Dear Inside Community, May is here, which means Meet Our Fund 3 is only a few weeks away. This is the latest installment in our most popular event series where some of the most dynamic venture funds in the industry reverse-pitch themselves to thousands of founders. Register today. We want you to have a free, front-row seat to this virtual event. This is your chance to pose questions directly to investors. Understand what they look for in portfolio companies and how they distinguish themselves when they invest. Don’t miss out when MOF3 goes live on May 24 and 25. —The Inside Team | |  Courtney |  |
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 Researchers from the Department of Computer Science at ETH Zurich in Switzerland, Andreas Rene Fender and Christian Holz, have published a nine-minute demonstration video and research paper explaining their vision for a mixed-reality work environment called "asynchronous reality." Workers wear VR headsets to focus on the work directly in front of them. Drawing on camera footage, co-worker interactions are recreated as holograms for the VR-headset wearer to consult when they've completed their tasks. The researchers have effectively "paused time," allowing co-workers to interact without disrupting a colleague. More: - The VR headsets "hide interruption in reality" by limiting the wearer's focus to the desk.
- Missed interactions are then re-presented in VR via 3D depth camera-created holograms that capture and then replay real-time events.
- Instead of text-based interactions, the immersive co-working environment allows workers to experience interactions in first-person and as if they were in real-time.
- Holz described the project to VRScout, "Asynchronous Reality is an individual’s perception of time and happenings in a shared spatial environment. It reconciles the opportunities of Mixed Reality to have any environment, any object, any interaction, anywhere with the need for collocated, person-to-person interaction that we require particularly in productivity scenarios, and in social settings."
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 Today, Spotify debuted its "Spotify Island" on the Roblox metaverse. It's the first streaming platform on Roblox, and visitors complete tasks and discover easter eggs to unlock exclusive prices or make their music to "climb the charts" using Spotify's digital recording platform Soundtrap. More: - Spotify plans on using the Island to host events.
- Sometime in the next few weeks, Spotify Island visitors will be able to interact with musical performers Stray Kids and Sunmi during the company's K-Pop-inspired "K-Park" event.
- Stage areas throughout the Island provide "virtual venues" that give users a chance to develop their musical talents.
- Abby Stewart, Director of Business Development at Spotify, said, “The stage isn’t the typical artist broadcast to fan experience. We’re flipping the script and empowering players to be the creators and truly feel like they’re the artist performing.”
- Spotify Island looks like the streaming platform has transformed into an island, using the same colors and imagery on Roblox and the application.
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 A message from MAGIC MIND What was the best day you had recently at work? We’re willing to bet it involved a big chunk of time free from meetings and distractions where you were able to get into a deep flow-state and do impactful, creative work. Magic Mind is a 2oz shot with 12 active ingredients all clinically proven to get you into that creative flow-state more often. It exists to help creators do more and stress less. Some people (alright, those people work at Magic Mind) have said "if athletes have Gatorade, creators now have 'Creatorade' with Magic Mind". That’s why entrepreneurs, creatives, executives, and everyone in between rely on Magic Mind to enhance their morning ritual and get more done. Oh, and it tastes delicious. Try Magic Mind today, 100% risk free (we’ll refund your first purchase no questions asked if it doesn’t work for you). Enter exclusive code INSIDE15 for 15% off your purchase, and find your flow-state today! Claim Your Discount
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 To celebrate 25 years in business, Tito's Vodka introduced a new bottle design complete with a QR code that prompts the appearance of interactive vignettes on a user's smartphone. The company worked with celebrated artist Paul Mann to create vintage movie-poster-inspired scenes in 3D. The company also hosts a standalone VR experience on the Meta Quest 2 AppStore. More: - Paul Mann is best known for his film art, having worked on films such as Flash Gordon and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
- The QR-prompted AR experiences were designed for smartphones.
- Vice president of Tito's brand marketing, Taylor Berry, explained, "We wanted to make sure it wasn’t anything you have to download — it could just pop up on your phone and be a web-based experience.”
- The Meta Quest app gives visitors a chance to explore daily life at a Tito's factory.
- The app took years to build.
- The VR experience was developed in concert with 14Four.
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Earlier today, Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA) announced it would open a metaverse headquarters. Where in The Sandbox VARA's "MetaHQ" will locate remains undisclosed. The project is the latest UAE initiative in the country's bid to become the world's leader in virtual assets. More: - VARA opened last March.
- The regulatory body requires firms operating in and with the UAE to apply for a crypto license.
- In a statement, Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Dubai Executive Council, explained that the country's MetaHQ would "initiate applications, enable younger licensees [to] enter the metaverse, openly share knowledge and experiences with consumers and peer regulators to raise awareness, enable safe adoption, and drive global interoperability.”
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 A message from CONNECTEAM Discover the New Way to Effectively Manage Your Employees Paper-Free Until this very day, so many businesses around the world are using pen and paper to handle crucial aspects of their daily business. But what’s stopping your employees from losing/damaging their shift schedules, forgetting to clock in and out, and not receiving important messages from their managers? That’s why thousands of businesses from more than 90 different industries are turning to Connecteam to solve these problems once and for all. With its wide range of features, managers can: - Ensure employees clock in at the right location
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 One fashion school in Florence, Italy, is hosting a four-week-long intensive course to develop digital-fashion specialists. The fashion school Polimoda has partnered with the digital design studio Monogrud to introduce the study titled "Fashion for Metaverse." More: - The course is geared toward advanced students and professionals.
- Students will develop skills needed to become specialized in digital fashions, including 3D masks, clothing for avatars, and other virtual items.
- The course will cover various topics, including Fashion Design in the Metaverse, Digital Culture and Iconography, Design Development, Art Direction, Fashion Future, and Metaverse Marketing.
- Polimoda director Massimiliano Giornetti described the course as a "unique and fully digital experience aimed at bridging the real and virtual worlds and allowing people to express themselves via configurable digital 3D avatars."
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 The Vatican's vast art collection will soon be available in the metaverse in a project chaired by the Dean of Philosophy at the Pope’s University in Vatican City. The project is being developed in collaboration with metaverse developer Sensorium and the Humanity 2.0 Foundation. The group hopes to create the "world's first VR and NFT gallery." More: - The Vatican's collection includes over 800 works by 250 different artists, including Michelangelo, Raphael, Marc Chagall, Salvador Dal, Paul Gauguin, Wassily Kandinsky, Vincent van Gogh, and Pablo Picasso.
- In line with Humanity 2.0's vision, the VR gallery will not require visitors to own any specialized hardware other than a smartphone or PC.
- The metaverse gallery will also host other events, such as free-to-visit educational talks.
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Quick Hits: *This is sponsored content.
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Upcoming events at Inside: - May 05 - [Live Webinar] Women in Sales: How to Build Your Personal Brand to Drive More Sales presented by Introhive (Register Here) *
- May 10 - Giving Voice and Intelligence to Digital Characters with David Colleen (SapientX) (Register Here)
- May 11 - Building Last-Mile Startups: Underground Delivery with Garrett McCurrash (Pipedream Labs) (Register Here)
- May 12 - Making Metaverse Dating a Reality (Register Here)
- May 18 - Need To Know NoCoder: Jatin Arora (Utilize) (Register Here)
- May 19 - Understanding Fractionalization (Register Here)
- May 24 - Meet Our Fund 3 (Register Here)
- May 31 - Ethereum Merge with Anthony Donofrio (Ethereum) (Register Here)
- June 01 - Selling Consumer Goods in Web3 (Register Here)
- June 09 - Empowering Content Creators with No Code (Register Here)
- June 22 - The Future of Open-Source Software Security (Register Here)
- June 30 - HR Strategies to Retain Remote Employees (Register Here)
*This is a sponsored listing.
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 |  | Courtney Rawlings is an Inside Research Analyst living in Los Angeles, California. She has returned to her hometown of LA after spending several years working at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, where she is completing a Ph.D. in Art and Architectural History. While working toward her Ph.D., Courtney has developed an interest in the language and history of the tech industry, especially regarding metaverse technologies, streaming, and podcasting. In fact, she hosted her own podcast Low Culture Boil! You can find her on Twitter: @ckayerawlings Email: courtney@inside.com | | | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 Ford. | |
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Connecteam is the all-In-One Employee Management Software. Time Tracking, Shift Scheduling, Communication, and Much More. | |
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