Exploring Design for Social VR: Mindful Realities Make-athon

Social VR is coming!

In the next few years, interacting with others inside virtual reality (VR) environments will become a normal form of communication for work, play, and creativity. 

Creating social VR spaces comes with a lot responsibility, and currently, a lot of unanswered questions on how to design spaces that are fun and collaborative. Because VR spaces feel real, so do the interactions between "avatars", or whatever you are represented as.

Group of friends having fun in one of the most heavily used social VR platforms today, Rec Room

On April 1st, We Make Realities is bringing together researchers, designers, engineers, and communicators to share learnings, insights, and come up with open-sourced ideas for building social VR to be safe, welcoming places for everyone--and think of ways to reduce harassment.

Our mission is to build allies for inclusivity and comfort in new realities (VR, AR, and beyond). VR hardware, and the tools to build VR experiences, are not easily accessible to individuals outside the VR industry. Yet because VR is so closely integrated with our minds and bodies, unlike any other platform, it will only succeed if we bring in knowledge that exists beyond what we are limited to in the tech industry.

What the heck is a..."Make-athon"?

This is not a hackathon! At a Make-athon, you do not need to be familiar with coding or VR technology to attend. We'll be using more pen and paper than technlogy itself! So OG.

Rather than programming a tangible VR application, we will generate written ideas for social VR features after learning from presentations on social VR topics, small group activities, and VR demos! We'll have social VR experiences for you to try on-site, including Rec Room, Altspace, VRChat, and others.

Who is the Mindful Realities Make-athon for?

The Mindful Realities Make-athon will gather:

• 10 VR Creators (designers, developers, creative directors, etc)
• 10 Cognitive Researchers / Psychologists / Behavioral Scientists 
• 10 Content Strategists / Communicators
• 10 Domain Experts that specialize in topics like harassment or culture-building 

You will all be divided into 10 teams of 4, with 1 person from each background mentioned above sitting at your table. We are committed to making sure that everyone's voice is heard regardless of your background. You all have incredibly valuable knowledge to bring to the table (literally). 

What is the outcome of this event?

Each team will write up a case study that we will provide a template for. Don't worry, this doesn't have to be super long! The goal is to break down a specific social VR idea or concept that your team comes up with, and then explain the reasoning behind why this idea could potentially benefit social VR worlds.

Your team's case study will then be shared on the We Make Realities Medium publication so that social VR creators around the world can learn from conversations that come out of the Make-athon. 

You are not building a product; you are building an open-source resource that others can experiment with. Please keep this in mind. If you are more interested in "owning" an idea instead of sharing it, this event might not satisfy your interests. 

Although we are focusing on ideation rather than diving deep into prototyping, we will have a follow-up to this event that will focus more on prototyping ideas inside VR.

So, I know NOTHING about VR. Will this make it harder to participate? 

Not at all! In fact, this event will be WAY BETTER if we bring in perspectives beyond the VR industry.

The We Make Realities family is already having awesome discussions online around how we can apply cognitive science learnings to VR. We'd love to have you join!

Twitter | Slack

What do I need to bring?

• Laptops are recommended but not required. This is not a hackathon, and you are not expected to code or build anything in Unity. (If you sign up as a Communicator/Content Strategiest, though, please bring a laptop).

• Knowledge that you want to share! If you know of really cool studies or concepts that could be applied to social VR, it wouldn't hurt to print it out and bring it along to share with your team.

• Your favorite brainstorming supplies. We'll be providing some, but if you have anything else that you'd like to bring, don't hesitate.

• A jacket. We will be headed outside for a 15-minute stretch at one point during the day. And you know, Seattle likes to rain :)

• A motivation to make social VR awesome. 

• An understanding of and agreement to our Code of Conduct. Please read it here. 

What is the venue like?

Substantial, a digital product studio in Capitol Hill, has a beautiful venue complete with an open work area full of daylight, meeting rooms where we'll have our VR stations set up, a view of the park, and even a meditation room if you need a break. They are generously loaning their space for this event. Thanks, Substantial!

Unfortunately, this building has a flight of stairs but no elevator. If you need special accomodation, please let us know (you'll see a question for this when you order your ticket) and we'll try our best to make it work! We apologize for this inconvenience.  

Will there be food?

Yes! The ticket cost ($15) goes toward your meals (nom nom nom).

Agenda (Tentative, but start/end times are correct)

9:30 AM - 10:00 AM  | Arrive, mingle, snack on breakfast, sip on coffee/tea

10:00 AM - 10:30 AM | Welcome, get to know each other (but not with an awkward ice breaker)

10:30 AM - 11:30 AM | Talks Part 1 (What is social VR? How can we design for VR differently?) + Q&A

11:30 AM - 11:45 AM | Break, stretch

11:45 AM - 12:00 PM | Creative Exercise 

12:00 PM - 1:00 PM | Talks Part 2 (Learnings from spending time in social VR worlds)

1:00 PM - 1:45 PM | NOMS! (Lunch)

1:45 PM - 2:00 PM | Walk around the block + ethnographic research (optional, but encouraged!) :)

2:00 PM - 5:00 PM | Activities + breaks 

5:00 PM - 6:00 PM | NOMS! (Dinner)

6:00 PM - 7:00 PM | Wrap up + group photo!

Our Stellar Speakers

Cameron Brown, Creative Director at Against Gravity (Creators of Rec Room)

Renee Gittins, CEO at Stumbling Cat 

(Talk descriptions will be posted soon)

Our Stellar Sponsors

Against Gravity (Gold Sponsorship)

Creators of Rec Room, the virtual reality social club where you play active games with players from all around the world.

VREAL (Bronze Sponsorship)

VREAL turns VR games into shared experiences. Hang out with friends inside the games you love, and record and stream content for VR and 2D viewers!

ARVR Academy (Bronze Sponsorship)

ARVR Academy is an organization dedicated to diversity and inclusion in immersive and emerging technologies through education and professional development efforts. 

Substantial (Venue Sponsorship)

Substantial is a Seattle-based digital product studio that offers technology, strategy and design for the web, mobile, and connected devices.

Parking

Parking:

Harvard Garage is very close to the venue, and costs $15 for a fully day 

See more parking available in real time

Public Transportation:

4 minute walk from Light Rail (Capitol Hill station)
Pine & Broadway: 10, 11, 49 Buses
First Hill Street Car (stops on Broadway at Pine)

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Halp! I still have more questions!

Do not fret, friend! You can reach us at wemakerealities@gmail.com. We'll reply the same day <3