High Fidelity is an American social

virtual reality Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that employs pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video games), e ...

company headquartered in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

Company

High Fidelity was founded in April 2013 by

Second Life ''Second Life'' is an online multimedia platform that allows people to create an avatar for themselves and then interact with other users and user created content within a multi player online virtual world. Developed and owned by the San Fra ...

founder and former CEO

Philip Rosedale Philip Rosedale (born September 29, 1968) is an American entrepreneur who founded Linden Lab, which develops and hosts the virtual world ''Second Life''. Biography Early life Rosedale was born in San Diego, California, in 1968. He took an inter ...

, Ryan Downe Karpf, and Irena Freidrica Heiberger. The company was formed to create a next-generation

platform featuring low latency, spatialized 3D audio, high-detail environments, realistic avatars, and a working economy built on blockchain. High Fidelity raised 2.4 million dollars in early 2013, led by True Ventures and

Google Ventures GV is a venture capital investment arm of Alphabet Inc., founded by Bill Maris, that provides seed, venture, and growth stage funding to technology companies. Founded as Google Ventures in 2009, the firm has operated independently of Google, Alph ...

. In 2015, it raised an additional 11 million dollars from

Vulcan Capital Vulcan LLC is a privately held company founded by the Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and his sister Jody Allen in 1986 to establish and oversee the family's diverse business activities and philanthropic endeavors. It includes Vulcan Real Estate ...

, and in December 2016, it raised another 22 million dollars in an investment round let by IDG Capital and

Breyer Capital James W. Breyer (born July 26, 1961) is an American venture capitalist, founder and chief executive officer of Breyer Capital, an investment and venture philanthropy firm, and a former managing partner at Accel Partners, a venture capital firm. B ...

. In June 2018, it raised 35 million dollars. The round was led by blockchain investment firm Galaxy Digital Ventures, which invested $20 million from its Galaxy EOS Ecosystem Fund. Other new investors included Blockchain Capital. Existing investors Breyer Capital, IDG Capital Partners, and Vulcan Capital also participated.

Products

High Fidelity provided a

platform for users to create, deploy, visit, and interact with

virtual world A virtual world (also called a virtual space) is a computer-simulated environment which may be populated by many users who can create a personal avatar, and simultaneously and independently explore the virtual world, participate in its activities ...

s along with other users. These virtual spaces can host up to 500 people at once. The software is free and open source. It can be used with most VR headsets or a traditional monitor in desktop mode. To promote commerce and protect content from forgery, digital assets in High Fidelity are certified on High Fidelity's blockchain-based Digital Asset Registry (DAR), which gives each item a unique fingerprint and provides a decentralized, publicly auditable ledger of transactions. Users can buy and sell virtual goods and services using High Fidelity's stablecoin cryptocurrency, High Fidelity Coin (HFC). On April 27, 2016, High Fidelity entered open beta. In July 2017, High Fidelity ordered six episodes of a VR talk-show titled Glitched: A VR Talk Show from Studio Capon and followed up with a weekly streamed dance party series in VR with DJ Tha Phlash. In 2018, High Fidelity staged a speaker series featuring VR conversations between High Fidelity CEO Philip Rosedale and academics, futurists, and VR experts such as Jeremy Bailenson, Courtney Cogburn, Peter Diamandis, and Jessica Outlaw. In November 2018, High Fidelity hosted FUTVRE LANDS, the first music and entertainment festival hosted completely in VR. The four-hour event brought together 466 avatars from 47 countries and included live entertainment from actors, artists, and musicians across multiple stages in a virtual festival venue. High Fidelity advisor

Thomas Dolby Thomas Morgan Robertson (born 14 October 1958), known by the stage name Thomas Dolby, is an English musician, producer, composer, entrepreneur and teacher. Dolby came to prominence in the 1980s, releasing hit singles including "She Blinded Me ...

performed a live concert set. Other attractions included live art, bingo, trivia, and limited-edition festival merchandise to buy and download from High Fidelity's marketplace. Plans for gatherings on the High Fidelity platform to use

were scrapped by the beginning of 2019, and the platform became audio-only. Users appear as dots in a birds-eye view of a space, and can move their dots around the space to have conversations with individuals or groups. Audio is spatialized, so that users will hear other users at different volumes depending on their relative locations within the space. In March 2019, High Fidelity hosted Multi-Con, a

comic con A comic book convention or comic-con is an event with a primary focus on comic books and comic book culture, in which comic book fans gather to meet creators, experts, and each other. Commonly, comic conventions are multi-day events hosted at co ...

inspired VR event featuring cosplay, fanart, and celebrity panelists.

Kari Byron Kari Elizabeth Byron (born December 18, 1974) is an American television host, best known for her role on the ''MythBusters'' and ''White Rabbit Project'' series. Early life Byron was born in the Bay Area, California. She graduated from Los Gat ...

Tory Belleci Salvatore "Tory" Paul Belleci (born October 30, 1970) is an American television personality and model maker, best known for his work on the Discovery Channel television program ''MythBusters''. He has also worked with Industrial Light and Magic on ...

, and

Grant Imahara Grant Masaru Imahara (October 23, 1970 – July 13, 2020) was an American electrical engineer, roboticist, and television host. He was best known for his work on the television series ''MythBusters'', on which he designed and built numerou ...

, the stars of Emmy-nominated MythBusters, hosted a panel and shared stories from MythBusters with the audience.

James Arnold Taylor James Arnold Taylor (born July 22, 1969), also known by his initials JAT, is an American voice actor, writer, producer and podcaster. He is known for portraying Ratchet in the '' Ratchet & Clank'' franchise, the main character Tidus in '' Final ...

, voice actor of

Fred Flintstone Fred Flintstone is the main character of the animated sitcom '' The Flintstones'', which aired during prime-time on ABC during the original series' run from 1960 to 1966. Fred is the husband of Wilma Flintstone and father of Pebbles Flintsto ...

and Obi-Wan, debuted his show “Talking to Myself” in VR at Multi-Con. In May 2019, High Fidelity announced it would focus its efforts on an application for remote and distributed teams. The yet-to-be-named application, accessible through both desktop mode and VR, provides a virtual space where people can collaborate using High Fidelity's spatialized 3D audio and realistic avatars. Interest in High Fidelity's virtual meeting platform ballooned during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

References

{{reflist, 2

External links

High Fidelity website

High Fidelity official blog
Virtual reality companies Companies based in San Francisco Software companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area American companies established in 2013 Software companies established in 2013 2013 establishments in California Software companies of the United States