Who Is This For? The Access Illusion of XR

Immersive Impact Review — Issue 2 Call for Submissions

Open Date: 4/1/26

Closing Date:  5/15/26

The Immersive Impact Review invites submissions for its second issue around the theme of “Who Is This For? The Access Illusion of XR.” The Review is an open-access publication dedicated to advancing knowledge at the intersection of immersive technologies and social good.  It is published by the Immersive Experience Alliance with funding from Agog.  

About the Theme

Immersive technology has always carried a democratic promise. VR can transport you to places you'd never otherwise visit. AR can layer new meaning onto familiar spaces. XR can give voice, visibility, and embodied understanding to communities and experiences that traditional media struggles to convey. The pitch is powerful: these tools can make the world more accessible, more equitable, more seen.

But who is actually seeing? And who is being left out?

In 1984, Rockwell sang "I always feel like somebody's watching me." Forty years later, in XR, somebody is watching but the deeper question may be who never gets watched at all. Whose stories don't get funded, don't get built, don't get distributed? Whose bodies aren't accounted for in the design of the hardware? Whose classrooms don't have the bandwidth or the budget? Whose health conditions don't attract the flashy VR treatment study? Whose cultural heritage is disappearing while the immersive tools that could preserve it remain locked behind price points and institutional access?

We might call this the access illusion: the story the immersive field has told itself from the beginning. The promise was that XR would be inherently democratizing, that the power of presence would dissolve the barriers between people, places, and experiences. That story endured because it contained a real kernel of truth: immersive technology can do extraordinary things. But the illusion lies in the leap from "can" to "does" or the assumption that transformative potential translates automatically into equitable access. The history of immersive technology is littered with moments where the democratic promise was invoked to attract funding, generate press, and build excitement, while the actual tools remained concentrated in the hands of well-resourced institutions, festivals, and research labs. Understanding how this illusion was constructed and why it has proven so durable is essential to moving past it.

These questions take on a different urgency now. Across the United States and beyond, efforts to erase histories, defund cultural and educational institutions, dismantle equity-focused programs, and restrict what can be taught and remembered are accelerating. The NEA, the NEH, public libraries, university DEI offices, K-12 curricula— the infrastructure that has historically supported the kind of cultural and educational work that XR for social good depends on is being actively dismantled. At the same time, immersive technology is maturing rapidly, moving from experimental novelty to strategic infrastructure in healthcare, education, workforce training, and civic life. These two forces, the defunding of public-interest work and the mainstreaming of immersive technology, might seem like separate problems driven by different actors. But they converge on the same communities.

When cultural funding disappears, many impact XR projects lose their support. When educational budgets are slashed, the schools that were already least likely to have XR tools fall further behind. When equity programs are eliminated, the pipelines that bring diverse voices into the immersive field narrow. The technology advances while the people it was supposed to serve are pushed further from the table. The access illusion doesn't just persist in this environment but it deepens–or does it? Is there something else entirely we are missing?

Our first issue explored how to measure value and sustainability in the face of resource constraints. This second issue pushes further: in a moment when the ground beneath public-interest immersive work is actively shifting, what happens? Do XR technologies stand up to these trends by offering new means of preservation, education, and connection that can survive the defunding of traditional institutions? Or do they become more exclusionary, more alienating, more concentrated among those who already have the most? When we talk about "impact," impact for whom? When we build immersive experiences meant to heal, teach, preserve, or transform, whose needs drive the design?

This issue asks: Who is this for? Who should it be for? And what must change to close the gap?

We seek contributions that examine what we might call the access illusion, that is, the distance between XR's egalitarian promise and the material realities of who can create, distribute, and experience immersive work. We want to understand who is building, who is funding, and whose priorities shape the immersive impact landscape.

We're interested in erasure and reclamation. When governments and institutions actively suppress histories, defund the arts, and restrict curricula, can XR serve as a counter-archive? What does it look like when communities use immersive tools to preserve and reclaim stories on their own terms? And what are the risks of well-intentioned outsiders building those experiences for them?

We want to hear about equity in immersive health. Clinical VR is expanding rapidly-- in pain management, mental health, rehabilitation, surgical training, and beyond. But whose bodies are these tools designed for and tested on? Which communities have access to immersive therapeutics and which are excluded from trials, treatment, and design processes? What does health equity look like in these environments?

We're looking for work on the edtech divide. XR is entering classrooms, but not all classrooms equally. What determines which schools, districts, and students get access to immersive learning? How do funding models, infrastructure gaps, and policy decisions shape who benefits from XR in education? And when XR education tools are deployed, whose pedagogical values and cultural perspectives are embedded in the content?

We seek contributions on design justice and co-creation. How are immersive experiences designed, and who has a seat at the table? What does it mean to co-design XR with the communities it's meant to serve rather than for them? What frameworks, practices, and failures can the field learn from?

We are eager to explore the political economy of immersive platforms. When impact creators build on commercial hardware and corporate platforms, whose terms govern the work? How do platform business models, data practices, and content moderation policies shape what kinds of impact XR are possible and for whom?

We want to hear about the body in the machine. XR hardware is not one-size-fits-all. Headsets that don't accommodate different head sizes, hairstyles, skin tones for tracking aren't just inconvenient, they're exclusionary by design. What does inclusive hardware and interaction design require?

We're interested in the global dimension, particularly the material and economic realities that shape where immersive impact work can happen and where it can't. How do infrastructure disparities like electricity, bandwidth, and device access determine the global geography of XR impact? What happens when economic imbalances between regions shape not just who experiences immersive work but what gets built and for which markets? And how does the field reckon with the tendency to exoticize the communities and places that global impact projects depict?

We are curious about the workforce and pipeline. Who gets to work in immersive technology? What barriers exist for underrepresented creators, developers, and researchers? How are training programs, funding mechanisms, and industry networks either opening doors or reinforcing existing hierarchies?

And we want case studies: concrete examples of projects, programs, or policies that either advanced or undermined equity in immersive experience, and what the field can learn from both.

Types of Writing We Love

We gravitate toward narrative nonfiction: writing with strong characters you want to follow, a real arc, and vivid, descriptive prose that puts you in the room. We're less interested in traditional academic style and more interested in work that reads like it was written by a human being with a point of view and a story to tell. Beyond that, we love work that makes structural problems feel personal and urgent. Writing that challenges the field's self-image without cynicism. Stories from practitioners who confronted hard questions about access and inclusion and are willing to share what they learned (including what they got wrong). We are also interested in pieces that connect XR's equity challenges to longer histories of technological promise and exclusion and work that centers the perspectives and expertise of communities who are more often represented in XR than consulted about it.

Who Should Submit

This journal welcomes voices from across the immersive ecosystem. You do not need a Ph.D. to contribute meaningful knowledge. We actively encourage submissions from researchers studying XR, equity, education, health, or technology policy; creators, producers, and designers working in immersive media; nonprofit leaders integrating XR into social change work; healthcare practitioners and researchers exploring immersive therapeutics; educators and edtech leaders working with XR in diverse learning contexts; legal scholars and policy advocates working on technology access and digital equity; artists exploring themes of erasure, visibility, and power in immersive work; technologists building XR platforms, hardware, and tools; community organizers, advocates, and cultural workers from communities frequently represented in impact XR; journalists covering XR, equity, and technology policy; and students engaging with these questions from any discipline.

Working with Our Editors

We develop articles collaboratively over several months. Our editorial process typically begins with feedback on an article summary, which leads to an initial draft. From there, we work together through one or two additional drafts before moving into final copyediting and reference checks. Some pieces require more rounds than others, and occasionally a piece may be postponed to a future issue or, in rare cases, retired from the process (with a kill fee) if it ultimately isn't the right fit. We take this iterative approach seriously because it produces better work and builds real relationships between editors and contributors. Our goal is for the revision process to feel like a genuine collaboration — one that makes the final piece stronger than if any of us made it alone. If you're someone who values thoughtful editorial feedback and is comfortable working through multiple drafts, we'd love to hear from you. 

Submission Categories

1. CASE STUDIES (2,500–5,000 words) In-depth examinations of specific XR projects, programs, or policies with documented outcomes. Who was included in the design process? Who benefited? Who didn't? Case studies should offer practical insights and include concrete details about decisions, trade-offs, and results. A case study should not be based on work you were involved with. Your own work may fit as a “Practice & Process” article (see below.)  Also note, we generally tend to publish case studies of projects that had a broad impact on the creative community and target audiences.  Projects with small audiences that weren’t widely diffused and studied may not be the best candidates for case studies.

Possible topics include community co-design processes for impact XR projects; XR deployments in under-resourced schools or clinics and what made them succeed or fail; efforts to use immersive technology for cultural preservation or counter-narrative work; platform or funder decisions that shaped who could access or create impact XR; and post-mortems of well-intentioned projects that reproduced the exclusions they set out to address.

2. HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES (2,000–4,000 words) Retrospective analyses that connect current equity challenges to longer histories. These pieces should illuminate patterns, draw unexpected connections, or provide context that helps the field understand where it stands.

Possible topics include the history of "democratizing" technology promises and how they've played out; earlier immersive technologies and who they served; the relationship between public funding for the arts and sciences and the development of socially engaged immersive work; and how previous waves of educational technology adoption did or didn't deliver on equity promises.

3. PRACTICE & PROCESS (1,500–3,500 words) Practitioner-focused pieces sharing real-world approaches to equity in XR production, distribution, or deployment. These should be grounded in project experience and offer actionable knowledge for others in the field.

Possible topics include designing XR experiences for accessibility from the start; building equitable partnerships with communities; navigating funding structures that shape whose stories get told; low-cost or low-bandwidth approaches to immersive impact work; and adapting XR health or education tools for contexts they weren't originally designed for.

4. PROVOCATIONS (1,000–2,500 words) Opinion pieces and critical commentary that challenge assumptions or reframe debates. Intellectually rigorous but essayistic in style. While we do value strong stances, we look for these submissions to lean heavily on facts and bodies of research to support their arguments.  

Possible topics include: Is XR for social good just another form of technological solutionism? The case against empathy tourism. Why "access" is necessary but not sufficient and what equity demands. Should impact XR abandon commercial platforms entirely? The field's diversity problem is a design problem.

5. CONVERSATIONS (2,000–4,000 words) Edited interviews or dialogues with thought leaders, practitioners, community members, policymakers, or funders. These should offer substantive insight, not promotional content. Include context and framing for readers.

6. RESEARCH ARTICLES (3,000–7,000 words) Empirical studies, theoretical frameworks, or systematic analyses. We prioritize work with clear methodologies and relevance to social impact. While rigorous, articles should be accessible to non-specialist readers–that is, we love hybrid research articles that involve rich setting and storytelling.

Possible topics include disparities in access to XR-based health interventions; equity audits of XR edtech deployment across school districts; comparative analyses of community-led versus externally produced immersive impact projects; empirical studies of how hardware design excludes specific populations; and assessments of workforce diversity and pipeline programs in immersive technology.

7. CREATIVE SUBMISSIONS & DOCUMENTATION Visual essays, interactive pieces, artistic responses, or documentation of work that engages with the theme. Proposals should include descriptions of the work, its connection to the theme, and technical requirements. Selected works will be featured in our VRChat virtual library.

8. REVIEWS: Reviews of specific XR projects for impact.  These can include praises and constructive criticism. Criticism should reference specific details in the work (spoilers are allowed!) while relating them to larger trends in XR production.   Reviews may focus on entire festivals, conferences, or publications about the immersive industry.  

Submission Guidelines

Format: Submit via our Issue 2 Form. Include a 150–250 word article summary, 5 keywords, and author bio(s) of 100 words or fewer per contributor.  Please submit by midnight PST May 15, 2026.  Proposals submitted earlier in the submission window will receive preferential consideration.

Style: Write for an intelligent, curious reader who may not be an expert in your specific domain. Define technical terms. Use active voice. Include visuals where helpful (images, diagrams, screenshots). Citations should follow Chicago (notes and bibliography) style.

NB: Each accepted submission will be supported by a small honorarium.

Questions?

Contact the editorial team: editors@immersiveimpactreview.com