Shakira promotes latest album with augmented reality treasure hunt
Sony Music US Latin has teamed up with the location-based experiences platform Landmrk, for the global launch of Shakira’s latest album ‘El Dorado’.
By placing digital content in the physical world, in the UK and globally, Landmrk’s platform gives fans of the Colombian superstar the chance to unlock exclusive experiences.
By logging into Landmrk’s specially designed mobile web platform, fans are able to find local ‘hidden treasure’ hotspots based on their location.
By travelling to one of Landmrk-generated hot spots, they are given the opportunity to unlock album exclusives, behind-the scenes footage, or even be guided to an exclusive performance by Shakira herself in New York City’s Washington Square Park. Fans are also encouraged to upload their golden selfies to the platform and on social media to ‘turn their city gold’ and share in the experience. Almost 200,000 people have engaged with the platform in the first two days.
See the full story here: http://www.netimperative.com/2017/05/shakira-promotes-latest-album-augmented-reality-treasure-hunt/
Walt Disney’s Recovered Original Disneyland Map to Be Auctioned
The original found its way into the hands of Grenade Curran. Curran was a Disney employee at the time, and asked Walt if he could keep the map sitting in the corner of Disney’s office. While it is doubtful Grenade could understand the full significance that this work would have to fans and Disney historians in the future, he still kept it safe and stored away.
See the full story here: https://www.wdwinfo.com/news-stories/walt-disneys-recovered-original-disneyland-map-to-be-auctioned/
Google now knows when its users go to the store and buy stuff
Google has begun using billions of credit-card transaction records to prove that its online ads are prompting people to make purchases – even when they happen offline in brick-and-mortar stores, the company said Tuesday.
The advance allows Google to determine how many sales have been generated by digital ad campaigns, a goal that industry insiders have long described as “the holy grail” of online advertising. But the announcement also renewed long-standing privacy complaints about how the company uses personal information.
“What’s really fascinating to me is that as the companies become increasingly intrusive in terms of their data collection, they also become more secretive,” said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. He urged government regulators and Congress to demand answers about how Google and other technology companies are collecting and using data from their users.
"While we developed the concept for this product years ago, it required years of effort to develop a solution that could meet our stringent user privacy requirements," Google said in a statement. "To accomplish this, we developed a new, custom encryption technology that ensures users' data remains private, secure, and anonymous."
Voices of VR: For Google, the Future of VR Is on the Open Web with WebVR & WebAR
I had a chance to catch up with primary WebVR spec author, Brandon Jones, at Google I/O to talk about why they’re holding off on shipping WebVR 1.1 and waiting until the latest WebVR “2.0” version is ready. It’ll ship as WebVR 1.0, but there has been such major refactoring to account for augmented reality that internally it’s referred to as the 2.0 spec. Mozilla will be shipping the 1.1 WebVR spec in their browser in August, but Jones says that the Chrome team doesn’t want to have to maintain and support the 1.1 version, which is sure to quickly be deprecated.
Sony’s Richard Marks: Voice commands are key for transforming VR into the Holodeck
Marks talked about what he thinks will be the next big step for PSVR. Surprisingly, it’s not new tracking systems or peripherals, but what we do with our voices and how virtual worlds react to them.
“There’s no limit to the things that we can do with software, right? So my whole world can just be remanufactured by the system at will, by a simple voice command, like, “Let’s go to a castle.” Boom! I can be in a castle. And I can be like, “Oh, no, a castle that has a drawbridge,” and it’ll just happen.
Back at GDC in March Sony showcased its work creating more believable characters in VR, presenting AI that had an understanding of the environments they were in and could react to them. That tech combined with voice control could create some incredibly powerful VR experiences going forward.
See the full story here: https://venturebeat.com/2017/05/21/sonys-richard-marks-voice-commands-are-key-for-transforming-vr-into-the-holodeck/
‘Pirates 5’ to Be First Hollywood Feature to Play New Panoramic Cinema Format in U.S.
Recently launched ScreenX is a multi-projector, 270-degree cinema system from Seoul-headquartered CJ 4DPlex (the company behind the 4DX 4D cinema system). According to CJ, the new installment of Pirates is scheduled to play at 83 ScreenX locations around the world, including two in the U.S., CGV Buena Park and CGV Cinemas LA, both in California.
To create the 270-degree versions of ScreenX releases, a ScreenX creative team uses CGI and footage provided by the studio. In the case of Pirates 5, select sequences of the film were converted to the widescreen format (not the entire film).
Pirates 5 will also play in 4D on 373 4DX screens worldwide, CJ reported.
See the full story here: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/behind-screen/pirates-5-be-first-hollywood-feature-play-new-panoramic-screen-us-1006335
Entrepreneurship in China
The BFA case illustrates the Chinese method, in which the central government creates an industrial policy, then provides funding, infrastructure, R&D, private sector incentives, capital and educational resources to intensify the chances of success. Startups get a leg up in a favored sector, which means that entrepreneurs may start companies that stay alive, even if they are not long-term winners in the race to find customers and profits.
But once a company gains traction, they have access to a home market unlike any in the world.
See the full blog here: http://www.nickdemartino.net/blog/2017/5/22/entrepreneurship-in-china.html
Building The VR Experiences And Worlds of the Future
Pallister added, “It feels like the current set of hardware has tipped us over a point where people can feel a magical experience but it is really only just the beginning of the types of experiences depicted in those fictional works.”
Pallister leads Intel’s virtual reality (VR) project lab in Hillsboro, Oregon. His team is working to improve the state of VR technology and to bring VR to mainstream audiences. In his current role, Pallister forecasts the progress of VR and the ingredient technologies responsible for driving VR experiences.
See the full story here: https://uploadvr.com/building-vr-experiences-worlds-future/