The XR4Human forum is the point of contact between a broader XR4Europe community, as it includes not just the current members, but all of those interested in the topic of inclusion and XR.The members of the forum are of different sectors: business, civil society and research. This allows the forum to be variegated in terms of inputs. The forum itself is the perfect online place to create a bridge among people of different sectors and provide knowledge sharing in the areas covered by the XR4Human project.
The forum provides community chats, topic-specific channels, documents/drafts, use of surveys etc.
These documents are essentials to be shared among a variety of different actors to tackle the emergent issue of fragmentation in the XR sector at a European level: on one side, civil society and researchers need to be involved to help citizens understand clearly the risk related to XR technology. On the other, businesses have to be involved too, as they are the ones that will be implementing the aforementioned standards by building human-centric products.
The forum will help XR4Human reach its main goals of:
1. Creating a European Code of Conduct (CoC)
2. Ensuring high standards of ethics, privacy and security
3. Strengthening and promoting collaboration among different parts of the European XR ecosystem. Hence, fostering cohesion.
The forum is accessible to everyone who wishes to join in a fairly easy way. Click here https://community.xr4europe.eu/ or scan the following QR code:
If someone is already a member, their access will happen directly via the XR4Europe login. If someone wishes to join, they simply need to use their ARMember credentials.
After that, the forum provides a window to the world of XR4Human as it allows both direct and indirect engagement to its users: direct engagement via the chatrooms and indirect engagement via the topics posted in the categories. In both cases, conversations are welcome so that the XR professionals at a European level can interact on the topics that they deem more interesting with the purpose of achieving the goals listed above.
The forum is provided by XR4Europe - the pan-European organization of XR professionals - in the framework of Work Package 1: Stakeholder Engagement and Horizontal Coordination. This work package is pivotal in ensuring the realization of the XR4Human project, as it allows for the growth of the XR community online and on-site. The forum is the key element for the growth of the community online and its involvement in addressing the risks related to XR technology, starting by understanding them.
Such risks are of different nature and were found to be: physical and mental health risks, social risks, abuse of power, and legal risks. Plus, the risks related to diversity and inclusivity and accessibility and interoperability. Indeed, gender, age, and social inequality could deepen the digital divide in Europe – posing a threat to European values such as equality and solidarity.
A human-centric XR industry, in fact, would have the objective to empower citizens in making more informed decisions by mitigating such obstacles. Such type of industry starts with online fora, like the XR4Human one, which will stand the test of time as it will be implemented until 2025, and then its legacy will continue for 5 more years.