Tony Parisi (software developer)

In 2022 Parisi joined as Chief Strategy Officer at Seattle-based LAMINA1, a blockchain and Metaverse startup co-founded by author Neal Stephenson.

In October of 2021, Parisi published a treatise titled “The Seven Rules of the Metaverse,” which went viral and has since become a de facto work in Metaverse canon. Parisi is the co-host with Mark Pesce of the podcast “A Brief History of the Metaverse.”

In 2016 Parisi joined San Francisco-based Unity Technologies as Global Head of VR/AR, and served in that position until early 2022. Over time his role shifted from overseeing all virtual and augmented reality strategy for the company to developing strategy and products that integrate virtual and augmented reality with advertising and e-commerce. While at Unity, Parisi filed and was granted a patent for an invention in augmented reality advertising.

In 2012, Parisi joined the Khronos working group creating glTF, a JSON- and binary-encoded file format for three-dimensional scenes and models intended for web and mobile applications. He served as glTF specification co-editor from 2012 to 2017, and contributed technical features such as the design of the original animation system. Parisi also wrote the initial file loader for Three.js, and the first sample exporter to glTF from the Unity game-engine editor. Parisi coined the name “glTF” (Graphics Language Transmission Format) as an alternative to the generic working title “ATF” (Asset Transmission Format), which the working group accepted. Parisi was also instrumental in getting the format adopted by companies such as Oculus and Microsoft in 2016, which helped propel the format into wide use and industry acceptance.

From 2011 through 2014, Parisi wrote books, created training courses and consulted to companies on WebGL, the standard JavaScript API for rendering interactive 2D and 3D graphics in web browsers. Parisi authored two O’Reilly Media books on WebGL programming. Parisi authored an introductory book on virtual reality programming published by O’Reilly Media in 2015.

Parisi has designed and developed several international 3D graphics standards. Parisi worked with Mark Pesce to develop VRML, which Pesce presented to the world in 1994. The purpose of VRML was to allow for the creation of 3-D environments within the World Wide Web, accessible through a web browser. Parisi worked with such corporations as Microsoft, Netscape, Silicon Graphics, Sun Microsystems and Sony to gain industry acceptance of the new protocol as a standard for desktop virtual reality.