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Crista Lopes has released a new update of the Diva Distro version of OpenSim, used by many individuals and small groups for private OpenSim deployments and hypergrid-enabled mini-grids, to accompany the recent general release of OpenSim 0.8.2.0. Lopes, also known as Diva Canto in-world, is one of the core developersRead More →

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CtrlAltStudio viewer developer David Rowe said he plants to stop work on the viewer, which is the only OpenSim viewer that currently supports the Oculus Rift. Linden Lab has an experimental viewer for the Oculus Rift, but it does not currently work with OpenSim. “I developed CtrlAltStudio viewer as a stop-gapRead More →

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WoofbertVR launched a Samsung Gear VR app this week that will allow users to take virtual tours to marque museums around the world. Powered by Oculus VR, the app is already available for download and first users will enjoy an offer to visit the Courtauld Gallery, which houses one of London’sRead More →

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Quantum Bakery LLC has released an iPhone case that doubles as a virtual reality viewer for iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, but most importantly, one that could turn out as very competitive since it  makes it possible to fit a virtual reality viewer into your pocket.Read More →

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Realiteer, a virtual reality company with a unique control mechanism, has released its first educational game, Wizard Academy for iOS and Android devices. I’m mentioning it here because it has a couple of game play mechanics I haven’t seen before, that could be useful for other developers. Walk-in place locomotionRead More →

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At AVATARFest 2015, a virtual festival celebrating life on the hypergrid, HYPEvents.net launched a website that lists events from all over the hypergrid so avatars can find out what is going on right now, and where. The website scrapes the web and parses event info from grid event calendars. The site provides a singleRead More →

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OpenSim crossed the 70,000 region milestone this month, with a new land area total of 71,034 standard region equivalents. It also crossed the 34,000 active users mark for the first time. OSgrid, Metropolis and Kitely were the biggest gainers in land area, with 1,272, 305 and 297 regions added, respectively. There are nowRead More →

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There are now 6,097 different products listed on the Kitely Market, in 11,847 product variations — 7,189 of which are exportable. Kitely groups items together, so that, say, a red version of a dress and a blue version of the same dress are listed as variations of the same product.Read More →

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Greenlight VR and Touchstone Research released the results of their survey of over 2,000 respondents this past week about attitudes towards virtual reality. Here are some highlights. 1. Gen-Z Rules Despite a perception among some of our readers — or maybe just in my house — kids aren’t all that blase andRead More →

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Press release: Vuzix Awarded Eight CES 2016 Innovation Awards, Including “Best of” in Gaming and Virtual Reality ROCHESTER, N.Y. —Vuzix Corp., a leading supplier of video eyewear and smart glasses products in the consumer, enterprise and entertainment markets, announced that the company has received eight International CES Innovation 2016 awards,Read More →

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More than 100,000 students have participated in virtual reality field trips through Google’s Expeditions, and the program is now expanding to 15 additional cities, Google announced Monday. Benefiting from the new move are Alexandria, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Detroit, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Orlando, Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Washington DC,Read More →

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This Friday, November 13, until Monday, November 16, AvatarFest celebrates the strength and diversity of the hypergrid community. With more than 10 live performances and over 15 exhibits this festival showcases the wide variety of talents from across the hypergrid. For example, “Immersive Edge” is a hypergrid story and adventure game in OpenSim. It is “mergingRead More →

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Second Life’s economy has a GDP of around $500 million, CEO Ebbe Altberg told The Next Web. According to Altberg, users cashed out a total in excess of $60 million last year. One user has sold around 300,000 virtual dresses at roughly $4 each. By comparison, in 2009, Second Life reported aRead More →

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Press release: Veterans United Foundation and Jaunt Inc. Release Honor 360 Virtual Reality Experiences Bringing National Memorials to Those Aging and Disabled Military Veterans Who Cannot Make the Trip This Veterans Day, Veterans United and Jaunt Bring Immersive, Virtual Honor Flights to US Military Veterans Everywhere COLUMBIA, Mo. – Jaunt Inc.,Read More →

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With virtual reality exploding, this is a great time for virtual world experts to repackage themselves as virtual reality consultants and start putting their hard-won expertise to work. Whether your focus is training and education, content creation, interaction design, scripting or development, you probably know more than most of theRead More →

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Virtual Life is now home to a couple of new skill-based games that offer visitors a chance to win real money, grid founder and CEO Keith Sparkman told Hypergrid Business. Froggy Leisure, a gaming company known for its presence in Second Life, and also active on the Avination and YrGrid,Read More →

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It’s back to the past for AviWorlds this week, as the grid has moved to turn off hypergrid connectivity and start charging for uploads. By our count, this is the fifth time the grid has turned off hypergrid connectivity after turning it on. The previous time was last winter, notRead More →

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Update: In August 2016, I bought a FiiT VR 2S, and that is now my new favorite. Another headset I’m recommending is the BoboVR Z4 headset, which has a 120-degree field of view, built-in headphones, and a built-in control button. As some of you know, I’m a big fan of open-sided headsets, likeRead More →

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For the first time since the creation of motion pictures, a new medium of storytelling is being built: virtual reality. As with any new medium of art, the rules are being established, language being developed and devices being explored. As it stands currently within the realm of virtual reality, anythingRead More →

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Update: There are now apps you can use that make it easier to create a new Google Cardboard QR Code. One we tried out recently is Sites in VR. Read our review here. I recently ordered Baofeng Small Mojing virtual reality headset from AliExpress. They start at $12, with free shipping, andRead More →

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Having been reading more and more of the Alpha Tester posts about High Fidelity I thought it was about time to give it a try – and our Daden U day on 30th October provided the ideal opportunity. High Fidelity is the new virtual world development from Second Life founder Philip Rosedale,Read More →

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YouTube has updated its Android app, the company announced yesterday, with better support for virtual reality. The app first added an option to watch videos in immersive 3D with the Google Cardboard-compatible headset back in June. The platform already had thousands of 360-degree videos, where people could use a mouse orRead More →

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They met as text on a digital page. An ocean between them assurance that they could be who they wished they were in their lover’s eyes. Love’s illusions fashioned in ones and zeroes texted across the transatlantic cable. No warning that the god-helmets they experimented with would fuse their consciousnessRead More →

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LandMark Entertainment Group is bringing theme park experiences to living rooms — via virtual reality. The company, best known for traditional rides and other theme park experiences based on movies such as Jurassic Park and Terminator, is planning to release the Pavilion of Me virtual entertainment portal,  in the fall of 2016Read More →

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Press release: Virtual reality specialist Daden awarded £230,000 by Innovate UK Daden Limited – a virtual reality specialist based at the Innovation Birmingham Campus – has been awarded nearly £230,000 by Innovate UK for its Virtual Field Trips as a Service initiative. The funding has been awarded in phase two of InnovateRead More →

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Just in time for the holiday season, four grids are lowering land prices or offering special holiday deals. 3rd Rock Grid A week ago, 3rd Rock Grid program director Zinnia Frenzy contacted Hypergrid Business to let us know that the prices listed in our vendor directory had changed. Instead of $50Read More →

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HTC’s Vive virtual reality  headset has received the Best Accessory at Paris Games Week, and Sony’s Playstation VR received the Technical Innovation prize at the world’s second-largest video game trade fair, the organization announced. The Vive was featured at Paris Games Week with several playable virtual reality demonstrations, including a first-personRead More →

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Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts today announced the first-ever integration of virtual reality experiences into worldwide hotel sales efforts. The group has rolled out Samsung Gear VR headsets across all Global Sales Offices and produced immersive 360-degree videos for over a quarter of its 94 hotels and resorts. Nearly half ofRead More →

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UK supermarket Asda has launched a virtual reality Halloween experience on its YouTube channel, and the video quickly became the second-most-watched video on the supermarket’s channel, with more than a million views in just a week. The 360-degree video can be watched on a traditional screen, where viewers can scroll theRead More →

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Aside from some patents, Apple has been very quiet on the virtual reality front. While many iPhone users are enjoying virtual reality applications and immersive videos, they are using Google Cardboard-compatible headsets. Today, Apple has finally taken one small public step into virtual reality, with the release of an immersiveRead More →

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With Halloween slowly encroaching on us like a spooky ghoul, there are parties, hunts and games all over the metaverse for this special and scary season. Here’s a list of more than a dozen events, all just a short hypergrid hop away. 1. OSgrid Halloween Dance The most popular grid on theRead More →

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According to Virtual Reality Brand Power Index released this morning by YouVisit, 75 percent of the Forbes World’s Most Valuable Brands have created some form of virtual or augmented reality experience for customers or employees, or are themselves innovating and developing these technologies. The tech sector is in the lead inRead More →

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Many grids, especially those with unique or specialized content, struggle with content protection issues. Both closed and open grids have problems with copybotters, while hypergrid-enabled grids also have the additional risk to scripts. Grids with large quantities of unique or high-end content are particularly at risk. So, for example, SecondRead More →

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Press release: Kaleidoscope VR Film Festival awards jury prize to Tomas Mariancik for Sightline: The Chair San Francisco, CA –Virtual reality agency Kaleidoscope in partnership with Broad Green Pictures, today unveiled the Jury Prize winner of the Kaleidoscope VR Film Festival (KVRFF). Presented by Vrideo, KVRFF is a multi-city tourRead More →

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Framingham, Mass.-based research firm International Data Corp. announced today that augmented and virtual reality is one of six key “innovation accelerators” the company will be devoting additional research focus to. “Innovation accelerators are the next wave of 3rd Platform technologies that are critical to digital transformation,” said Crawford Del Prete,Read More →

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UK-based AuraVisor launched a Kickstarter campaign Wednesday to raise $153,000 for a new all-in-one virtual reality headset that requires neither a PC nor a smartphone, and already raised more than $100,000. The headset is expected to sell for around US$450, and includes an external game controller. Early backers were able to orderRead More →

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Sunnyvale, California startup LucidCam promises to make virtual reality filming accessible to anyone with a $600 hand-sized camera that films in 180 degrees. And the company just launched a crowdfunding campaign on IndieGoGo offering the camera to early supporters at a 50 percent discount. LucidCam hopes to raise $100,000 with itsRead More →

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Press release: Next Galaxy Corp and EON Reality Join Forces to Expand CEEK The Partners will Share Technical Expertise and Combine Sales and Marketing Efforts Miami Beach, FL. – Next Galaxy Corp., a leading developer of innovative content solutions and immersive consumer virtual reality technology, and EON Reality Inc., theRead More →

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On this day in 2008, Crista Lopes, a professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine, sent an email to the OpenSim developers mailing list. “I started working on an extension to OpenSim that makes it work in peer-to-peer mode… I’m really excited to say that this is working!” sheRead More →

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OSVR, the open source alternative to the Oculus Rift, is now available for pre-order from Razer for $300. “The current stock we have is being shipped to areas in the US and the EU,” the company announced on its forums yesterday. “Countries in Asia Pacific will follow soon.” According to MaximumRead More →

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3rd Rock Grid is proud to announce the hand-over of its management to the Stichting 3rd Rock Grid Foundation, a not-for-profit corporation registered in the Netherlands. The foundation’s six-member board of unpaid directors, comprised of involved citizens, includes previous owners, together with dedicated volunteers.Read More →

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Indiana’s basketball season officially opens this Saturday, October 24, with the first game live-streamed in virtual reality. The Mark Cuban Center for Sports Media and Technology introduces virtual reality to their fans with their new Samsung Gear VR headsets. Fans will be able to experience Hoosier Hysteria as if they wereRead More →

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The Army’s Research Laboratory Simulation and Training Technology Center has begun work on a browser-based viewer for OpenSim that uses WebGL, HTML 5 and Javascript technology. “The initial work was done using our MOSES Grid Manager that laid down the interfaces to the Open Simulator needed for this task,” said Douglas Maxwell, the scienceRead More →

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Games, immersive videos, and branded marketing experiences will drive adoption in virtual reality next year, according to a panel of experts hosted by We are Wearables last week in Toronto. Gaming markets will lead other markets in adopting commercial virtual reality, according to Milan Baic, founder of Pinch VR, a smartphone-based virtual reality headset maker.Read More →

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HTC will be holding demos of its Vive headset tonight and tomorrow in fifteen cities across the United States as a promotion for the new Paranormal Activity movie. I have tried the Vive headset, and it was significantly farther along than any other virtual reality headset I’ve tried. If youRead More →

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The 2015 OpenSimulator Community Conference, scheduled for Saturday, December 5, has been extended into Sunday. “On the second day the OSCC grid will be open,” said Crista Lopes, hypergrid inventor and OpenSim core developer. “There are five breakout areas and the expos, so there’s plenty of room for everyone over aRead More →

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Press Release: Kennesaw State Students Release Virtual World Production Kennesaw, Ga. – An experiment in journalism storytelling debuts today with the public release of the virtual world machinima “The Kid, The Cop, The Punch.” The story is narrated by Xavier McElrath-Bey, a youth justice advocate, telling of a childhood encounterRead More →

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SAN ANTONIO – Merge VR has announced that its soft, foam goggles are available for pre-order through Amazon, and will ship before holidays. The Merge VR Goggles are among the top tech products debuting in the consumer entertainment market this holiday season. Compatible with any iOS or Android smartphone from the lastRead More →