Embargoed for Release: January 23, 2024

Press contact: Claire Weingarten

claire@livingmachinesmedia.com

 Nominee and presenter announcements for
The Polys - 4th Annual WebXR Awards

New York, NY: The 4th Annual Polys Awards will take place on Sunday, March 3rd in a hybrid real-world and virtual event broadcasting the Polys Red Carpet Theatre on the Engage Platform and across the 3D web. 


JOIN THE EXCLUSIVE LIVE PRESS CONFERENCE IN ENGAGEXR
TO ANNOUNCE THE 2023 POLYS NOMINEES
Tuesday, January 23, 2023 at 10am PT|1pm ET| 6pm UTC
with Polys Hosts Julie Smithson and Sophia Moshasha

RSVP for Join Information at press@thepolys.com
Download ENGAGE at https://engagevr.io/download-engage/ 
Watch Party in Nowhere at https://nowhere.io/thepolys  

The Polys honors the finest experiences created in WebXR and the top talent working in the Immersive Web. The live event begins with Red Carpet interviews hosted by Sophia Moshasha at 5pm Eastern followed by the 4th Annual Polys awards. The public is invited to virtually attend the event streamed live to community venues in the Metaverse or watch on YouTube. Select tickets will be made available for press and industry to attend in person, live via VR or web-enabled device.

CELEBRATING UNPRECEDENTED ACHIEVEMENT WITH
THE NEW XR ELEVATION AWARD

The new “XR Elevation Award” for Advancement of the Medium will be presented to the producer’s of Fatboy Slim’s “Eat Sleep VR Repeat” Concert Engage experience that has been called “jaw-dropping” by leading VR journalist Charlie Fink and “ground-breaking” by legendary VR Podcaster, Kent Bye.

Presenters and Speakers this year include:

  • Tom Furness, “The Grandfather of VR” and founder of The Virtual World Society will present our top award “Experience of the Year”
  • Renard T. Jenkins, Creative and Production executive formerly of Warner Media and PBS will present “Education Experience of the Year”
  • Joanna Popper, Executive Producer, formerly of CAA and HP, will present “Entertainment Experience of the Year”
  • Tom Emrich from Niantic will present Innovator of the Year. Niantic’s WOL, is nominated in four categories, “Mixed Reality,” “Education,” “Entertainment,” and “Experience of the Year”
  • Sonya Haskins, Head of Programming at AWE, Augmented World Expo, the leading XR industry conference, will present “Game of the Year”
  • Felix Zhang, Immersive Web Engineer on the browser team at Meta Reality Labs will present “Mixed Reality Experience of the Year.” Felix is also nominated for “Innovator of the Year,” “Developer of the Year” and “Game of the Year.”

TECHNOLOGY TRAILBLAZERS

The 2023 Polys awards used a wide mix of XR, volumetric and holographic in the live show that streamed across worlds, featuring many firsts in blending realities for live broadcast.

“We’re building the award show of the future for the medium of the future, using Spatial Computing to celebrate Spatial Computing,”
notes Ben Erwin, Creator and Executive Producer of The Polys Awards. 

A unique hybrid live and virtual world crossover ceremony, the Polys - WebXR Awards utilizes immersive technologies like volumetric video capture from Emmy-Award winning studio Scatter and holographic award trophies from Looking Glass Factory to merge the real and virtual event. 

The Poly is the only trophy that celebrates VR content and platform creators including stereoscopic content in six degrees of freedom (6DOF) that runs in a headset or XR web browser. Honors Awards include recognitions for lifetime achievement, development and community leadership.

A LINEAGE OF HONORS

A tradition unique to The Polys is that previous honorees choose who follows them, and the lineage this year continues with:

  • Lifetime Achievement: Neil Trevett, Chair of the Metaverse Standards Forum, President of the Khronos Group, and VP of Developer Ecosystems at NVIDIA
  • Ombudsperson of the Year: Micaela Mantegna, Metaverse and AI Ethicist, TED Fellow and International Intellectual Property Attorney will be presented by Brittan Heller
  • Community Honor: Paige Dansinger, Founding Director of the Better World Museum 

To sponsor the 2024 Polys, contact ben@thepolys.com

SAVE THE DATES

PRESS CONFERENCE: Tuesday January 23rd 1PM EST/10AM PST

The Polys: 4th Annual WebXR Awards: Sunday March 3rd, 2024 5PM EST/8PM PST

Please find our public social media assets folder for the 4th Polys at:
https://bit.ly/4thPolysPressKit

About The Polys WebXR Awards: The Polys are an industry recognition and award for immersive content serving as a launchpad for leaders in VR, XR and spatial computing. It is the only award that celebrates the makers, creators, and developers who are building holographic futures in the immersive web, empowering creatives and inspiring others to join this exciting field. 

What is XR? Extended reality devices including smart glasses and passthrough “XR” headsets allow for 6DOF experiences with the ability to see through the head-worn display. Apple’s new Vision Pro headset is an example of a spatial computing or XR device.

What is 6DOF? Six degrees of freedom includes the movement capacities enabled by VR and XR devices to track our hands and movements as well as our interactions with a keyboard or mouse with the web. 6DOF WebXR websites may enable a wide variety of play with or without a headset.

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