“It’s about the experience, stupid!” “Beyond the Screens.” “Digital expanding experiences.” This have been several phrases, mottos, just random things to say since I started this journey.
A quick disclaimer, this will be long. Yet entertaining. Read at your own risk. Or come back to it, if I have generate some interest.
Why did I started this journey? Great question. Because why not. There is a certain Tech CEO turned now Bond Villain that mentioned about minimizing regrets in life. This was one of those regrets. Since I can remember, I could write some original stories that my classmates enjoyed. I believed it was a satire on our former presidents of El Salvador, were I was raised until I graduated, and decided to come back here.
I never was interested in writing a “Best Selling Book” or never been good or interested in traditional flat screen gaming (I totally suck in COD!) You can ask my wife on how many buttons I press accidentally when fighting with a boss. But VR, it was love at first sight. No it wasn’t that terrible VR troopers. Nor reading great sci-fi lit like ‘Snowcrash’ or ‘Ready Player One’. It was a demo at one of the now defunct Microsoft stores. (RIP). One of them was facing a T-Rex. Another frightening, yet thrilling love from my childhood. I was in love. During this time, I was traveling across the country as a trainer. Work Hard, Partying Harder.
Then COVID happened. Everybody locked down. Schools closed. Work from Home. I could see the limitations of ‘flat screen’ tech, especially for our distraction targets population (ADHD, others, myself included.) Remote learning via monitors, JUST DID NOT WORK. Not to mention other limitations like Teleheath, Teams/Zoom meetings that reminds your of the Brady Bunch intro, and other limitations that I don’t remember. The point is….BORING.
Not to mention how many people like myself who worked around the world, would love to spend time with their children, or enjoy some time with their spouses, like watch some streaming or playing a game like I do with my Sam.
Then came the idea. Then the name. Prexense. Pronunce like Presence, as in being there, but changing some spelling, especially the X to emphasis experience, excitement, exhilarating and other ex- words to represent what we will do.
Then the ‘Metaverse’ boom came, hijacked by Facebook who ridiculously changes their name to Meta, but still earned the mistrust of everyone due to their known sales of private data. And others that attempted to ride the train and add blockchain, crypto, NFTs and other “Web3” technologies that have nothing to do with Extended Reality, Spacial Computing or just it.
Why moved to Pittsburgh?
We lived at the time in Inwood, West Virginia. As I envisioned Prexense, I saw that of all the surrounding areas, this region had what I was looking for. First thing I saw was that Pittsburgh was one of the 20 finalists for Amazon HQ2. Then I saw they have one of the top tech universities, Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) which has the first Entertainment Tech School in the world, in addition to several universities from University of Pittsburgh to West Virginia University and others. It has one of the leading studios in the nation, Schell Games, lead by the one and only Jesse Schell (meet twice :)). And the State of Pennsylvania had a Game Tax Incentive. Although more expensive than Inwood. (Yes, we moved during the inflation and high interest rates). It’s less expensive than California, DC and New York.
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