Emerging Tech Roundup — March 27
The Quantious team’s top picks for timely trending news in the tech world.
This week in tech: MWC offers refunds, NASCAR goes virtual, Minecraft teaches young students, an AR app tries to help the hearing-impaired, XR makes a splash in the world of art collecting, and HP teases their new VR headset.
MWC 2020 Offers Refunds, Discounts Following Cancellation Due to Coronavirus
(CNET, Mar 25)
COVID-19 has led to many event cancellations, putting event organizers into a difficult position. Mobile World Conference 2020 was one of the first to cancel due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but exhibitors don’t need to worry about losing money. MWC recently announced that they’re offering complete refunds, credit for future events, and more to all exhibitors scheduled to attend MWC 2020 before it was abruptly cancelled. This act of goodwill by MWC shows how committed the event is to preserving its reputation and customer loyalty. MWC plans to return in 2021 and be just as great as ever.
Fox Will Broadcast Nascar’s Substitute Sim Racing “Season” on Television
(The Verge, Mar 25)
With the NASCAR season suspended indefinitely, Fox needed a way to keep racing fans entertained. This has led to the idea of doing virtual races on the simulation racing platform, iRacing. Many drivers were open to the idea of “competing” in these virtual races because they’re already using the platform to train. In fact, many drivers have racing rigs in their homes, including a real seat, steering wheel, pedals, and large monitors to give a truly lifelike feel. The virtual races will air on Fox and FS1 in the usual NASCAR timeslots, but racers will not be earning their usual paychecks or seasonal points.
Coronavirus: Minecraft Offers Free Lessons to Children
(BBC, Mar 24)
As the Coronavirus leads to further shutdowns, many school children are at home learning through online resources. To help out, the incredibly popular online game, Minecraft, is offering fun learning resources for kids. There are 12 unique Minecraft “worlds,” each with a different history lesson. For example, one world discusses Greek history, and another covers the International Space Station. The worlds contain puzzles, challenges, and games related to their respective topics, and they are available to users through the end of June.
Looking to Listen: Building Augmented Reality for Good
(DEN OF GEEK, Mar 24)
Cochlear.ai was founded in 2017 with the goal of creating an AI technology that can recognize and identify all types of sounds. Now, Project Looking to Listen is planning to build an AR app with that technology in order to help hearing impaired individuals to decipher the sounds around them. While other sound recognition systems focus primarily on speech, this technology focuses on all sounds in a user’s environment. The end goal of the project is to have a wearable technology that hearing-impaired people can use to see visual prompts which would inform them of all nearby sounds.
A New Platform for Galleries to Create Virtual Reality Exhibitions Using 3D-Scanning Technology
(ArtNet, Mar 24)
Oliver Miro is the son of art dealer Victoria Miro, and the Founder of Vortic, an exciting new XR platform. Vortic was created for collectors to visualize a piece of artwork in their homes in detail and at full scale. Currently, pieces can be shipped around the world for collectors to view before buying, but this takes more time, costs more money, and carries a hefty carbon footprint. Vortic simplifies this process, allowing private viewings and visualizations of artwork within your home.
HP Reverb G2 Teased as “the New Standard in VR” With Valve, Microsoft
(Slash Gear, Mar 23)
HP, Valve, and Microsoft are teaming up to bring us a new VR headset. Reliable details are hard to find, but it’s rumored that the headset will be called “HP Reverb G2.” This name makes sense as it comes after HP’s Reverb headset, which was released last year. The new headset promises to deliver top power and quality for an HMD, with HP and Steam describing it as the new standard in VR.
