a four-day week and we hope Atom’s experiences will encourage more businesses to make the shift permanently,” Lister said.
Not for everyone
While a four-day work week appears to be, on the face of it, a great idea, it isn’t something that can work for all industries or all businesses. Many manufacturing roles, service jobs, or purely customer-facing roles may find it to be unworkable.
Of the 61 companies which participated in the recent study, Professor Juliet Schor of Boston College, the lead researcher on the trial, points out that “Results are largely steady across workplaces of varying sizes, demonstrating this is an innovation which works for many types of organisations.”
But getting there can be a headache. The switch involves huge commitment to change an organisational culture to an 100-80-100 model, and can lead to stress, burnout, disconnect, and scheduling conflicts. Companies also have to choose what works best for them: reduced hours every day for all staff, or Mondays or Fridays off for set teams, to ensure business continuity across the full work week.
Rethinking priorities has to be at the start of any discussion about moving to a four-day week. Companies—and workers—need to look at the optimum end goal and then work backwards to see how it can be achieved with reduced hours.
Scheduling less meetings can be one way to take back time. For example, all public sector employees in Iceland work 35 hours, which was achievable by cutting meetings back in favour of email.
Australia has just gotten on board with the concept too, with its government releasing a recommendation that stated, “The committee recommends the Australian Government undertake a four-day week trial based on the 100: 80: 100 model […]. The trial should be implemented in diverse sectors and geographical locations.”
It is clear that, despite challenges, there is an appetite for new ways of working—whether that’s in terms of allowing employees full flexibility to determine their day, or moving an entire business to a four-day week.
The British tech sector can rest a little easier tonight after the UK arm of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) was sold to HSBC for just £1.
The intervention followed last week’s collapse of the subsidiary’s California-based parent company. The Bank of England (BoE) intervened over fears that mass withdrawals in the US would spread to the UK business.
Many of SVB UK’s 3,300 customers, which include numerous VC investors and startups, warned they would go bust if their deposits were lost. The BoE had initially planned to put the bank into insolvency, which would have only guaranteed protection for deposits worth up to £85,000, or £170,000 for joint accounts.
The deal with HSBC supersedes the insolvency plan. Customer deposits can now be protected without requiring taxpayer support.
“This action has been taken to stabilise SVB UK, ensuring the continuity of banking services, minimising disruption to the UK technology sector, and supporting confidence in the financial system,” the BoE said in a statement.
After the deal was announced, SVB UK said it was resuming normal operations.
Following the announcement that @HSBC_UK has acquired SVB UK, we’re resuming normal operations from today. Our clients should not notice any significant changes, however, there may be short delays across the next few days as we return to business as usual. Thanks for the support
TechUK, an industry lobby group, said the sale will be a relief for the British tech ecosystem.
“Without access to their deposits these companies faced the prospect of not being able to pay staff or rent or suppliers — in short many would also be facing insolvency and the many thousands of people working in this part of the tech sector would be very worried about their jobs!” said techUK CEO Julian David.
For HSCB, the acquisition of all SVB UK’s assets for a nominal £1 could be an extremely good deal. The Bank of London, which had also submitted a rescue bid, described the sale as a “missed opportunity.”
“It cannot be right that once again the heritage banks that have provided a poor service to UK entrepreneurs over many years benefit from their already dominant position,” the clearing bank said in a statement.
Legal experts are already pointing to the lessons for startups. Charles Fletcher, a partner at law firm Mishcon de Reya, recommended several steps that businesses can take to avoid the risks that SVB UK has exposed.
“Key actions include keeping corporate accounts with more than one bank, having an emergency funding plan to avoid cashflow squeezes, separating funds from different sources and taking a strategic approach to managing currencies,” said Fletcher.
“These should accompany fundamental business planning and management steps, such as a detailed risk register and crisis management protocols.”
Talespin is known for using VR in enterprise education – particularly for developing soft skills. Pearson, “the world’s leading learning company,” identified a need – specifically, helping business leaders understand the emerging future of work. Together, the two companies created an elaborate “storyworld” guiding learners through over 30 interactive education modules.
To learn more about “Where’d Everybody Go? The Business Leader’s Guide to the Decentralized Workforce,” we talked with Talespin CEO Kyle Jackson.
The World is Changing
The decentralized workforce is one of those trends that has, to a degree, always been there. With improving connectivity and ever-more portable hardware combined with an increase in the number of “knowledge workers” it’s been growing for a while now. The pandemic accelerated it as businesses that had remained centralized suddenly saw their workforce distributed.
Many workers like the opportunity to work largely when and where they like. Developments in culture and technology generally are making it more appealing and more practical, for example, with new approaches to financial technologies that encourage and facilitate independence – a sort of technologically driven take on rugged individualism.
Some companies have leaned into this massive shift as it can reduce overhead and even increase productivity as well as morale. However, some business leaders have been less able to really attach themselves to the idea which at the same time is becoming increasingly difficult to avoid.
“What we’ve broadly seen in the XR space is lots of single-module learning journeys,” said Jackson. “People just couldn’t do that with this topic.”
Where’d Everybody Go?
To address these challenges, Pearson – with AI analytics company Faethm, which Pearson acquired in 2021 – put together a list of “future human capabilities” that would be required to navigate this new direction in work. Working with Talespin helped to determine the direction of the project early on.
“We looked at that list and overlaid this concept of just how fast work is changing,” said Jackson. “Everybody is leaving jobs and no one can hire anybody – so where did everybody go?”
The experience currently consists of over 30 modules in four thematic tracks:
Applying Web3 to Business Strategy and Operations
Management and Upskilling
Equity and Values of the Modern Workforce
Practical Thinking.
There is also an introductory track, which helps learners choose the content that they’re going to work through. The whole experience might take a learner around seven hours to complete, but they don’t need to do it all at once. They don’t even need to do all of it.
“In that intro track you get a kind of choose-your-own-adventure overview,” said Jackson. “If you want to have your leadership team take just one of the tracks, that’s perfectly fine.”
Pearson and Talespin
The “choose-your-own-adventure” aspect comes in through the complex “storyworld” through which the content is delivered. Learners are essentially playing an interactive roleplaying game that helps them practice the topics of each track.
“Learners take on the protagonist’s role of a city commissioner,” reads a release shared with ARPost. “The learner must help local startups and enterprises navigate challenges that real-world businesses face today, like leading hybrid workforces, exploring the adoption of new technology, and instilling equitable workplace practices.”
The experience drew from the expertise and insights of both Pearson and Talespin, who worked closely to create the tracks and modules.
“It’s been very collaborative. Both teams have been in the trenches as a single team,” said Jackson. “We’re definitely more than just the platform in this case where in other cases we’re just the platform and the company is on their own.”
Creating the Experience
The level of involvement from Pearson was no doubt partially enabled by Talespin’s use of their own user-friendly creation tools. These also helped to allow the incredible speed with which the momentous project was realized.
“The idea formed in the middle of last year. Because we built a no-code platform, we really accelerated the product pipeline,” said Jackson. “Our North Star was how do you get the ability to create content into the hands of people who have the knowledge. … The no-code platform was built in service of that but we decided that we had to eat our own dog food.”
Jackson said that for the back-end team that were masters of their previous toolset, using the no-code version was initially frustrating. However, the platform played a large role in launching the experience, which has become a model for future long-form content from Talespin.
“This is the first of several of these that we have coming,” said Jackson. “Even though it’s a new concept to do a storyworld for an immersive learning experience, we’ve had a lot of interest.”
Demystifying Decentralization
Thanks to Talespin, virtual reality – one of the technologies playing a role in the decentralization of work – is helping companies navigate the future of work. This is a big moment for work as we know it, but it’s also a big deal for Talespin, who may have once again revolutionized immersive storytelling as an enterprise education tool.
Besides making one of the most influential VR games to date, Valve also made sure Half-Life: Alyx was just as moddable as its other iconic titles. And thankfully there’s no shortage of talented modders out there who have built extended campaigns and new levels for the PC VR shooter.
One such HLA modder is Nate ‘Polygrove’ Grove, an Environment Artist and Designer at game publisher Annapurna Interactive, which is known for titles such as Outer Wilds, Stray, and What Remains of Edith Finch.
Last Friday Grove released their first solo HLA mod project, called ‘Re-Education’, something the environment artist calls a “medium-length campaign (30 minutes to an hour) featuring standard Half-Life Alyx style gameplay with a focus on slower pacing and environmental storytelling.”
You can check out the trailer below:
In Re-Education, the idea is to scavenge, explore, and make the dangerous journey while en route to a safehouse on the outskirts of City 17. There, Alyx finds her commandeered train has been halted by a Combine barricade.
“She must make her way through a long-abandoned school to access the switch that unblocks the tracks, but the task may prove more difficult than expected,” the DLC’s description reads.
The free DLC can be downloaded though Steam Workshops, which of course means you’ll need the base game to play.
This isn’t Grove’s first HLA mod either. You may also recognize the developer’s ‘Polygrove’ handle from the credits in the Half-Life: Incursion mod as well, which included the talents of Maarten Frooninckx (Hammer scripting), Ross Joseph Gardner (script writing), and Joey Bracken (voice over).
There’s a host of great content to explore outside of Re-Education and Incursion too, with one of our top picks being the Half-Life: Alyx ‘Levitation’ mod, which brings around 3-4 hours of Combine-ganking fun in an unofficial chapter that you’d swear is direct from Valve.
The UK has finally unveiled plans for its GDPR replacement: the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill (DPDIB). Introduced in Parliament last week, the bill aims to boost economic growth while protecting privacy.
The proposed rules promise to reduce paperwork, slash costs, foster trade, and (please, Lord) cut down on cookie pop-ups. They also controversially claim to produce savings of more than £4 billion over 10 years (more on that later).
The shadow of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU looms large over the plans. In its pitch for the bill, the government pledges to unleash an elusive Brexit dividend.
“Our system will be easier to understand, easier to comply with, and take advantage of the many opportunities of post-Brexit Britain,” said Technology Minister Michelle Donelan in a statement. “No longer will our businesses and citizens have to tangle themselves around the barrier-based European GDPR.”
That’s the plan, at least — but it’s already proved divisive.
Cutting red tape
Data-driven trade makes a massive contribution to the UK’s coffers. In 2021, it generated an estimated £259 billion and 85% of British service exports.
The DPDIB envisions further rewards from simplified legal requirements.
“Our new laws release British businesses from unnecessary red tape to unlock new discoveries, drive forward next-generation technologies, create jobs, and boost our economy,” said Donelan.
All data regulations have to balance protecting people and promoting innovation. Under the GDPR, many companies became frustrated with the bureaucratic burdens. The DPDIB aims to tip the scales back towards business benefits.
“It was essential to clarify confusion and simplify administrative burdens.
Chris Combemale, CEO of the Data and Marketing Association (DMA), collaborated with the government on the new rules. He expects the bill to provide “a catalyst for innovation,” while maintaining the privacy protections needed for consumer trust.
“It was essential for the bill to safeguard the key ethical principles of existing laws, while clarifying areas of confusion and simplifying onerous administrative burdens on small businesses,” Combemale tells TNW via email.
The lighter regulatory load is proving popular. Businesses have welcomed the simplified requirements for recordkeeping, processing personal data, and automated decision-making, as well as the ability to reject data access requests that are “vexatious or excessive.” Praise has also been heaped on the new framework for digital IDs, extra resources for the UK’s data watchdog, andincreased fines for nuisance calls and texts.
Chris Vaughan of Tanium, an endpoint security company, says the new rules are more straightforward than the GDPR.
“One major benefit brought by the new law is the reduction in business costs that GDPR creates — made even more welcome as organisations continue to struggle in the current economic landscape,” Vaughan tells TNW.
Relaxing rules, however, can also increase risks.
Privacy dangers
Critics warn that the new laws will endanger citizens.Upwards of 30 civil society groups have called for the bill to be dropped over concerns it will weaken data protection and harm marginalised groups.
Colin Hayhurst from Mojeek, a privacy-based search engine, is particularly troubled by the reduced accountability for “low-risk” data processing. He also worries that the bill is legislating too many complex issues at once.
“My concern is that critical issues around innovations like AI will simply not get enough scrutiny or thought,” says Hayhurst. “It’s worth noting that the EU considers AI regulation such a complicated and important subject that it has an entirely separate bill dedicated to the matter.”
Hayhurst is particularly struck by the implications for AI in research. The new bill gives commercial organisations the same freedoms as academics for any data processing for research “that can reasonably be described as scientific.”
This could create big opportunities for businesses building AI with data collection. But it could provide even more power to large companies with research arms, such as Google’s DeepMind and Meta’s FAIR.
“Big tech companies with research groups can continue to harvest and use all the personal data they have, to train AI in their research activities,” says Hayhurst. “All of this comes with risk; and unfortunately, this risk is overwhelmingly going to be shouldered by those whose data is fed into the machine, rather than the companies themselves.”
Google’s acquisition of DeepMind sparked fears that NHS patient data would be accessible to US healthcare companies. Credit: Maurizio Pesce
To mitigate the risk, rules on responses to data access requests could be tightened — particularly when the data creates profit. A one-month deadline for replies may be appropriate for small companies, but not for global corporations with warehouses full of supercomputers.
“There is an irony that companies are able to make it incredibly easy for themselves to collect data on a person and then very difficult for the person who owns the data to find out what data a company holds on them!” says Hayhurst. “This is one area where a ‘one size fits all’ approach doesn’t deliver for consumers.”
The digital economy
Despite his misgivings, Hayhurst acknowledges that the government has responded to feedback. Notably, a proposal to drop the balancing test for a “limited, generic, but exhaustive list of activities” has not made it into the final text. However, concerns remain that businesses will be held to lower ethical standards.
Critics are particularly wary of the reduced requirements for oversight, recording, and user control of data processing. There is also extra room for data processing without an individual’s consent. These changes could leave the public both more at risk and less confident in the digital economy.
“The government is selling out personal privacy for business benefits.
“If businesses aren’t aware of how much data is being collected, what for, and the implications of its use, how can they expect consumers to trust them with such information?” asks Angel Maldonado, CEO of e-commerce firmEmpathy.
Michael Queenan, CEO and co-founder of Nephos Technologies, takes the criticisms a step further.
“The government has decided to sell out personal data privacy for business benefit and innovation,” Queenan tells TNW. “Why else would it remove important, already adopted, global data protection steps?”
One motivation may be the potential savings. As previously mentioned, the reforms are predicted to unlock £4.7 billion for the UK economy. But evidence for this claim is hard to find.
The government references the figure with a link, which has been broken since we first saw the announcement. The source can be found via the Wayback Machine, but the estimate it links was published back in July 2022 — when a different version of the bill was introduced. Critics suspect that the £4.7 billion estimate has little basis in reality.
“Contrary to saving businesses billions, the bill could result in higher compliance costs and administrative burdens for businesses that operate in multiple jurisdictions,” says Shaun Hurst, Principal Regulatory Advisor at regtech firm Smarsh.
GDPR arrangements
Divergences from the GDPR are a recurring theme in pitches for the DPDIB. The government has emphasised the benefits of these deviations, but they also threaten data transfers with the EU.
The UK currently has EU data adequacy status, which protects the flow of data between both jurisdictions. MEPs, however, have taken issue with Britain’s planned reforms. If they decide that the new bill doesn’t meet the requisite standards, the adequacy agreement could be lost.
As a result, companies selling in both the UK and EU would have to comply with two sets of laws. Tech giants may be reluctant to develop product and policy variations for a new regime, while domestic firms could consider relocating to the union.
“Being released from red tape will only be a benefit if business continues to be able to work with European citizens and their data across borders by taking advantage of the adequacy ruling that has applied to the UK since Brexit,” says Amanda Brock, CEO at OpenUK, a non-profit that represents open technology.
As the first secretary of state for the newly-created Department for Science, Innovation, and Technology (DSIT), Michelle Donelan is responsible for British tech regulation.
The government has, however, publicly stressed the importance of maintaining data adequacy. Some privacy experts are also confident that the new measures will fulfil the EU’s requirements. Yet even if the UK retains data adequacy, firms that trade in the EU must meet the GDPR standards. Consequently, the main beneficiaries of the new regime may be companies that only operate in the UK market.
“I think these so-called ‘savings’ will never materialise for most businesses,” says Farhad Divecha, founder of AccuraCast, a London-based digital marketing agency. “If you have visitors from Europe or do business with Europe, you still have to comply with GDPR. So if anything, we’ll end up having more complicated requirements that differ for your customer base in the UK versus in Europe.”
Nonetheless, the departure from the GDPR could have positive global outcomes. Ilia Kolochenko, the founder of security firm ImmuniWeb and a member of Europol’s Data Protection Experts Network, hopes the bill can influence the EU’s rules.
He fears that businesses are struggling with GDPR fatigue, inconsistent enforcement across member states, and the growing costs of formalistic compliance.
“European companies would gain a significant competitive advantage on the global market if European GDPR goes through a similar set of improvements and simplifications,” says Kolochenko.
“If the trend of overregulation persists, we will probably see massive and deliberate non-compliance, as costs and penalties for non-major infringements will likely be much less important than costs of a holistic implementation of the mushrooming EU cybersecurity regulations and directives.”
It’s a valiant call for balance, but one that’s unlikely to gain consensus approval — just like every other argument on data protection. Despite these deep divisions, there’s surely at least one thing on which we all can agree: “DPDIB” is a hideous acronym.
On Christmas morning last year, dozens of households in the Republic of Ireland woke up to a hot water tank that had been heated overnight – for free.
These households were part of a pilot run by the pioneering social enterprise EnergyCloud, which has found a way of using surplus wind energy on blustery nights to help people who are experiencing fuel poverty.
All it takes is the installation of a special switch that allows EnergyCloud to activate water heating when there is bountiful energy on the grid. People can still heat their hot water tank via a manual switch whenever they choose and they can also switch the whole system off if they are away from their home for a time.
“We can remotely send a message that clicks on your hot water and heats up your immersion at night-time,” explains Derek Roddy, co-founder of EnergyCloud. He adds that free water heating was delivered multiple times last year, not just on Christmas morning.
Energy prices in Europe have soared in the last couple of years, due to shifts in demand during the pandemic and, more recently, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This has triggered a worrying rise in fuel poverty but efforts to help are afoot. Renewables, in particular, could be coming to the rescue.
EnergyCloud is a non-profit social enterprise with a voluntary board of 11 people. Funds and technologies are donated by EnergyCloud partners, including Roddy’s firm Climote, energy provider SSE Airtricity and Amazon Web Services.
People who receive free hot water get text message alerts so that they know when it is available. “It is making a difference in people’s lives,” adds Roddy.
Hot water tanks, he says, can be reimagined as batteries: “A typical hot water tank would store 6 kWh of energy in hot water, which is a staggering amount of energy.” If you added up all the hot water tanks in Ireland, you would get a total of around 6 GWh.
Costing the surplus
Surplus energy from wind farms is an increasingly expensive problem. In 2022, the UK’s National Grid paid £215 million to shut off wind generation when the electricity wasn’t needed – a cost that gets passed on to consumers, further raising prices. EnergyCloud has found a way of using surplus energy while also helping people who might be struggling to pay their energy bills.
Everyone, in theory, benefits from this – not least because a lack of heating and hot water can cause or aggravate health problems. The UK’s Building Research Establishment estimates that cold homes, in England alone, cost the National Health Service more than half a billion pounds each year.
Other initiatives to help households experiencing fuel poverty in the past have included a programme in Scotland that installed Tesla Powerwall batteries in more than 100 homes, though Roddy notes that the costs are minimal when you are able to divert energy to existing hot water tanks instead.
EnergyCloud says it aims to install its remote-controlled hot water tank switches in at least 10,000 homes by the end of the year and the enterprise is already planning to expand into Northern Ireland and Scotland.
“It’s a really interesting concept,” says Marilyn Smith at the non-profit EnAct, which researches social issues around energy consumption. However, she notes that some people might hesitate to allow the installation of remotely controlled equipment in their homes. So far, that hasn’t been a barrier for EnergyCloud. All participants have been voluntary and Roddy says 65,000 additional homes have already expressed an interest in joining.
A ‘public good’
Smith argues that emerging energy companies are increasingly presenting renewables (and surplus electricity) as a potential “public good”. Other European ventures have sought to help low-income households around the world access renewable energy directly. Take Trine, a 16 person-strong firm based in Sweden that allows people to invest in solar energy projects in Africa, Asia and Central America. More than €80 million have been raised via the platform so far.
“There’s plenty of technology out there – batteries, panels, converters,” says Trine founder Christoffer Falsen. “It’s really about being able to accelerate that with the injection of capital.”
He explains that Trine-funded schemes can, for example, allow a household in Kenya to purchase a solar panel in instalments, enabling them to access cheaper electricity and move away from fossil fuel generators, which are extremely common in much of Africa. To date, nearly 3 million people worldwide have accessed electricity from renewables funded by Trine’s investors.
Although it was “unthinkable” before, Falsen says Trine may soon allow investors to support renewables projects in Europe as well: the rise of energy prices on the continent means increased profitability from energy projects, so the potential returns have risen, too. Previously, European ventures were not attractive enough in this regard.
“I think there will be a bigger push for energy independence and that, I think, will be very good for this entire sector,” says Falsen. He notes, however, that there are questions over whether high energy tariffs in Europe will continue, adding to uncertainty for investors.
Electricity at cost
Europe’s growing cadre of “energy communities” – groups of households that buy into generation projects such as small-scale wind farms – already understand that energy independence can shield people from the highest bills.
A long-running example is the community in Eeklo, Belgium that benefits from wind energy harnessed by EcoPower. It provides electricity to customers more or less at cost.
“We have a lot of wind in our region,” says Jan de Pauw, project engineer at EcoPower. There are 65,000 EcoPower members in Flanders, of which a few thousand live in Eeklo. The company has a headcount of around 50 people, operates a total of 20 windfarms in Flanders, and has raised €60 million of citizen-invested capital to date.
“People become members of EcoPower not because they want to earn a lot of money and have a high dividend but they want to have access to locally produced energy at a fair price,” says de Pauw.
The advantages have become clear during the last 12 months, as energy bills rocketed in Europe. EcoPower estimates that its members saved around €700 on their total bill for 2022. To become a member, households must buy a single share for €250 but people experiencing fuel poverty can pay this off in tiny instalments of just €3.50 a month for six years.
With more and more renewable generation on the continent, expect to see increasing opportunities for sharing or cheaply distributing energy in the forms described above.
There could be other impacts of all this, too, as well as helping people in low income or fuel-poor households. Roddy says that, once participants in the EnergyCloud pilot heard that their free hot water would come from local wind farms, they expressed glowing acceptance of renewables. (TNW asked to speak to a participant but were told none was forthcoming.)
Big, white and pointy onshore turbines have occasionally been described as eyesores by some. But schemes such as EnergyCloud, which make clear the potential financial benefits of renewables, could change attitudes, argues Roddy.
“People got this straight away. This was not a hard sell,” he says. “I think we’ll have people literally approaching their elected representatives insisting that there’s wind farms and solar farms built in their area.”
Treble uses a “wave-based approach” that accounts for the source of the audio, as well as the geometry of the space and the physical properties of the building material. In the event that the virtual space includes fantastical or unspecified materials, the company assigns a set of physical characteristics from a known real-world material.
“AI is kind of the talk of the town these days and one of the major issues of training AI is a lack of data,” said Pind. Training AI to work with sound requires a lot of audio which, historically, had to be sourced from physical equipment transported and set up in physical environments. “Now they’re starting to come to us to synthetically generate it.”
