DJ Henderson – Page 180

What the hell is job boomeranging and why is it trending right now?

business, Design & Dev, House of Talent / DJ Henderson / January 17, 2023

Not, in fact, a fun sports perk offered by tech companies eager to keep up with the latest in compensation trends, “job boomeranging” is actually a rising workplace trend. In a nutshell, it’s when a former employee bounces back to a previous employer.

The trend has been observed by experts such as Anthony C. Klotz, associate professor of management at UCL School of Management in London; Klotz is also responsible for coining the term, the “great resignation.”

One trend complements the other. The great resignation cohort left their jobs in droves during the pandemic: 47 million US workers quit their job in 2021. In France, resignations peaked towards the end of 2021 and, in the UK, job-to-job movement was at an all-time high between October and December 2021 as workers sought better work-life balance, more money, or a step up the career ladder.

Bounce back

Boomerangers, on the other hand, form part of a new movement that’s also being called the “Big Regret.”

Endless column inches have trumpeted the advantages of making a career move over the past couple of years, and anecdotal evidence from that friend-of-a-friend who did it and never looked back helped to make a compelling case too. Research also backed up workers’ rationales to ditch the day job and look elsewhere. According to Pew Research Center, 60% of workers switching jobs saw an increase in their real earnings.

For many workers––those for example, who may have been coasting along in “quiet quit” mode––or anyone who genuinely felt it was time to make a career change, the change has proved positive.

But there is a sizable cohort of people for whom that job switch hasn’t worked out as planned.

No regrets?

UKG, a workforce management platform, ran a survey across six countries in 2022. The company compared responses of 1,950 employees who quit their jobs since March 2020, with the responses of people managers who had people on their team resign.

Forty-one percent of people felt they quit their old job too quickly, and 43% of job quitters admitted that they were better off at their old job. Of those who weren’t quite feeling their new position, 62% agreed that their old job was, in fact, superior.

So can you ever go back? Professor of management Michael A. Campion looked at boomerang employees for a research paper called “Welcome Back? Job Performance and Turnover of Boomerang Employees Compared to Internal and External Hires,” in the Journal of Management.

“In an era when the average employee will work for many different employers during their career, however, organizations are becoming more open to rehiring former employees,” Campion says.

Changing mindset

There is evidence that employers were softening on this even before Covid-19. A 2015 study commissioned by The Workforce Institute showed a changing mindset around re-hires. Back then, 76% of HR professionals said they were more accepting of hiring boomerang employees than before.

In 2019, more than 10% of Microsoft’s hires were boomerangs, and at LinkedIn in the UK, 5% of all new hires in 2021 were actually former employees who returned to the company.

“Hiring former employees, who are a known entity, is thought to be less risky than hiring new employees. They are also familiar with the job, understand the organization’s culture and values, and may have relationships with existing employees,” Campion explains.

However, boomerang employees often don’t excel when they bounce back to a former employer. “Results suggest that boomerang managers’ performance tends to remain the same after being rehired,” he says.

Get re-hired

So how can you go about getting re-hired at your old firm, and boomerang back to your happy place? The first thing to do for the future is to always keep things cordial. Leaving your old job on a good footing is the most important factor in being able to go back as a rehire, so beware sending any critical all-hands emails, for example.

You’ll know fairly fast if your new role and company aren’t a fit––the company culture isn’t right, the job hasn’t worked out as planned, or you can’t get on with your new boss. If that’s the case and you can’t see yourself staying in your new position long-term, then get in touch with your old manager or the hiring team to check in. You want to get a sense of the lay of the land; if your contact will be well-received, and from there, you can open a wider dialogue.

If you’re still close to your previous boss, schedule a lunch or a coffee break. Tell them what’s going on, and explore whether there’s any opportunity for you to return.

It’s common to panic and want to go back to what you know. But do ask yourself some hard questions too. Do you want to return because it’s an easy option? Think about your previous experience with the company––and what motivated you to leave in the first place.

Before you accept any offer to boomerang back, make sure it’s one that gives you the chance to progress, prove yourself––and grow your career.

For more great opportunities in tech, visit The House Of Talent Job Board today

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New Waveguide Tech From VividQ and Dispelix Promises New Era in AR

augmented reality, featured, News, optics / DJ Henderson / January 17, 2023

Holograms have been largely deemed impossible. However, “possible” and “impossible” are constantly shifting landscapes in immersive technology. Dispelix and VividQ have reportedly achieved holographic displays through a new waveguide device. And the companies are bringing these displays to consumers.

A Little Background

“Hologram” is a term often used in technology because it’s one that people are familiar with from science fiction. However, science fiction is almost exclusively the realm in which holograms reside. Holograms are three-dimensional images. Not an image that appears three-dimensional, but an image that actually has height, width, and depth.

These days, people are increasingly familiar with augmented reality through “passthrough.” In this method, a VR headset records your surroundings and you view a live feed of that recording augmented with digital effects. The image is still flat. Through techno-wizardry, they may appear to occupy different spaces or have different depths but they don’t.

AR glasses typically use a combination of waveguide lenses and a tiny projector called a light engine. The light engine projects digital effects onto the waveguide, which the wearer looks through. This means lighter displays that don’t rely on camera resolution for a good user experience.

Most waveguide AR projects still reproduce a flat image. These devices, typically used for virtual screens or screen mirroring from a paired device, often include spatial controls like ray casting but are arguably not “true” augmented reality and are sometimes referred to as “viewers” rather than “AR glasses.”

Some high-end waveguide headsets – almost exclusively used in enterprise and defense – achieve more immersive AR, but the virtual elements are still on a single focal plane. This limits immersion and can contribute to the feelings of sickness felt by some XR users. These devices also have a much larger form factor.

These are the issues addressed by the new technology from Dispelix and VividQ. And their material specifically mentions addressing these issues for consumer use cases like gaming.

Bringing Variable-Depth 3D Content to AR

Working together, VividQ and Dispelix have developed a “waveguide combiner” that is able to “accurately display simultaneous variable-depth 3D content within a user’s environment” in a usable form factor. This reportedly increases user comfort as well as immersion.

“Variable-depth 3D content” means that users can place virtual objects in their environment and interact with them naturally. That is opposed to needing to work around the virtual object rather than with it because the virtual object is displayed on a fixed focal plane.

VividQ 3D waveguide

“A fundamental issue has always been the complexity of displaying 3D images placed in the real world with a decent field of view and with an eyebox that is large enough to accommodate a wide range of IPDs [interpupillary distances], all encased within a lightweight lens,” VividQ CEO, Darran Milne, said in a release shared with ARPost. “We’ve solved that problem.”

VividQ and Dispelix have not only developed this technology but have also formed a commercial partnership to bring it to market and bring it to mass production. The physical device is designed to work with VividQ’s software, compatible with major game engines including Unity and Unreal Engine.

“Wearable AR devices have huge potential all around the world. For applications such as gaming and professional use, where the user needs to be immersed for long periods of time, it is vital that content is true 3D and placed within the user’s environment,” Dispelix CEO and co-founder, Antti Sunnari, said in the release. “We are thrilled to be working with VividQ.”

When Waveguides Feel Like a Mirage

Both companies have been building toward this breakthrough for a long time. Virtually every time that APost has covered Dispelix it has at least touched on a partnership with another company, which is typical for a components manufacturer. New product announcements are comparatively rare and are always the result of lots of hard work.

“The ability to display 3D images through a waveguide is a widely known barrier to [a compelling AR wearable device],” VividQ Head of Research, Alfred Newman, said in an email. “To realize the full capability, we needed to work with a partner capable of developing something that worked with our exact specifications.”

Of course, those who have been following immersive tech for a while will understand that a long time working hard to achieve a breakthrough means that that breakthrough reaching the public will require working hard for a long time. Devices using this groundbreaking technology might not reach shelves for a few more calendar pages. Again, Newman explains:

“We license the technology stack to device manufacturers and support them as they develop their products so the timeframe for launching devices is dependent on their product development. …Typically, new products take about two to three years to develop, manufacture, and launch, so we expect a similar time frame until consumers can pick a device off the shelf.”

Don’t Let the Perfect Be the Enemy of the Good

Waiting for the hardware to improve is a classic mass adoption trope, particularly in the consumer space. If you’re reading that you have to wait two to three years for impactful AR, you may have missed the message.

There are a lot of quality hardware and experience options in the AR space already – many of those already enabled by Dispelix and VividQ. If you want natural, immersive, real 3D waveguides, wait two or three years. If you want to experience AR today, you have options in already-available waveguide AR glasses or via passthrough on VR headsets.

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The 20 Best Rated & Most Popular Quest Games & Apps – January 2023

best meta quest 2 games, best oculus games, best oculus quest 2 games, best oculus quest games, best quest 2 games, best quest games, Feature, News, quest 2 games, quest games, Top List, top oculus games, top quest 2 games, top quest games, VR Gaming / DJ Henderson / January 16, 2023

While Oculus doesn’t offer much publicly in the way of understanding how well individual games & apps are performing across its Quest 2 storefront, it’s possible to glean some insight by looking at apps relative to each other. Here’s a snapshot of the 20 best rated Oculus Quest games and apps as of January 2023.

Some quick qualifications before we get to the data:

Paid and free apps are separated
Only apps with more than 100 reviews are represented
App Lab apps are not represented (see our latest Quest App Lab report)
Rounded ratings may appear to show ‘ties’ in ratings for some applications, but the ranked order remains correct

Best Rated Oculus Quest 2 Games & Apps – Paid

The rating of each application is an aggregate of user reviews and a useful way to understand the general reception of each title by customers.

Rank	Name	Rating (# of ratings)	Rank Change	Price
#1	The Room VR: A Dark Matter	4.89 (12,079)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"≡"}">≡	$30
#2	Moss: Book II	4.88 (465)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 1"}">↑ 1	$30
#3	Puzzling Places	4.88 (1,571)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↓ 1"}">↓ 1	$15
#4	Walkabout Mini Golf	4.87 (9,181)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"≡"}">≡	$15
#5	I Expect You To Die 2	4.84 (2,571)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"≡"}">≡	$25
#6	DYSCHRONIA: Chronos Alternate	4.82 (357)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"≡"}">≡	$20
#7	Swarm	4.81 (2,232)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 1"}">↑ 1	$25
#8	Vermillion	4.81 (599)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 3"}">↑ 3	$20
#9	I Expect You To Die	4.8 (5,065)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 4"}">↑ 4	$25
#10	Moss	4.8 (6,291)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 2"}">↑ 2	$20
#11	COMPOUND	4.8 (284)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 3"}">↑ 3	$20
#12	The Last Clockwinder	4.8 (492)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 4"}">↑ 4	$25
#13	Red Matter 2	4.8 (960)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↓ 3"}">↓ 3	$30
#14	Cubism	4.8 (771)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 1"}">↑ 1	$10
#15	Arcaxer	4.8 (137)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↓ 8"}">↓ 8	$25
#16	Ancient Dungeon	4.79 (692)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↓ 7"}">↓ 7	$20
#17	Ragnarock	4.79 (1,150)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"≡"}">≡	$25
#18	YUKI	4.78 (209)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↑ 3"}">↑ 3	$20
#19	Pistol Whip	4.78 (9,187)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"↓ 1"}">↓ 1	$30
#20	Into the Radius	4.78 (2,663)	0,”↑ “&abs(R[0]C[-7]),R[0]C[-7]<1,"↓ "&abs(R[0]C[-7])))" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"≡"}">≡	$30

Rank change & stats compared to December 2022

Dropouts:

PatchWorld – Make Music Worlds

Among the 20 best rated Quest apps

Average rating (mean): 4.8 out of 5 (±0)

Average price (mean): $23 (±0)

Most common price (mode): $25 (−$5)

Among all paid Quest apps

Average rating (mean): 4.2 out of 5 (±0)

Average price (mean): $20 (±$0)

Most common price (mode): $20 (±$0)

Continue on Page 2: Most Popular Paid Oculus Quest Apps »

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2022 Was a Plateau Year for VR, Here’s What to Expect in 2023

2023 vr, 2023 xr, apple mr, Apple VR, apple xr, Feature, Meta, meta quest, News, quest, VR Industry / DJ Henderson / January 16, 2023

The end of 2022 marks more than a decade since the Oculus Kickstarter sparked the modern era of VR. While the space has undoubtedly grown tremendously since then, 2022 felt largely like a plateau year, with Meta standing unchallenged as the dominant player in the space—while progressing disjointedly in too many directions at once. But with new headsets, promising new content, and a looming heavyweight positioned to challenge Meta all on the horizon, 2023 could big a much bigger year for the VR space.

The 2022 Plateau

2022 wasn’t a bad year for VR by any means, but for the most part the status quo remained unchanged.

There’s no doubt that Meta has been the central pillar of the VR space in 2022, having pivoted its attention in a very public way by renaming the entire company to Meta just before the year began. The company’s Quest 2 headset has retained its position as the most popular headset on the market, even becoming the most-used headset among PC VR players, despite Meta having all but abandoned PC VR as a platform.

Despite its dominance (or perhaps because of it), Meta has continued to make very good hardware while struggling deeply with its software. Though Quest 2 is certainly more capable than similar products, the user experience is disjointed and unrefined. The Quest Pro only continued this trend; the high-end headset brings a range of impressive improvements to the hardware along with new sensing capabilities, but its new features are significantly hampered by an undercooked software offering.

Regardless of various missteps, Meta is undoubtedly doing the most to keep VR afloat right now. Quest 2 is an affordable headset that’s created a large enough market of users that developers are finding growing success on the platform. In 2022 that’s meant that many developers have begun or continued to treat Quest 2 as their highest priority platform. To that end, we saw many ports of existing VR games coming to Quest 2, and most new releases being either Quest 2 exclusive, or on Quest 2 and some other platforms.

Unfortunately Meta’s dominance has meant that much of the air in the room as been sucked away from other parts of the VR space that were once key pillars.

Despite the release of new and updated enthusiast PC VR headsets, the platform has stagnated due to the content focus shifting away from PC VR. Many of the games released this year on PC VR were designed first and foremost for Quest 2, which means many lacked the scale and polish that resonates with enthusiast PC VR users.

Valve’s seeming disinterest in VR ever since the release of Half-Life: Alyx back in 2020 hasn’t helped either. The company continues to sell its 2019 headset for the same price that it was charging on day one, with no official confirmation that it has plans to do anything major in the VR space (hardware or software) in the near future. Sony’s PSVR1, meanwhile, has largely lost any remaining relevance since the announcement of the upcoming PSVR 2.

On the Horizon for 2023

But there’s lots of interesting things on the horizon for VR in 2023. Crucially we may see some real competition for Meta from several different angles, which is sorely needed to keep the company (and the industry at large) on a steady course toward making VR a more valuable platform in order to increase mainstream viability.

First Up

The biggest near-term event for the VR industry in 2023 will be the launch of PSVR 2 in February. Although Sony has technically continued selling its original PSVR headset over the years, it’s been on the market for more than six years now—and gained ‘last-gen’ status well before that.

Given all that time between—and that the company isn’t bringing its exclusive VR content forward to the new headset—the upcoming launch of PSVR 2 feels like a re-entrance into the VR market for Sony rather than a continuation. But now that the company has made the commitment, they’ll likely put strong support behind the headset for at least a few years.

Importantly, as a console maker, Sony knows well that ‘content is king’, and we can expect to see a new slate of quality VR content funded by the company, some of which could make it onto other headsets. Sony’s original PSVR is still home to some of the best exclusive VR games in the industry, made by its own first-party studios; at a minimum it would be nice to see those top titles updated and improved for PSVR 2, and better yet it would be great to see Sony setting its first-party studios to the task of creating high quality VR content once again.

But PSVR 2 only represents pseudo-competition for Meta, since the headset only appeals to those that already own a PS5 (or who are willing to buy a PS5 just to get the headset).

Real Competition for Meta?

On the other hand, some real competition from the likes of Pico and HTC may be on the way.

On the high-end, HTC’s newly announced Vive XR Elite is clearly positioned to compete with Meta’s Quest Pro. With most of the same essential features, but a lower price point ($1,100 vs. $1,500), the Vive XR Elite at least looks at face value like an alternative choice for those looking for a more compact VR headset with improved passthrough AR capabilities.

And on the low-end, Pico’s recently launched Neo 4 is the first such headset that is truly competing on price with Quest 2. Priced at €20 or €50 less than Quest 2 (depending upon storage capacity), looks like a real alternative. Granted, the company has yet to formally bring its headset to the United States—Meta’s home turf.

But… both Vive XR Elite and Pico Neo 4 share a common problem, and that’s content.

A Big Moment for Content Momentum

Regardless of specs and price, unless the content that users want is available on these headsets, they are difficult to consider real options (and thus real competition). As of now, both headsets lack many of the best-selling and most-played killer apps that are available on Meta’s Quest headsets.

But that could finally be changing. Compared to prior alternative standalone headsets, XR Elite and Neo 4 have a much more significant and recognizable body of content than we’ve seen in the past. If more developers recognize the benefit that both they and consumers alike would see from having a more competitive standalone market… perhaps this could be the start of an important sea change in the industry.

The Elephant in the Room

Of course the single biggest elephant in the room has been and will continue to be Apple. It seems that every month we get a new rumor about when the company will enter the market, with the only certainty being that the company is definitely hard at work on something—though no one knows precisely when they will announced it, let alone launch it.

Apple, more than any other company in the world, has the potential to disrupt Meta at its own game by releasing an XR headset with a highly polished user experience… something the social-media-turned-metaverse company (and frankly the VR industry at large) has struggled with.

Make no mistake, Apple’s entrance into the XR space will have wide reaching implications practically overnight—both within the XR space and outside of it.

Look for UX Innovation, Not a Hardware Breakthrough

But nobody should be expecting hardware breakthroughs from Apple. The company is stuck with the same (largely physical) constraints as the rest of the major players in the industry. Whatever device they launch is likely to have similar specs and form-factor to what the latest headsets we see on the market today. More importantly however, Apple is likely to contribute key software design, device interoperability, and overall UX learnings that other companies in XR have consistently struggled with.

While Apple is certainly a threat to the likes of Meta, the company’s entrance into the market is also likely to be a boon for Meta overall; not only will it be a validation of Meta’s early and ambitious bet on the space, but the best XR design concepts revealed from within Apple will be adopted for the betterment of the industry at large. For Meta, Apple’s entrance into the space can’t come soon enough.

Meta Faces the Same Old Struggles

While Quest 2 has been more widely adopted than any other standalone headset, user retention continues to be an issue. Not only due to substandard UX, but also the headset being stuck in an arcade phase where years-old games like Beat Saber, Superhot VR, and Job Simulator continue to be among the most popular games on the platform—seemingly signaling that only a small amount of compelling new content has reached the headset in the years since Quest 2 has launched. Meanwhile, the headset most enthusiastic userbase—core gamers—is underserved, waiting for the sort of large-scale and highly polished content that they expect from the traditional gaming space.

As for Meta’s 2023… outside of the Apple wildcard, the company has confirmed that it’s working on a next-gen consumer headset due out this year, which is very likely to be Quest 3. And while the company has some pretty wild R&D projects in the oven, more likely than not, Quest 3 will adopt core parts of the Quest Pro headset rather than offering some kind of major leap in features or form-factor.

Last But Not Least

As for PC VR, the only thing keeping the platform alive is an enthusiast player base that’s hungry for greater immersion and starved for next-gen VR content. Unfortunately with so much attention focused on standalone VR by platform holders and developers, PC VR in 2023 will be largely stuck with content built for other platforms that happens to spill over.

Between that content, the VR modding scene, smaller-scope projects from enthusiast indie developers, and the occasional release of VR-optional flight or racing sims—PC VR will feel like it’s on life support through 2023.

PC VR is and continues to be the place where users can push immersion to the next level with niche accessories like full-body trackers, racing & cockpit peripherals, haptic vests, and gun stocks. And while some unannounced PC VR headsets may make an appearance in 2023, the drought of next-gen PC VR content means dwindling reasons to upgrade.

– – — – –

What’s your 2023 VR outlook? Let us know in the comments below.

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Brainy UK scientists create robust optic fiber that may unlock our quantum future

Next Featured, Tech / DJ Henderson / January 16, 2023

Optical fibers have become the foundation of modern data transmission, used for everything from telecoms and internet services to governmental and space applications. This is because they’re capable of transmitting larger amounts of data at faster speeds and over longer distances, compared to other technologies.

The structure of optical fibers, however, can occasionally lead to network failures, as any twisted or bent cables can hinder the information transfer. To address this issue, scientists at the University of Bath in the UK have designed a new type of fiber, aiming to enhance the robustness of these networks.

A regular optical fiber consists of three elements: the core, the cladding, and the coating.

The core is at the center and provides a pathway for light (the medium through which data is transmitted) to travel. The cladding holds the light inside the core and controls the direction in which it travels, bouncing along as though reflecting off a mirror. Finally, the coating works as the primary buffer and a jacket encases the entire structure.

optical fiber structure — The typical structure of an optical fiber. Credit: Bob Mellish/Wikimedia

“Whenever you fabricate a fiber-optic cable, small variations in the physical structure of the fiber are inevitably present. When deployed in a network, the fiber can also get twisted and bent,” Physics PhD student Nathan Roberts — who led the research — said.

These distortions can hinder the light’s optimum pathway and lead to information degradation as it moves between the sender and receiver.

“One way to counter these variations and defects is to ensure the fiber design process includes a real focus on robustness. This is where we found the ideas of topology useful,” Roberts added.

Topology is the mathematical study of the properties of geometrical objects that remain unchanged despite deformations, twistings, and stretchings. It has already been applied to physics and light research, but the Bath scientists are the first to use it in optical fibers.

The physicists have created a fiber that employs topological principles by adding several light-guiding cores in the fiber, linked together in a spiral. Light can still travel between these cores, but, thanks to the topological design, it remains trapped within the edge. These so-called “edge states” are shielded from disorder in the overall structure.

“By adopting optical fibers with topological design, researchers will have the tools to pre-empt and forestall signal-degrading effects by building inherently robust photonic systems,” Dr Anton Souslov, co-author of the study, explained.

Currently, the researchers are looking for industry partners to further develop their concept, which could benefit not only existing communications, but also future quantum networks.

“We have shown that you can make kilometers of topological fiber wound around a spool. We envision a quantum internet where information will be transmitted robustly across continents using topological principles,” Roberts noted.

Compared to conventional computers, quantum technology is expected to be vastly more powerful when it comes to storing and processing information, while promising an unparalleled (so far) level of data security — a potential game changer for information networks.

However, the quantum states of light with transfer information can be easily affected by the environment, presenting a significant challenge. This study may pave the way towards using topological design to preserve quantum information in optical fibers.

You can find the research here.

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New HoloSuite Feature Enables Users to Seamlessly Blend Volumetric Video Clips

augmented reality, extended reality, featured, metaverse, News, Software, virtual reality / DJ Henderson / January 16, 2023

Arcturus, volumetric video editing and streaming tools provider, has been at the forefront of virtual production, revolutionizing immersive content experiences across a vast range of verticals.

As part of its efforts to bring volumetric video to a wider audience, it prioritizes research and development of new tools that allow creators to fully harness the power of volumetric video. One of its latest releases is an innovative tool that aims to transform virtual production, XR storytelling, and metaverse experiences on HoloSuite.

Blend: Connecting Volumetric Video Clips With Seamless Transitions

Arcturus recently unveiled a new beta tool that further amplifies the capabilities of HoloSuite, its flagship platform for volumetric video. The “Blend” tool, a product of years of research and development by the Arcturus team, gives users a unique way to explore new forms of digital storytelling, build immersive experiences, develop metaverse content, and more.

Arcturus - Beta feature Blend volumetric video

With Blend, users can connect volumetric video clips and blend them seamlessly. Creators can now take live-action clips, use volumetric video characters to populate virtual backgrounds, and build branching narratives with imperceptible transitions between tracks.

With the new tool, creators of metaverse experiences can use people instead of computer-generated avatars in their content. They can insert blended volumetric video clips of live-action 3D performances into digital environments without having to create digidoubles. Blend also allows users to blend and loop multiple recordings of a photorealistic subject.

“Volumetric video isn’t just offering content creators new ways to do old things better; with the right tools, it offers possibilities that simply weren’t there before,” said CEO of Arcturus, Kamal Mistry, in a press release shared with ARPost. “Our new tools will open up a huge range of potential uses across multiple industries, and soon we will begin to see content unlike anything that’s ever been seen before.”

The Arcturus team designed and developed the Blend tool to meet the emerging demands of volumetric video users. While still in beta, all current HoloSuite users have access to the tool and can provide their feedback to help improve its capabilities.

With the beta testing running over the next few months, the team can fine-tune functionalities and ensure compatibility and stability before the tool becomes a standard feature on the platform.

More HoloSuite Updates From Arcturus

The Blend tool is just one of the several updates released for HoloSuite last month. Along with it, Arcturus also released a host of quality-of-life improvements and upgrades that open a wider range of potential uses for HoloSuite across multiple industries.

Unity users can now enjoy improved OMS playback with their HoloSuite plugins. This provides them with better viewing controls for volumetric video files within Unity. Support for upgrades for OMS playback on Unreal Engine 5 is expected to roll out soon.

Game engine users can now also use “Generate Normals” to smoothen noise for better relighting on volumetric subjects. For more dynamic viewing, HoloSuite added new lighting preferences that include adding environmental lighting directly within HoloEdit. The new native 4DS file support also allows users to import data directly from 4DViews.

New feature Arcturus HoloSuite 4DS import

Framing the Future of Video

Arcturus is committed to giving content creators the tools they need to create authentic digital human representations and immersive experiences. To further advance technology in this field, it has announced a new $11 million round of Series A funding in November 2022. The funding, led by CloudTree Ventures with substantial investments from Epic Games and Autodesk, signifies confidence in the vast potential of volumetric video.

The new funding will help Arcturus grow its infrastructure and continue developing the HoloSuite platform. It will help expand research into new tools that further the use of AI in volumetric video production, improve 3D data capture, and enhance live streaming on digital platforms among many others.

Just like the Blend tool, more tools and techniques are bound to revolutionize the way users create and interact with digital content. As it unlocks new possibilities for virtual production through state-of-the-art 3D creation tools, Arcturus is framing the future of video.

New HoloSuite Feature Enables Users to Seamlessly Blend Volumetric Video Clips Read More »

Why TensorFlow for Python is dying a slow death

House of Talent, Insider / DJ Henderson / January 13, 2023

Religious wars have been a cornerstone in tech. Whether it’s debating about the pros and cons of different operating systems, cloud providers, or deep learning frameworks — a few beers in, the facts slide aside and people start fighting for their technology like it’s the holy grail.

Just think about the endless talk about IDEs. Some people prefer VisualStudio, others use IntelliJ, again others use plain old editors like Vim. There’s a never-ending debate, half-ironic of course, about what your favorite text editor might say about your personality.

Similar wars seem to be flaring up around PyTorch and TensorFlow. Both camps have troves of supporters. And both camps have good arguments to suggest why their favorite deep learning framework might be the best.

That being said, the data speaks a fairly simple truth. TensorFlow is, as of now, the most widespread deep learning framework. It gets almost twice as many questions on StackOverflow every month as PyTorch does.

On the other hand, TensorFlow hasn’t been growing since around 2018. PyTorch has been steadily gaining traction until the day this post got published.

For the sake of completeness, I’ve also included Keras in the figure below. It was released at around the same time as TensorFlow. But, as one can see, it’s tanked in recent years. The short explanation for this is that Keras is a bit simplistic and too slow for the demands that most deep learning practitioners have.

Graph showing percentage of StackOverflow tagged TensorFlow, Keras, and PyTorch over time — PyTorch is still growing, while TensorFlow’s growth has stalled. Graph from StackOverflow trends.

StackOverflow traffic for TensorFlow might not be declining at a rapid speed, but it’s declining nevertheless. And there are reasons to believe that this decline will become more pronounced in the next few years, particularly in the world of Python.

PyTorch feels more pythonic

Developed by Google, TensorFlow might have been one of the first frameworks to show up to the deep learning party in late 2015. However, the first version was rather cumbersome to use — as many first versions of any software tend to be.

That is why Meta started developing PyTorch as a means to offer pretty much the same functionalities as TensorFlow, but making it easier to use.

The people behind TensorFlow soon took note of this, and adopted many of PyTorch’s most popular features in TensorFlow 2.0.

A good rule of thumb is that you can do anything that PyTorch does in TensorFlow. It will just take you twice as much effort to write the code. It’s not so intuitive and feels quite un-pythonic, even today.

PyTorch, on the other hand, feels very natural to use if you enjoy using Python.

PyTorch has more available models

Many companies and academic institutions don’t have the massive computational power needed to build large models. Size is king, however, when it comes to machine learning; the larger the model the more impressive its performance is.

With HuggingFace, engineers can use large, trained and tuned models and incorporate them in their pipelines with just a few lines of code. However, a staggering 85% of these models can only be used with PyTorch. Only about 8% of HuggingFace models are exclusive to TensorFlow. The remainder is available for both frameworks.

This means that if you’re planning to use large models, you’d better stay away from TensorFlow or invest heavily in compute resources to train your own model.

PyTorch is better for students and research

PyTorch has a reputation for being appreciated more by academia. This is not unjustified; three out of four research papers use PyTorch. Even among those researchers who started out using TensorFlow — remember that it arrived earlier to the deep learning party — the majority have migrated to PyTorch now.

These trends are staggering and persist despite the fact that Google has quite a large footprint in AI research and mainly uses TensorFlow.

What’s perhaps more striking about this is that research influences teaching, and therefore defines what students might learn. A professor who has published the majority of their papers using PyTorch will be more inclined to use it in lectures. Not only are they more comfortable teaching and answering questions regarding PyTorch; they might also have stronger beliefs regarding its success.

College students therefore might get much more insights about PyTorch than TensorFlow. And, given that the college students of today are the workers of tomorrow, you can probably guess where this trend is going…

PyTorch’s ecosystem has grown faster

At the end of the day, software frameworks only matter insofar as they’re players in an ecosystem. Both PyTorch and TensorFlow have quite developed ecosystems, including repositories for trained models other than HuggingFace, data management systems, failure prevention mechanisms, and more.

It’s worth stating that, as of now, TensorFlow has a slightly more developed ecosystem than PyTorch. However, keep in mind that PyTorch has shown up later to the party and has had quite some user growth over the past few years. Therefore one can expect that PyTorch’s ecosystem might outgrow TensorFlow’s in due time.

TensorFlow has the better deployment infrastructure

As cumbersome as TensorFlow might be to code, once it’s written is a lot easier to deploy than PyTorch. Tools like TensorFlow Serving and TensorFlow Lite make deployment to cloud, servers, mobile, and IoT devices happen in a jiffy.

PyTorch, on the other hand, has been notoriously slow in releasing deployment tools. That being said, it has been closing the gap with TensorFlow quite rapidly as of late.

It’s hard to predict at this point in time, but it’s quite possible that PyTorch might match or even outgrow TensorFlow’s deployment infrastructure in the years to come.

TensorFlow code will probably stick around for a while because it’s costly to switch frameworks after deployment. However, it’s quite conceivable that newer deep learning applications will increasingly be written and deployed with PyTorch.

TensorFlow is not all about Python

TensorFlow isn’t dead. It’s just not as popular as it once was.

The core reason for this is that many people who use Python for machine learning are switching to PyTorch.

But Python is not the only language out there for machine learning. It’s the O.G. of machine learning, and that’s the only reason why the developers of TensorFlow centered its support around Python.

These days, one can use TensorFlow with JavaScript, Java, and C++. The community is also starting to develop support for other languages like Julia, Rust, Scala, and Haskell, among others.

PyTorch, on the other hand, is very centered around Python — that’s why it feels so pythonic after all. There is a C++ API, but there isn’t half the support for other languages that TensorFlow offers.

It’s quite conceivable that PyTorch will overtake TensorFlow within Python. On the other hand, TensorFlow, with its impressive ecosystem, deployment features, and support for other languages, will remain an important player in deep learning.

Whether you choose TensorFlow or PyTorch for your next project depends mostly on how much you love Python.

This article was written by Ari Joury and was originally published on Medium. You can read it here.

Why TensorFlow for Python is dying a slow death Read More »

‘Rec Room’ Teams Up with NFL for New Virtual Merch Featuring All 32 Teams

News, nfl, nfl vr, rec room, rec room avatars, rec room footbal, rec room merch, Social Virtual Reality, Social VR / DJ Henderson / January 12, 2023

Rec Room announced it’s partnering with the National Football League (NFL) to bring a host of officially licensed virtual merch to the social VR platform.

Kicking off today, Rec Room will feature a new NFL pop-up shop where users can buy NFL-licensed virtual hoodies and hats, which includes all 32 NFL teams.

Although we were hoping for an official NFL football mini-game too, the studio says its’ also launching a photobooth in the platform’s ‘Rec Center’ hub which will also let fans show off their NFL-licensed gear by snapping a few photos for social.

The platform has played host to similar events in the past, with an NBA event last year bringing team jerseys and branded basketballs to the platform. More recently, Rec Room signed a deal with Mattel to release avatar items based on the world of Masters of the Universe.

Rec Room now boasts over 82 million lifetime users, which is in part thanks to the fact that it’s free to download across basically all major platforms, including mobile, PC, console, standalone VR and PC VR.

This, combined with a $3.5 billion valuation thanks to over $294 million in outside funding to date, has undoubtedly allowed the company to expand its selection of first-party mini-games, which include activities such as paintball, offroad racing, co-op dungeons, and more.

Moreover, the studio has since monetized its free-to-play app with the addition of premium paid memberships, which unlocks the ability for users to not only earn in-game currency by creating and selling items, but also convert it into actual cash. The platform’s premium users create things like rooms, gadgets, avatar items, and mini-games—all of it designed to pull in users and get them spending in app’s in-game currency.

‘Rec Room’ Teams Up with NFL for New Virtual Merch Featuring All 32 Teams Read More »

‘Roblox’ Rumored to Launch on Meta Quest in Late 2023

News, Quest 2, quest roblox, roblox, roblox quest, roblox vr, Social Virtual Reality, Social VR / DJ Henderson / January 12, 2023

Roblox already supports PC VR headsets in addition to every conceivable traditional platform out there, although a recent report maintains the metaverse powerhouse may land on Quest later this year.

The report arrives from The Verge’s newly released paid newsletter, Command Line, which was created by The Verge’s deputy editor Alex Heath.

In it, Heath reports Roblox may be arriving on Quest in the second half of 2023, however that “plans are subject to change.” Thus far, neither Meta nor Roblox has responded for comment.

This isn’t completely out of left field either. In the company’s Q1 2021 earnings call, Roblox CEO and co-founder Dave Baszucki said its free-to-play game made “perfect sense” for the Quest platform.

Still, creating a native Roblox app for Quest may not be as trivial as it sounds, and that’s despite the fact that the social gaming platform can run on even the humblest of Android devices. Like VRChat or Rec Room, the platform is awash with tons of user-generated content, and making sure that content can run on Quest 2 will require some performance hoops if the app wants to maintain its much famed cross-play functionality.

One thing is fairly certain though, if Roblox is coming to Quest, it probably won’t support Quest 1, as Meta is currently in the process of phasing out the headset for both first-party social functions and security patches.

‘Roblox’ Rumored to Launch on Meta Quest in Late 2023 Read More »

ROSE and Mastercard® Augment the Miami Design District in a New Immersive Experience

AR experiences, art, Art & Culture, augmented reality, featured, Mastercard, ROSE, trending / DJ Henderson / January 11, 2023

Mastercard cardholders can see Miami’s Design District in a whole new light, thanks to an immersive experience from ROSE. Follow along for a look at the #Priceless experience and exclusive insight from ROSE on how it came together.

Experience Miami’s Design District In AR

The newest experience on Mastercard’s “Priceless” platform is an AR tour of Miami’s Design District, led by CEO, entrepreneur, and art collector Craig Robins. Some of the seven stops in the viewer’s virtual tour are currently in Robins’ private collection.

ROSE and Mastercard immersive experience - Miami Design District AR tour

“This iconic destination provides enthusiasts with special access to the vibrant arts scene in Miami, as well as the multi-sensory dimensions of the Mastercard brand through our sonic music and immersive visual branding,” said Mastercard Executive VP of Consumer Marketing and Revenue, Monica Biagiotti. “To ensure the experience captures everything the Design District represents, we’re thrilled to partner with the ultimate insider, Craig Robins who introduces a special, curated tour for our guests.”

Each of the stops is marked by an orb that appears in the viewer’s camera feed on their connected smart device. Viewers can select experiences by tapping the orb or by moving toward it. Each bubble transports viewers to its own immersive experience, wherein they can further navigate around the artworks and architecture presented in the tour.

ROSE and Mastercard Augment the Miami Design District in a New Immersive Experience

“We’ve been dipping our toes in the AR space to better understand how people want to engage with this new technology,” said Biagiotti. “AR and other emerging data-driven technologies provide us with an opportunity to connect more consumers with their passions – like travel – in innovative ways so they can learn or experience something new and enriching.”

The stops along the tour include:

Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawing #1138;
Virgil Abloh’s Dollar a Gallon III;
Buckminster Fuller’s Fly’s Eye Dome;
Criola’s Interdimensional Portal;
John Baldessari’s Fun Mural (Part 1);
Urs Fischer’s Standing Julian;
Jana Euler’s Two Brides.

ROSE and Mastercard - Priceless immersive experience

“Miami is becoming a destination for art and technology, this experience really marries the two as a way for Mastercard™ cardholders everywhere to experience iconic and large-scale art pieces from anywhere using immersive technology,” ROSE Associate Creative Director Nicole Riemer said in an emailed response.

How the Immersive Experience Came Together

This immersive experience is the second XR experience created by ROSE and Mastercard. The first was a Snapchat Lens for Mastercard’s Stand Up To Cancer campaign that launched last summer.

“Working with Mastercard™ has been great!” said Riemer. “For both projects, the Mastercard™ teams have been super excited about using augmented reality and have trusted us as experts in this space. That has allowed us to have a very collaborative relationship.”

Another familiar piece of the puzzle was 8th Wall. ROSE had been working with the company since before it was purchased by Niantic, and the relationship shows no signs of souring.

“Their support is always great. Their team is very available to work through how to implement our ideas on their platform, and being open to feedback about features,” said Riemer. “During the development of this project, their team checked in often to see if they could offer support, as well as planning for using this as a case study for their platform.”

How to Experience Miami From Anywhere

Mastercard cardholders can virtually visit Miami’s Design District here. The immersive experience runs through June 1, 2023.

(Terms apply. Quantities limited.)

ROSE and Mastercard® Augment the Miami Design District in a New Immersive Experience Read More »

Meta Sharpens the Axe for Quest 1: First-party Social Ends in March, Security Patches in 2024

meta quest 1, News, Oculus Quest, oculus quest 1, original quest, quest 1, quest 1 games, Standalone VR Headset / DJ Henderson / January 10, 2023

It seems Meta is finally taking the original 2019 Quest behind the shed this year, as the company announced it’s set to deprecate first-party social features on the device, which includes access to Parties and Meta Horizon Home. Meta also announced it won’t be delivering new features beyond critical bug fixes and security patches until 2024.

The company sent out an email to users of the original Quest detailing the upcoming changes. Here’s that email in full:

We launched Quest 1 over four years ago and we are grateful to the Quest 1 community for pushing VR forwards. As we look to the future, we remain committed to supporting the community of Quest 1 users and will continue to support the headset with a few changes:

You will still be able to use your Quest 1 headset and available apps.

We won’t be delivering new features to Quest 1.

We plan to continue maintaining the system software with critical bug fixes and security patches until 2024.

Quest 1 users will no longer be able to create or join a party.

Quest 1 users who currently have access to Meta Horizon Home social features will lose access to these features on 5 March 2023. You won’t be able to invite others to your Home or visit someone else’s Home.

If you have any questions about these changes or about your Quest 1 headset, we encourage you to contact Meta Store support here: https://store.facebook.com/help/support/

Thank you to the entire Quest 1 community for helping us get to where we are today.

Launched in May 2019, the original Quest wasn’t just the company’s first 6DOF standalone headset—it was a valuable new platform that sparked an explosion in content revenue, making it the target platform du jour for VR game developers. Many of the hits of today owe their success to having gained foothold on the original Quest.

Quest (left) comapred to Quest 2 (right) | Photo by Road to VR

A little over one year later, Meta (ex-Facebook) released its successor, Quest 2, which substantively included higher resolution displays (1,440 × 1,600 OLED vs 1,920 × 1,832 LCD) and a higher refresh rate (72 Hz vs up to 120 Hz), both of which were driven by a Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2—a significant upgrade over the Quest 1’s Snapdragon 835.

Undoubtedly, Quest 2 has since cemented itself as the go-to home for VR developers looking to maximize profit; two years after its launch, Quest 2 content has managed to generate $1.5 billion in revenue.

Although you’d think social function deprecation and a clear end date to security patches for Quest 1 should come as no real surprise; it’s old and you’d be hard-pressed to find it new in the box anywhere. Still, seven of the top 10 best-rated games on the Quest Store support the original Quest in addition to Quest 2. A majority of them were released after the launch of Quest 2.

Granted, Quest 1 users should only really focus on the security patch death date; even then, the headset will still be able to access all store content in addition to being used as a PC VR headset with Steam.

Meta Sharpens the Axe for Quest 1: First-party Social Ends in March, Security Patches in 2024 Read More »

UK pumps cold cash into green freight with new £7M tech fund

Next Featured, Tech / DJ Henderson / January 10, 2023

Story by

Ioanna Lykiardopoulou

Ioanna is a writer at SHIFT. She likes the transition from old to modern, and she’s all about shifting perspectives. Ioanna is a writer at SHIFT. She likes the transition from old to modern, and she’s all about shifting perspectives.

On Monday, the UK government launched a £7M tech fund aiming to decarbonize the freight industry and improve transport links.

Over the course of three years, the Freight Innovation Fund (FIF) will go to up to 36 SMEs to develop innovative technologies that can make industrial transport more “efficient,” “resilient,” and “greener.”

“Each year in the UK, we transport 1.6 billion tonnes of freight using many different modes of transport, and it has never been quicker or easier,” Nicola Yates OBE, CEO at Connected Places Catapult — the government’s innovation accelerator — said in the associated press release. “The freight sector makes a huge contribution to our economy and contributes significantly to domestic carbon emissions,” she added.

The fund will support the development of ideas and respective technology which will mainly address three persistent issues in the freight sector:

The lack of large-scale, cross-industry data collection and sharing between different modes of freight transport (such as road, rail, and maritime) that could boost efficiency and coordination.
Issues in intermodal transport and ways to improve the division of large shipments into smaller ones, which could reduce emissions and traffic.
Upgrades in freight distribution in ports across different transport modes that could have a positive ripple effect on the predictability, scheduling, and efficiency of journeys.

The FIF will be delivered to SMEs by Delivered by Connected Places Catapult, allowing them access to technical and business support from the organization.

The selected SMEs will also benefit from a freight innovation fund accelerator, which will provide support to innovators and help them access private investment, as well as from a freight innovation cluster — a community of innovators within the sector that organizes networking events and activities.

“Our freight industry is vital to underpinning the economy and keeps Britain moving, so it is crucial we invest in new innovations to make it greener and quicker, Roads Minister Richard Holden noted. “This fund will accelerate new ideas and technologies, helping to develop a future pipeline of innovations that can be rolled out to create jobs and allow everyone to get their goods faster and easier.”

UK pumps cold cash into green freight with new £7M tech fund Read More »

Author name: DJ Henderson