Jon Jaehnig has been a freelance writer for 10 years across a variety of fields, most recently for the augmented and virtual reality news outlet ARPost. He earned his bachelor’s degree in Scientific and Technical Communication, with a minor in Journalism, from Michigan Technological University. We spoke with Jon on current trends in VR and the metaverse, how this exciting tech might improve, and what’s next for the industry.

How did you get into journalism and covering the AR/VR/XR industry?

I got into writing about the AR/VR/XR industry trying to find jobs in “technical writing.” That’s a specific style of writing for specific kinds of documents—usually within businesses, governments, non-profits, etc.—but a lot of people think it means “writing about technology.” So I was basically hired by mistake to do something completely different from what I was looking for. But that was more than ten years ago, and I’m still here.

What about VR and the metaverse interests you the most?

VR and the metaverse have a huge potential to bring people together in new and exciting ways. Things like Zoom can do that to an extent, but to feel that I’m sharing a space with someone who’s sitting across the world has endless potential—whether you’re talking about businesses, education, social experiences, anything.

What’s one trend in the VR/AR/XR world that you’re not fond of, and why?

I’m worried that people want to take some of our worst traits into virtual spaces. Things like graphic violence and pornography exist within media. But in virtual reality, having these believable, responsive artificial people that we feel okay with objectifying, abusing, murdering—what does that do to us? Will that harm the ways in which we view the human users of virtual spaces? Or the human occupants of our physically shared spaces?

Do you think VR still has more work to do? Or are we here, at its peak?

I think that the software is largely as good as it needs to be. Things like graphic reproductions of assets like motorcars can already be as good as the real thing. I think people will keep tinkering to make representations of people in VR more lifelike, and that’s swell, but that’s more of a luxury than a practical need at this point.

What advice do you have for PR professionals pitching you?

I need images. Always. I could get a great pitch from a PR, I could make a great pitch for my editor, and the first thing that she’s going to ask me every time is whether I have images.