Digital life
fromTechRepublic
10 hours agoGoogle Vids Just Got a Major AI Upgrade - Here's What's New
Google Vids enables intuitive video creation using AI, allowing users to direct avatars and publish content quickly with simple text prompts.
Following the acquisition, the Cinemersive Labs team will join SIE's Visual Computing Group (VCG) and contribute to our broader efforts in advancing state of the art visual computing within games. This includes applying machine learning to enhance gameplay visuals, improve rendering techniques, and unlock new levels of visual fidelity for players.
The professional-grade simulator has a precision-designed cockpit and race seat to recreate the realism of FPV in the single-seater racer. To simulate the nuances of a Formula -1 car riding the tarmac, the simulator has a high-torque force feedback steering and a Leo Bodnar SimSteering 2 base.
When I was working at Magic Leap, and people asked me why I thought that was a good idea, I would ask the rhetorical question: "do you really think that twenty years from now everyone is still going to be going around all day staring at little rectangles in their hands?" At the time it seemed obvious to me that the answer was no.
What we like to say is, 'Where would you like to go today?' You get to leave the walls of the nursing home. We can link six units together, so we can do a trip together ... We can go down the streets of Paris, France.
Meta sent an email blast to Horizon Worlds users today stating that the social VR world will officially end on its Quest VR headsets; starting March 31, Horizon Worlds will no longer be in the Quest store. Some Horizon-specific perks, including Meta Credits, avatars, and some digital clothes and in-world purchases, will also be removed.
"It's not an overstatement to declare another VR winter," said J.P. Gownder, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester. "I think we might even go as far as to say there's only a handful of successful scenarios where people are using VR." This assessment reflects the industry's struggle to find practical applications beyond niche markets.
One of the big focuses of the new operating system version is what Pico calls PanoScreen, a feature that lets the wearer run multiple applications at once while also keeping a 360-degree view of the real-world space around them. Other users can pop into the space as 3D avatars while you spin around to see spreadsheets, browser tabs, design software, or whatever else you're working on.
Project Genie, which is currently only available for Google's AI Ultra subscribers, uses AI to build virtual worlds. That sounds interesting, if not necessarily revolutionary. Videogame developers already model and build virtual worlds all the time. Project Genie's simple concept, though, belies the tech's potential impact. The new system, and the Genie 3 model behind it, have the potential to forever change how videogames are built and played.
Instead of attempting to make the 3D social platform work for both VR and mobile, Meta is "explicitly separating" its "Quest VR platform from our Worlds platform" and "shifting the focus of Worlds to be almost exclusively mobile," Samantha Ryan, Reality Labs' VP of content, says in a blog post. The new approach sets Meta up to better compete with platforms like Roblox and Fortnite, which also offer user-generated experiences that can be played on your phone.
Manufacturing environments are becoming more advanced, automated, and electrified-but they are also becoming more dangerous. High-voltage (HV) systems, robotics, advanced machinery, and tightly coupled production lines introduce risks that traditional training methods are no longer equipped to address effectively. Instructor-led classroom training, PDFs, videos, and even supervised shadowing have long been the foundation of manufacturing training. However, when the consequences of error include severe injury, fatal accidents, equipment damage, or production downtime,
The Motoko's dual first-person-view cameras are positioned at eye level to basically see what you see, enabling real-time object and text recognition - translating street signs, tracking gym reps, summarizing documents on the fly, all of that. There are also dual far and near-field mics, working together to capture voice commands and pick up dialogue within view.
This week, fancy mouse manufacturer Razer showed off an "improved" version of its Project Ava at the 2026 Consumer Electronics Show. Ava is an AI-powered assistant designed to analyze game footage and offer real-time advice while you play, and while the project isn't new, its latest iteration is a freestanding peripheral that displays a cat-eared anime girl trapped in a glass tube who just kind of stands there while Ava robotically delivers advice.
Xynavo is a pair of lightweight AR glasses built around lightweight immersion, private audio, and expandable functionality. It offers a 70-degree field of view and dual 4K micro-OLED displays, creating a virtual screen equivalent to more than 300 inches, yet weighs only 95g. The goal is to turn whatever you already own into a cinema-scale display you can wear, without the weight and noise of a full headset.
This past summer, Google DeepMind debuted Genie 3. It's what's known as a world world, an AI system capable of generating images and reacting as the user moves through the environment the software is simulating. At the time, DeepMind positioned Genie 3 as a tool for training AI agents. Now, it's making the model available to people outside of Google to try with Project Genie.
Razer announced a concept AI wearable at CES that resembles a pair of wireless headphones (or Razer's Barracuda gaming headsets, to be precise), with two camera lenses built into the ear cups. The current iteration of Project Motoko is powered by an unspecified Qualcomm Snapdragon chip and uses dual first-person-view cameras positioned at eye level to capture objects, text, and anything else around you. There are also multiple microphones for receiving voice commands, dialogue, and environmental audio, and hands-free controls for managing audio settings.
Valve's second attempt at launching its Steam Machine is still set to happen in early 2026, according to AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su. In an AMD earnings call, Su specifically mentions support for Valve Steam Machine, which will make use of an AMD processor. "From a product standpoint, Valve is on track to begin shipping its AMD-powered steam machine early this year," Su states, stopping short of giving an exact timeframe.