Microsoft Mesh digitizes us into holograms
No time right now?
Video conferencing is only the first step. Microsoft wants to turn all of us into holograms that can interact with each other in virtual 3D space, for example at trade fairs or in meetings.
Microsoft presented its new mesh platform at its Ignite 2021 in-house exhibition. This is software on the Azure cloud that thinks the thoughts of virtual and augmented reality from the person.
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The human being as a 3D hologram
The core of Mesh is a 3D digitization of the user, who should then be able to take part in a wide variety of events in the virtual space as a hologram. In the end, the user experience should be as if you were actually participating in a real event.
It all sounds a lot like Second Life, but as a representation of reality in the digital world. Microsoft speaks of “holoportation”, conceptually based on teleportation. The service of avatarization, however, requires uniquely advanced technology.
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Open approach aims to integrate many devices and technologies
In order to give the platform a chance to assert itself, Microsoft Mesh created an open plan. The headsets from Microsoft and the Facebook subsidiary Oculus are to be supported right from the start. Others are possible. Other software platforms should also be able to use the mesh features, presumably via an open API.
Mesh is not limited to people. Rather, the platform can represent any type of digitized asset and play it in virtuality. At Ignite, for example, Pokémon Go developer Niantic showed an application in which the pocket monsters materialize via AR next to the user, for example on the sidewalk. The gaming industry will use this to create a wide range of experiences.
When it comes to display technology, mesh does not commit itself. The platform should work just as well with VR headsets as with AR glasses or a mixture of both.
First test impressed, but not convincing
Joanna Stern of the Wall Street Journal received mesh equipment from Microsoft and was able to take part in the Ignite presentation. She was impressed by the experience, as she reports.
However, an excess of technology and cabling would rather prevent them from everyday use at this point in time. However, she predicts a great future for holoportation and suspects that it will one day become as natural as a zoom meeting.
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