"Hey Meta, translate that for me"

Good morning folks!

Remember EDITH? I’m not talking about your high school crush; I meant the smart glasses used by Iron Man, which he gifted to Spiderman in the movie “Far From Home.” It looks like we’re one step closer to that reality thanks to a big update from Meta on their Ray-Ban smart glasses.

Headlines for people in a hurry:

• 👓 Ray-Ban Meta Glasses Can Now Answer Questions With AI

• 🚫 Pico 5 Cancelled: Massive Layoffs At Byte Dance

• 🕺 Quest 3 Gets Inside-Out Body Tracking & Body Occlusion

• 🎮 Xbox Cloud Gaming Comes To Meta Quest

Read time: 3 minutes

TOP STORIES

AUGMENTED REALITY

Ray-Ban Meta Glasses Can Now Recognize What You’re Seeing & Answer Questions

Forget ChatGPT. This is the most impressive feat of AI we’ve seen all year!

Last September at Meta Connect, Zuckerberg unveiled the Ray-Ban Meta Glasses and teased the AI object recognition and voice assistant capabilities, which he said were “coming later.”

Well, that later is here. The Ray-Ban Meta Glasses have received a significant update with multimodal AI capabilities, allowing users to interact with their environment in new ways. This feature enables users to ask questions about what they're looking at, such as identifying objects, translating signs, or suggesting captions for photos.

And this is not your regular Alexa or Siri. The glasses are powered by Meta's Llama 2 large language model, the same kind of technology that powers ChatGPT. This basically means that on your next vacation, you won’t have to awkwardly ask your tour guide what each and every sign on the street means.

META

Quest 3 Gets Inside-Out Body Tracking & MR Occlusion

Meta Quest 3's latest update introduces inside-out upper body tracking (IOBT) and dynamic occlusion.

Ok, now in plain English: One of the biggest problems with Quest 3’s mixed reality was that virtual objects, although look great, are usually displayed in front of objects and furniture, including your arms. This might feel like a small issue, but it entirely ruins your mixed reality experience.

So imagine you were trying to grab a cute virtual pet. No matter what you do, your arms will always end up behind the object, giving you a sense that it’s not real but just a 2D image. But now, that has been fixed with the dynamic occlusion feature in the new update.

On top of that, the Quest received inside-out body tracking, which uses the headset's cameras to accurately track the user's upper body movements, making VR interactions more realistic and immersive. For everyday users, these advancements mean more realistic and engaging VR experiences, whether gaming or using VR for other applications.

PICO

Pico Cancels Quest Competitor. All Eyes On The Vision Pro

According to reports, ByteDance, the Tik-Tok parent company, has reportedly cancelled the development of the Pico 5 VR headset. This is due to the low sales figures of the Pico 4, which launched at $499.

Pico has now laid off and transferred a big chunk of their workforce, whose total headcount went down by almost 60%, from 1800 to 800. They’ve also cancelled their in-development Beat Saber competitor and handed off what would have been its first major exclusive, Ubisoft's Just Dance VR, to an undisclosed new partner.

So since they couldn’t compete in the under-$500 category against market leaders like Quest and PSVR, what do you think is their next strategy? Well, compete with Apple’s $3499 headset!

Wait, what? Yup, that’s right! Pico is planning to develop a high-end VR product that goes head-to-head against the Vision Pro. The plan is still in the ideation stage and there’s no clear timeline yet.

NEWS FLASH

XBOX

Xbox Games Now Available On Quest

• 🎮 Xbox on Quest: Xbox Cloud Gaming arrives on Meta Quest, offering a big-screen gaming experience for streaming flatscreen games.

• 🕶️ Quest 2 Stock: Quest 2's 256GB model is mostly out of stock, while Quest 3 is readily available, indicating high demand.

• 🏠 Smart Home on Quest 3: Quest 3's Immersive Home app lets users control smart home devices in mixed reality.

• 🕹️ Looking Glass Go: Looking Glass Go, a pocket-sized holographic display, is now on Kickstarter, offering 3D viewing without special headsets.

• 🎨 Steam Link VR: Steam Link for Quest gets 'Advanced Supersample Filtering' for a clearer VR experience.

• 🔫 Shootout VR: Shootout, a free-to-play VR hero shooter, is now available on Quest.

• 🏋️ FitXR's Mixed Reality Workout: FitXR introduces Slam, a mixed reality workout game for Quest 3, offering a gamified HIIT experience.

• 🔋 Meta Resumes Quest 3 Battery Strap Orders: Meta resumes orders for the Quest 3 Elite Battery Strap after addressing a charging issue, with new shipments expected by year's end.

BOOKMARKS

Immersive Articles From The Web

• The First $100 You Should Spend On Meta Quest Games

• The Top Immersive Learning Trends to Watch in 2024

COOL PROJECTS

SPACE

Space Not Immersive Enough?

WRAP UP

MEME OF THE DAY

“Some People Do Be Like That”

Have a great weekend folks.

Have any good Quest game suggestions for the weekend? Hit reply and let me know!

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