Being Social in VR Meetings: A Landscape Analysis of Current Tools
Anya Osborne, Sabrina Fielder, Joshua McVeigh-Schultz, T. Lang, Max Kreminski, George Butler, Jialang Victor Li, Diana R. Sanchez, Katherine Isbister
Abstract
In the 21st century workplace (especially in COVID times), much human social interaction occurs during virtual meetings. Unlike traditional screen-based remote meetings, VR meetings promise a more richly embodied form of communication. This paper maps the experiential terrain of seven commercial VR meeting applications, with a particular focus on the range of shared social experiences and collaborative abilities these applications may enable or constrain. We examine a range of applications including Spatial, Glue VR, MeetinVR, Mozilla Hubs, VRChat, AltspaceVR, and Rec Room. We analyze and map avatar system strategies, meeting environments and in-world cues, meeting invitation model, and different models of participation. In addition, we argue that commercial applications for meeting in VR that cater to workplace contexts might benefit from borrowing some of the strategies used in more leisure-focused environments for supporting social interaction.