There was an aspect of expectation to Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2017 in Barcelona that went far beyond the usual trade show hype. With the mobile world encompassing everything in our technology universe, MWC 2017 very quietly – and firmly – showed that the mobile ecosystem can, and will, show the way forward. All of that hype about VR and super mixed reality last year? We have greater clarity this year – from Samsung Gear to network operators such as Verizon and Orange. Augmented reality seemed too much too soon last year? We now have more AR implementations, and more interest and demand in AR now than ever before. 5G yet another acronymic bamboozle? It will take a while, for sure, but it’s coming – this year.

MWC 2017 was a watershed, in its own quiet way. And it’s not just the big boys who are spurring innovation. Qualcomm and Intel duked it out near each other, as always, but while the companies shared as much of the stage in the IoT, smart auto, AI shuffle, it was more evident than ever that the European start-up ecosystem was making major strides in the mobile SDK world. From gesture recognition (the Swedes showed off Manomotion and Crunchfish) to intelligent location (Finland’s Quuppa), we are seeing more efficient delivery of complex experiences, driven from European university spin-outs and venture-backed start-ups.

The week was endless, as usual, and started with GSMA’s event at the Pullman Barcelona Skipper Hotel, and an excellent panel moderated by Bonfire Lab’s John Gilles, on VR/AR, paneled by Verizon Ventures’ Ed Ruth; Oculus’ Andy Mathis, and Ericsson’s Per Borgklint.

John Gilles, Bonfire Labs; Ed Ruth, Verizon Ventures; Andy Mathis, Oculus, and Per Borgklint at GSMA Summit’s VR/AR panel

Mobile Sunday, at the Estrella Damm event center, saw a critical mass of people – investors, start-ups, and analysts – with a mass of new faces. Kudos to Robin Wauters and Rudy De Waele on growing this event into a seminal MWC gathering.

Rudy De Waele and Robin Wauters great the Mobile Sunday crowd at the Estrella Damm event center

With the entire world worried about cybersecurity’s ability to take on new threats, the mobile world had more answers at MWC 2017, including solutions from Estonia. More network-based innovations for smart cities and IoT were on display from everywhere – from SK Telecom to Huawei.

The device manufacturers did not boffo announcements, but incremental progress – from Sony’s Xperia accessories to LG and Samsung’s forthcoming tablets – and the nostalgic hype for the Nokia 3310 and the new BlackBerry device showed the diversity of the market.

Sony’s super slow motion feature showed that the smartphone has now overcome the likes of GoPro

Sony Xperia Ear, an earpiece which uses gesture recognition

Oddly enough, two of the biggest statements at the event emanated from New Jersey: Verizon and Nokia Bell Labs. Verizon’s stand was a show of innovation, from its telematics group to smart city and IoT solutions to the new holding company, Exponent, which will deliver service architecture for other carriers. The company’s envrmnt studio, and end-to-end VR/AR offering, will be part of Exponent.

Me at the Verizon stand. The company made a major statement through its envrmnt VR/AR studio

But, overall, the most stunning statement made at the show was from Nokia. Its stand was a testimony to new ideas and even a new attitude. Bell Labs shined with its race track demo, which had radio-controlled cars (cheekily named after Bell Labs luminaries, including Claude Shannon) powered over 4G and 5G networks, showing the efficacy of network controls. Nokia, which acquired Bell Labs and the old Alcatel-Lucent entity last year, has already rebranded and repowered Bell Labs, and it was evident at MWC 2017.

We can only hope that the coming year will deliver more experiences powered by network innovation, which was quietly the star at MWC 2017.

Estonians hard at work, first thing in the morning, on Day #3 of MWC 2017

LG was a quiet presence at MWC 2017

Samsung bristled with energy; its Galaxy Note 7 disaster well in the rearview mirror

IBM’s Watson story has increased since last year, and drew flocks of people to its psychedelic-meets-Deco booth, complete with the “cognitive dress,” which is designed based on user’s moods and whims.

IBM’s “cognitive dress”

Intel’s mega-pixel wall

ST Microelectronics’ “smart football” – the Wilson X Smart Football – brings IoT to the sports world

Kim Mathews mans the Nokia Bell Labs race track; scenes of the track and one of the radio-controlled cars, featuring the names of Bell Labs Nobel laureates John Bardeen and Arno Penzias

The first VR/AR Association New York Chapter event of 2017, ‘Virtual Reality for Producers: How to Create and Deliver for the New Content Frontier,’ took place last Wednesday night, February 15th, at the NYU Data Futures Lab, and it delivered not only a full standing-room-only crowd of 95 people, but some of New York’s finest producers working the VR scene.

You can watch the video of the event at:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B58D21m9dOMOdFJJSGE1UWMzVzA

Kris Kolo, New York chapter head of the VR/AR Association, introduces the goals and benefits of the organization

As more New York producers learn the craft of producing in VR, the industry will grow concomitantly. Wednesday’s session was an ideal session for learnings from the likes of Paul Cheung, direct of interactive at Associated Press (AP); Alissa Crevier, global head of partnerships, at Littlstar, and Christian Egeler, director of VR/AR product development with Verizon envrmnt.

Chris Pfaff introduces the speakers and sets up the event

Paul Cheung guided the audience through his learnings with the almost dozen VR cameras that he and his team have tested. He discussed some of the work that AP has done with branded content partners, and how to adapt the standards of the AP (an organization that literally developed the journalistic standards known as “AP Style” over the past 180-plus years) to VR production. In other words, while shooting a scene, do you keep the DP and/or the producer in the shot, or matte that out? For AP, that choice is obvious: leave the production team in the frame. Cheung described some of the learnings in VR as they apply to the overall production work that his interactive has to deal with, enabling a smoother workflow scenario.

Paul Cheung discusses the range of VR cameras that AP has tested and and used

For Alissa Crevier, Littlstar’s work has grown to the point where the company is as much a platform for content as it is a stand-alone producer of VR content. This has created a new kind of channel for VR partners, and the Littlstar roster of clients includes the who’s who of major content distributors, including Disney/ABC, Discovery, Nat Geo, Showtime, and the Wall Street Journal, among others. Crevier’s experience with Spotify, and the music industry in general, have helped her navigate clearances and understand the vagaries of the live music scene, and live streaming, to understand the value of WebVR versus individual VR platforms, such as Oculus, Gear, or Vive, among others.

Alissa Crevier presents Littlstar’s productions and its content platform model

Christian Egeler took the audience through the Verizon envrmnt learnings, and how they have applied to the studio’s growth in areas that include their Social VR platform. The envrmnt cross-platform SDK has gained traction in the industry, including with the March, 2017 issue of Cosmopolitan magazine, which includes an AR app, a native app, and integrated envrmnt SDK so that trigger images are easier to recognize. Egeler also showed an Alpine Village demo with dynamic updates (first showed at the Amazon Web Services Invent and Nvidia conferences). He hinted at the possibility that envrmnt might release a “build your own” 3D engine later this year. A VR experience produced for Super Bowl LI was also demonstrated.

Christian Egeler shares learnings from Verizon envrmnt’s studio work, and showcases new work, including its Social VR platform

The audience, mostly comprised of producers, was intrigued by the experiences that the three presenters had. The lively panel discussion dove into issues surrounding the growth of an industry that still has yet to standardize areas of production and post-production, as well as the growth of WebVR, in the wake of a still-early headset market.

Paul Cheung during the panel discussion

Mina Salib (right, speaking), program manager at the NYU Futures Labs, introduces the audience to new opportunities at the Labs

Paul Cheung (rear of photo, against window), and Alissa Crevier (right front), address audience questions after the ‘VR for Producers’ event

On a rainy Thursday in late-April, history was made in an institution that is dedicated to history, namely, the Five Freedoms of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. The first Producers Guild of America (PGA) New Media Council East event at Newseum, entitled ‘Virtual Reality, Storytelling, and News,’ brought together the who’s who of virtual reality (VR) in the journalism industry, and sparked conversations that detailed the need for standards in virtual reality production.

Hosted at the Knight Conference Center at Newseum, with demos from the Knight Foundation; Washington Post; Associated Press, and Gannett Digital, the panel demonstrated the exceptional leadership in VR that journalists have exhibited. Knight Foundation’s Mitch Gelman; Washington Post’s Cam Blake; USA Today Networks’ Robert Padavick; Gannett Digital’s Ray Soto, and Associated Press’ Paul Cheung discussed a variety of topics, including the need to understand deadlines for VR (which, obviously, takes longer to produce); the need to understand how audiences perceive storytelling in VR, and the need to work on local levels for VR.

Watch the full video at https://youtu.be/iVOrFpJwfj8.

Moderated by Chris Pfaff, one of the founders of the PGA New Media Council, and a former vice-chairman of the PGA New Media Council, the discussion ranged from lessons learned in technology, including how to stitch images so that objects and crew members do not appear – or do appear – in the frame; what camera rigs are doing to help shape storytelling; how apps are enabling a more democratic approach to VR, and how this exploratory period of VR journalism will open up new opportunities for documentarians and reporters.

The audience of more than 80 people asked astute questions, including why Web 1.0 VR companies, and their technologies, took so long to re-enter the scene, and how the “new digital divide” might be addressed by the panel.

The event was produced by the Newseum team, including Jeffrey Herbst, Cathy Trost, John Maynard, Scott Wiliams, and Jonathan Thompson, along with the PGA’s Renee Rosenfeld and Chris Pfaff.

This will likely be the first in a series of PGA-Newseum events addressing the VR arena. Stay tuned.

Chris Pfaff, (left), moderates the panel at Newseum

Jeffrey Herbst, CEO of Newseum, welcomes the audience

Paul Cheung, director of interactive for Associated Press, and Jeffrey Herbst

Ray Soto, Gannett, demonstrates the Gannett AR/VR program

Jeffrey Herbst and Paul Jastrzebski, developer relations manager with Oculus

Brian Savoie, director of technology education and outreach, and David Layer, senior director, advanced engineering, NAB

The Knight Foundation’s VR demo area at the event

Jon Harmon, filmmaker, experiences VR at the event