Joanna Popper’s Post

AWE was wonderful last week. I was honored to be a part of the XR Hall of Fame with 101 inspirational people and friends like Ivan Sutherland, Jaron Lanier, Nonny de la Peña, PhD Tom Furness Jacquelyn (Jacki) Morie Evan Spiegel John Carmack Brenda Laurel Neal Stephenson Tim Sweeney Avi Bar-Zeev Tony Parisi Alvin Wang Graylin John Gaeta Jeremy Bailenson Elizabeth Baron David Baszucki John Hanke Dr. Helen Papagiannis, Ph.D. Jeri Ellsworth Gabe Newell Tish Shute (Leichliter) Nicole Lazzaro 😎 AWE Rony Abovitz Matt Miesnieks Palmer Luckey Ashley Crowder Chris Milk Sutu . Eric Romo Curtis Hickman Christina Heller Felix Lajeunesse Paul Raphaël Timoni West Christina Lee Storm Lady Pheønix . Tom Emrich 🏳️🌈 Mike Rockwell Carolina Cruz-Neira Shelley Peterson and many more. AWE did such a beautiful job of honoring us with a Red Carpet "Hollywood Walk of Fame" style stars, a museum with the honorees & the history of the headsets, and an induction ceremony where we got to award this year's Auggie winners. This is a fantastic list and there are so many people who belong on it who weren't so have already nominated many for next year's list. And you can too. Link in the comments. I moderated a panel on Bringing Storytelling, Visuals and Audio together into an Immersive Experience with Young Guru, Adrian Rashad Driscoll and Don Allen Stevenson III. They shared good insights on how to work best with platinum selling musical clients, proving ROI for artists, using AI to get to the creative alignment faster, and creating clips to drive developer creativity. It's always wonderful to see: -the new content developers are making. Shoutout to Thibault Mathieu, Patrick Ascolese for showcasing great experiences! -hear new announcements -- Meta announced a new accelerator for Creators focused on lifestyle apps! Congrats Anand Dass and May-May Chen! - the hardware & software players like Magic Leap, Meta, Apple, HTC Vive, XReal, Snap, Qualcomm, NVIDIA, HaptX, Wevr, and others continue to advance the technology and inspire! Congrats Ori Inbar Sonya Haskins Nate Harper for a fantastic week! Cheers to the team on a huge success in your new home of Long Beach! Let's keep it. Speaking of Long Beach, we also got to see Gabriel Iglesias get the key to the city. Congrats Fluffy! This is truly the best community with so much creativity, inspiration, imagination, passion, love and hope for each other. It was wonderful to see each of you there and learn more about the work you're doing and the advancements you've made. I didn't take enough pictures. I'm already looking forward to next year's edition of AWE! #VR #XR #AR #Spatialcomputing #technology #entertainment #media #AugmentedWorldExpo

It was great to work with the Producers Guild of America to help program Innovation panels at Produced By Conference. I have been in PGA for some years & became Innovation Chair this year. Thanks Susan Sprung, Michelle Byrd, Stephanie Allain Bray & Donald De Line for the invite. 🙏🙌 The Produced By conference was fantastic. Topics included: From Pitch to Screen with Tokyo Vice & Hacks with Sarah Aubrey, JT Rogers, Alan Poul, PAUL W DOWNS/LUCIA ANIELLO, Jennifer Statsky. Curb Your Enthusiasm and How to with John Wilson with Amy Gravitt, Jeff Schaffer & John Wilson. The State of Producing with Tommy Oliver, Lynette Howell Taylor, Mike Farah, Brad Simpson, Stephanie Allain Bray AI: What every Producer Needs to Know with Renard T. Jenkins, Lori McCreary, Ghaith Mahmood and Carolyn Giardina The Future of Producing with Charles Roven, Greg Berlanti, Roxanne Avent Taylor & Donald De Line Elevate your Project using AI with Souki Mansoor, Jake Aust from AGBO, Joe Penna & me From Pitch to Screen with Accused with Howard Gordon, Lauren Stein, Michael Thorn, Stacey Wilson Hunt. The winner of the PGA Innovation Award Body of Mine was also shown! Perfect timing during Pride month. Congrats Cameron Kostopoulos & Evan Siegal. It's available on the Meta Quest store, so check it out! Some takeaways: 3 Ps from Stephanie Allain on what's needed for a successful project. Passion Persistence Partnerships 3Cs from Mike Farah on what's needed for a successful team. Culture Chemistry Complimentary Advice from Roxanne Avent Taylor on producing inside or outside the Hollywood system. Produce the money Produce the content Get it on the screen Don't give up Advice from fellow Northwestern University Alum Greg Berlanti on how to make a successful TV Show-- ensure these 3 are right: The Story The Writer The Home From Oppenheimer's Charles Roven: many non-traditional financing sources (especially post billion $ box office & Oscar 🤩) Tips from Renard T. Jenkins, Lori McCreary, Ghaith Mahmood & Carolyn Giardina on what Producers need to know: ⚖️While laws are "sifting sands," AI created works are generally not copyrightable today unless extensive human involvement. 🎬Therefore generally being used for pre-production (concept design, idea generation) rather than final pixel. ✅ Companies should have AI policies for employees and contractors. Tips from Souki Mansoor, Joe Penna, Jake Aust and my panel on Elevate Your Project Using AI: 🎨AI can help with creating concept art, pitch decks more quickly, then pay professionals to create final work 📱ChatGPT can help with admin tasks like call sheets, scheduling, pitch language but must always be reviewed by humans. Can also write language for different departments to help "translate" among groups 📚Can also create a GPT to be an internal wiki for a show Videos available online for PGA members. #producers #filmmaking #entertainmentindustry #entertainment #technology #innovation

Board "diversity's" 7-year low: Board of it. "The share of board appointments going to women has declined steadily since 2021 and hit 7-year low in Q1 of this year, according to new report from 50/50 Women on Boards. In first 3 months of 2024, 30.7% of board appointments across Russell 3000 index belonged to women-- lowest share since 2017. In 2021, women made up 45% new directors; in 2022, stat was 39% and in 2023 38%. This early 2024 measure of 30.7% (of a total of 587 seats) represents even steeper drop-off. The 7-year low arrives as women still hold only 29.7% of board seats across the Russell 3000, a 0.3% increase from last year. Women of color hold only 7.8%. While there has been progress over past decade to diversify boards, that progress hasn’t achieved anything near parity. Heather Marie Spilsbury Women on Boards’ CEO, identifies reasons for decline. Economic uncertainty leads companies to revert to existing networks rather than broaden board searches for wider pool of candidates, she says. Election years bring more risk aversion, she argues. Some boards lack clear succession plans, slowing down process of bringing on new directors, she says. Meanwhile, companies are watching wave of conservative legal efforts against corporate diversity and inclusion efforts. And California’s SB826, which required boards in that state to have at least three female directors, was struck down in 2022, eliminating a strong motivator for businesses to maintain board diversity. Across the Russell 3000, 41% of companies still have boards with 2 or fewer women. And some of those businesses are clearly focused on other pressures; companies with less diverse boards were more likely to exit the Russell 3000 because of sales, mergers, or bankruptcies, the report found. The financial services sector was least diverse at the board level. Expanding boards has led to the most successful diversification efforts; 87% of newly filled seats belonging to women were additions, not replacements." 💵💰💸It has been proven by numerous studies- an inclusive board and leadership drives better stock price, strategic, financial, & product outcomes. If the board and leadership aren't inclusive, team isn't doing fiduciary duties. I don't frame it about "diversity" but about fiduciary duty 📈💵and representing customer and employee base. 👋If you need a Growth and Innovation Strategic Leader for your Board to tap into exponential growth with expertise incl: 📸Technology- digital transformation, leveraging AI, spatial computing 🎦Media - brand storytelling, marketing, business development, effective content creation, talent relationships 📈Maximizing Growth through organizational structure & intrapreneurship 💲Corporate governance, strategy, nom/gov and financial management experience for your Board, let's talk! 👋 Who doesn't need this in your Board room? I'm available for Board roles or have great colleagues to refer. Emma Hinchliffe Fortune Him For Her BoardProspects

AI on the Lot was great this year. Congrats to Todd Terrazas, Max Einhorn and Mike Gioia on a successful event. 💡Renard T. Jenkins' keynote focused on the importance of human creativity and ingenuity using AI tools for better results. He posed while much of the focus in Hollywood has been on the replacement and downsizing of creative roles, whether the executive / financial roles should be more at risk of an algorithm than creative roles. 🤖Our panel on "AI Simulation & Agents" was a lot of fun with: Edward S., CEO of Simulation AI David Slade, Director (Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, Twilight, Breaking Bad) Parth Patil (parth 🔥. ), AI Specialist at Office of Reid Hoffman Shuying Luo, Co-Founder & CTO at Altera 🔥 On our panel we discussed the making of ReidAI (a virtual Reid Hoffman which can be seen here on LinkedIn), how Altera creates virtual beings to hang out and play Minecraft with you and create friendship, how last year's strike created more time and opportunity for Hollywood creatives to experiment with AI, and Ed's work with Showrunner AI and White Mirror. It was lively, full of debate and too short. 🔥Added Notes: Edward Saatchi's The Simulation team just announced their "text-to-episode" platform today, as the "Netflix of AI" which allows the audience to generate their own short TV episode in real-time. It's currently focused on animated styles and storylines. Other highlights were: 🎬Filmmakers competition. The teams made short films based on a script by Bernie Su in 48 hours using AI tools. Congrats to the winning team of Adriana Vecchioli, Jagger Waters and Nem Perez. Their zom-com (zombie romantic comedy) was charming and funny. I also enjoyed the films by Kiri Margaros, Jared Cotton, D. Ryan Reeb, REZA SIXO SAFAI, Matthew Wenhardt and Jonathan Muller. What was created in such a short time was all very impressive. 🎞️Hearing more about the behind the scenes on the T2 Remake with Nem Perez, REZA SIXO SAFAI, Max Einhorn and Matthew Wenhardt. And seeing some of the pipelines used. 👩🎨Enhancing human creativity with Momo Wang, Mark Goffman, Joe Penna, Matthew Nix and Dana Harris-Bridson. All of these stellar creatives are utilizing AI to augment their own work and abilities. 🤩 Of course always wonderful to see the creative communities that gather at these events like Katya Alexander, Mariana Acuña Acosta, Andy Stack, Scott Lighthiser, Ed Ulbrich, james jones, Rachel Joy Victor, Charlie Fink, Rob Minkoff, Taryn Southern, Kathleen Mccaffrey, Jackee Chang, Gregg Katano, Russell Palmer, Justin Diener, Minh Do and many more. #AIontheLot #Entertainment #Filmmaking #technology #AI

Master of Lights is now available on the Meta Quest store. I hope you download and check it out. ✨🌟⭐️🤩 Congrats to the whole team involved. I'm proud to be an EP with such a creative and impactful team. 💫 #VR #VirtualReality #Gaming #mastersoflight #VRGaming #handtracking Celine Tricart Marie Blondiaux COVEN Albyon G4F RECORDS Martina Welkhoff Maëlle Holtzer Julien Sequert Link to the game: https://lnkd.in/d4zZnhPG

Congrats to Christina Heller and JP Ungaretti on "Unexpected Treasures," an upcoming film -- alien adventure and love letter to the beautiful Joshua Tree desert. 🌵🛸💗 I am thrilled to be an executive producer on this indie film along with Ginny G., Marcie Jastrow and MICHAEL MASUKAWA. And yes, while lots of immersive folks are involved, it's a flattie! 🙌Many of us started our careers in traditional film and TV and it's fulfilling to express creativity across various mediums. This project is the embodiment of the team's lifelong dreams and I adore being in the dreams fulfilled business. 🌸 We were lucky with an excellent cast and crew and gorgeous locations. So many amazing and talented people involved! 👏🙌 Stay tuned for more. 🛸🌵🛸 #film #entertainment #indiefilm #filmmaking

Congrats to CogX LA Festival: AI & Transformational Tech on their first LA event! It was a wonderful event full of interesting people, talks, salons and artistry. I had spoken virtually in a few CogX sessions during Covid but hadn't made it to London for any of the events so was very happy they brought CogX to us in LA. Some highlights: David Maisel and Jeremy Boxer on Marvel and Ekos. Will.I.Am, Mati Staniszewski and Cynthia Littleton on AI and sound. Taryn Southern, Shelby Ward, Don Allen Stevenson III, Paul Trillo and Dave Clark on AI content creation. Jake Aust, Ed Ulbrich and Ted Schilowitz on their extensive careers and AI and Hollywood. And of course our panel "Beyond the Screen: Storyworlds and the Future of IP" with Diana Williams, Wadooah Wali and Jenna Seiden. Takeaways: -It's a time for experimentation. -Experimentation is paying off for early adopters and creators who find themselves in heavy demand for their skills and innovative use of tools. These creators had previous directing and artistic talents and experience and are further honing their talents with new tools. -Legal and ethical concerns delay public-facing adoption from incumbents. -Multiplatform storytelling enables deeper audience immersion and connection to content if done in an organic way that connects with audiences. -Innovators like Will.I.Am see futures where technology drives adoption to historically underrepresented groups which shifts resources and power balances and results in a more equitable world. -David Maisel advises when you find the Venn diagram of relevance, your unique skill set and commercial opportunity to run at it, as that's where excellence lives. Congrats to Charlie Muirhead, Jeremy Boxer and Rachel M. for a successful event. #AI #entertainment #technology ElevenLabs, Metaphysic.ai, AGBO, Curious Refuge

Thanks AWE for including me in the XR Hall of Fame with so many leaders from the industry like Nonny de la Peña, PhD, Jacquelyn (Jacki) Morie, Tom Furness, Jaron Lanier, Avi Bar-Zeev, Ivan Sutherland, Mark Bolas, Brenda Laurel, Carolina Cruz-Neira, Neal Stephenson, Tim Sweeney, John Carmack, Palmer Luckey, Tony Parisi, Alvin Wang Graylin, John Gaeta, Jeremy Bailenson, Nicole Lazzaro, Christina Heller, Christina Lee Storm, Ashley Crowder, Shelley Peterson, Tom Emrich 🏳️🌈, David Baszucki, Lady Pheønix ., John Hanke, Philip Rosedale, Dr. Helen Papagiannis, Ph.D., Jeri Ellsworth, Gabe Newell, Tish Shute (Leichliter), Rony Abovitz, shari frilot, Matt Miesnieks, Evan Spiegel, Chris Milk, Sutu ., Curtis Hickman, Graham Gaylor, Felix Lajeunesse, Paul Raphaël, Timoni West, Jesse Joudrey, Jan Ilavsky, Vladimir Hrincar, Peter Hrincar, Scott Montgomerie, Jesse Schell, Eric Romo and many more can't tag them all. https://lnkd.in/gd4WtNpR I'm looking forward to AWE this year as it moves down to SoCal for the first time. I'm excited to moderate a panel on Blending Story, Visuals and Audio for Memorable Immersive Experiences with Don Allen Stevenson III, Adrian Rashad Driscoll and Young Guru. Great programming by Sonya Haskins. https://lnkd.in/gSFXJDqg Last, the people making these lists put so much work into them so hats off to Ori Inbar and team. It was a nice surprise to be included. That said, these lists inevitably overlook people who belong on them but they said this is the 1st annual list so there will be another one next year, and they set up a link to nominate people https://lnkd.in/gxH2jST7 It's wonderful to look at the faces and contributions of so many accomplished ground-breaking luminaries and great friends together in one place. #XR #VR #VirtualReality #AWE #XRHallofFame #Awards

Want to win an Emmy? The submission deadline is on May 9. ⏰ Here's what you need to know... Check out details for rules and procedures for all groups and awards. Note that PAGE 28 has all the Emerging Media Awards details: https://lnkd.in/gWaXS824 You can also find more information on the Awards Calendar here: https://lnkd.in/gQjG3K55 If you're interested in being part of the for Emerging Media Peer Group, make sure to review the Membership Qualifications here: https://lnkd.in/gmtijm_V Remember, all entry materials are due by May 9th. If you have any specific questions, feel free to DM me, or our Emerging Media peer group Governors Christina Lee Storm or Eric Shamlin. We have a great peer group Executive Committee this year: Vicki Dobbs Beck Amy Seidenwurm Alice Taylor Eddie Chu Melissa Eccles Todd Lichten Gregg Katano Neil Parris Spence Bovee @Nicole Mojan Pirshafiey and me 👏🙌🏆 Academy of Television Arts & Sciences #emmys #televisionacademy #awards #nominations #EmergingMedia Let's do this! 🏆����