New Technology Assignment

According to an article published on Entrepreneur.com, Augmented Reality (AR) is a technology that is projected to be a new social media trend. The short definition of augmented reality is, “an enhanced version of reality with computer generated images over a user’s view of the real-world”. This is different than virtual reality because augmented reality doesn’t virtually inhibit your entire environment but rather uses your existing environment and simply overlays virtual images on top of it. There is currently a company working in Fort Lauderdale, Florida called Magic Leap that works with MR or mixed reality technology. They take aspects of virtual and augmented realities into their technologies. Their most popular video is of whale breaching in a school gym. This video gives a good example of what augmented reality looks like. Magic Leap applies their technology to things such as gaming and communication. Augmented reality technology can be used for something as simple as a Snapchat filter or as complex as an instruction on how to perform a life threatening surgical procedure.

There are many different ways to apply augmented reality to our daily lives. Augmented reality can be used with aviation, business, communications, construction, design, education, entertainment, gaming, healthcare, and so much more. For the sake of this assignment, I want to focus on how augmented reality can influence communication. We have known for quite some time that texting is not as effective as communicating face-to-face. Humans are very visual people so without seeing the person that we are communicating with, it’s difficult to read their non-verbal ques. In 2017, Apple announced that the new iPhone X and the iOS 11 software update would feature AR apps in the app store. An example of the new AR technologies on iPhones are Animojis. This introduced a fun new way to communicate with others using the face of an emoji but having all of the facial expressions and movements of the person recording the video. Snapchat has taken advantage of this technology before Facebook and Instagram caught on.

I had no idea what augmented reality was prior to doing this assignment. A few months ago, there was a Snapchat filter that, when your camera was flipped toward the room, a majestic whale would float around your room. I had no idea that I had witnessed augmented reality without realizing what it was. Snapchat uses augmented reality technology quite a bit with their filter options.  Everything from the dog filter to a dancing hot dog, these are all examples of augmented reality. I think that the success of this technology will get progressively more popular in the near future. Augmented reality is such a versatile technology that social media companies won’t be the only ones that will take advantage of it.