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Since its emergence in the 1960s, virtual reality (VR) has generated significant enthusiasm among researchers and practitioners, as well as technology and media companies. In journalistic practice, however, VR has so far only been able to compete to a limited extent. This paper first establishes the status quo of VR apps in the journalistic field as found in the Oculus Store, and then analyses the user comments (N = 770) of 15 VR apps produced by journalistic media outlets to evaluate their perceptions in terms of the constructs of immersion, emotion, usability, and utility. Results show that users positively highlight VR’s capacities to elicit immersion and emotion, while technological aspects of usability and utility are often assessed negatively. Additionally, positive emotional and immersive reactions in VR are possible despite flaws in technology, and a positive immersion is also associated with a positive emotional VR experience. Derivations for a potential restart of VR apps in journalism are drawn.

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For the past 19 years, the Laser Hardened Materials Evaluation Laboratory (LHMEL), located at Wright-Patterson AFB, OH, has maintained a number of calibrated high energy power measurement devices capable of measuring CO2 powers up to 150 kW. These devices, calibrated annually to the National Institute for Standards & Technology (NIST) high energy standard calorimeters, serve as secondary standards for in-house calibration of LHMEL's commercial power heads and calorimeters. Recent discussions with academic and industrial laser users have identified an industry need for traceable calibration sources above the 1 kW level. This paper describes the methods used to calibrate LHMEL's commercial power measurement devices using the LHMEL secondary standards and also describes the process by which other laser users can access these same calibration capabilities to confirm the accuracy of their own power heads and calorimeters. The LHMEL calibration capability offers academic and industrial laser users the opportunity to economically calibrate existing power measurement devices on demand to an NIST-traceable secondary standard. The method described has been applied to calibrate systems up to 100 kW while maintaining measurement accuracies to within ±6.3%.