Curious if Meta will ever recoup its investment into VR/AR? A quick Google search indicates Meta has invested north of $100 billion into this tech. The public just doesn't seem that interested in VR/AR. A very small percentage of my family and friends even own a VR headset. Most people are busy and don't have time to strap on a headset when they get home. If gaming / "the metaverse" is the cornerstone of VR, why are almost all gamers playing on a PC or console? And on the AR front, has anyone actually seen anyone out-and-about wearing those Meta AR glasses? Anyone remember Google glass? What happened to Magic Leap?<p>It's unsual, if you would have asked me 15 years ago- I would have told you _absolutely_ VR/AR would be huge. It just hasn't been the case. People don't want to wear headsets and there's nothing that the AR glasses can do that my phone can't. The whole thing has become a money blackhole.
I bought a PS4 VR maybe 2-3 years ago, when it arrived I was excited to try it on, and realized I needed to also buy the camera. I did not think it was worth another 5 minutes on amazon to buy the camera, so the thing just sits there collecting dust. No interest at all. Then there is the price. I pass by a store, and Oculus and friends are $300+. I have bought other things that cost more, like iPhones. Still not willing to buy a VR headset for that, especially when I do not know what I will be getting. I am sure I will be disappointed by the limited ecosystem.
The only killer app for me, when it comes to VR headsets, would be flight sim, and I have been too busy for the last year to even sim on my 4k monitor, so I haven't taken the headset plunge yet. Still, that's the only thing I can think of that would make sense for me. Maybe there are others.
It is a good use for VR, but I also imagine most serious flight sim users already use TrackIR which seriously hampers their adoption to VR. Im not sure if I was offered one or the other for free if I would even choose a VR headset despite being a much higher monetary value because TrackIR already works so good, doesn't restrict vision from my actual controls, and doesn't isolate me from other things that might be going on around me.
It's just that AR/VR is not interactive. Sure they try to simulate interactivity through buttons or hands tracking but its lame and fake.<p>Even when have indistinguishable from reality visuals the illusion falls apart the moment you try to touch it. The fidelity through buttons is rudimentary and through hand tracking is non existent. The suspension of disbelief isn't there, humans fingers are incredibly sensitive and dexterous and we are trained whole life all the time to know how things feel. AI/AR isn't going to have any success without solving that.
That tracks with how great it feels when you match the positions of the virtual and real wheels when simracing.
Peeking under the lenses you see your own arms seamlessly continue into the virtual ones and feels like you are grabbing the virtual wheel.
The VOID VR was the greatest fusion of VR + reality. CAD-mapped laser tag warehouses while wearing a VR headset and backpack computer. Near-perfect immersion. COVID sadly killed it. Was a beautiful thing - so happy I got to try it out. Even ended up buying a lot of the defunct equipment off eBay.<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oad_t6k3w5c" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oad_t6k3w5c</a>
Maybe VR goggles need to be paired with VR gloves?
You nailed it. Im a tech nerd by day, rather occasional casual gamer, and besides that - I dont want to interact with more technology than needs be. The thought of having additional nonsense overlaid on my view is actually nauseating.<p>It could make sense selectively during construction, mining, etc, but even then its a sometimes thing and it needs to be completely unobtrusive. Meta dont seem to be aiming towards or catering to this.
This is the first feature which makes me kind of excited for VR. I live away from my country and my parents for over 20 years and I’d love to be able to sit in my parents’ living room, or have them sit in mine and share a moment together. FaceTime is already great, but I can imagine this will feel more intimate.
Agreed. Both my parents are getting older but live in different cities quite far apart from each other and me. Being able to virtually spend time together would be good if it’s realistic enough. During Covid I got into the habit of playing VR games with my father since I wasn’t able to physically visit and he was isolated. Not quite the same as being there physically of course but it helped a lot. Something both of us looked forward to.
+1 To add to the experience of connecting to people, I can also imagine our family members taking a photograph together while in VR of the family living room – a memento we can take away. That would work if our VR avatars are realistic representations of ourselves, which I think Meta can do (?)
This sounds like an absolute nightmare. Technology disconnected us over decades, then gave us "solutions" to stay in touch 24/7, people are lonelier than ever but we keep pushing for more of this shit. You can already call and video call your family, basically for free, what does VR bring to the table ?<p>"Hey John, grandpa will expire soon can you quickly jump in your headset and upload yourself to his VR cabin in the wood, the one we rent from MetaSpital for $99 a day, to take a selfie with him before he dies alone in a cold hospital room"
Agree 100%. Sounds absolutely awful.
It's just another way to record a time and place. No more different to a video than a video is to a photo. Just slightly more fidelity.<p>It's a good thing. It's a nice thing. Chill.<p>I get that there's reasons to be angry at big tech but this isn't one of them. Accurate and easy 3d scanning, high fidelity rendering and a way to view in 6dof stereoscopic is just a great use case entirely separate from the machinations of our evil overlords.
And how does a 3d rendered world that doesn't exist anywhere other than in a computer has more fidelity than real life ?<p>> It's a good thing. It's a nice thing. Chill<p>That's your opinion, the fact that VR tanked hard seems to indicate most people don't agree
It has more fidelity than a photograph or a 2d video. No one has claimed it is higher fidelity than real life.
> And how does a 3d rendered world that doesn't exist anywhere other than in a computer has more fidelity than real life ?<p>It's not always posible to meet up with people in real life. A lot of my friends moved overseas and I have neither the time nor inclination to be flying to sweden/the USA constantly.<p>> That's your opinion, the fact that VR tanked hard seems to indicate most people don't agree<p>This in no way changes the reality of their situation, in fact frankly, its irrelevant. Something being "nice" or "good" does not require it also have mass market appeal.
>> I have neither the time nor inclination to be flying<p>Everybody struggles with that trade-off; it would be nice if the pro virtual connected crowd acknowledged that a big part of the value of these relationships is that they aren't easy or casual. The infrequency and cost/effort involved is part of what inherently makes them special. I seem to be in the minority that would trade 100 cursory relationships for 1 deeply meaningful relationship.
Pedantic: "nice" or "good" does actually imply there's mass market agreement because otherwise what is the effective definition of the word "nice" or "good"?
If this continues the trend of technology discouraging in-person, physical connectedness then it's not an all-good, all-nice thing. It could actually be a very dangerous, very bad thing.
That's an extreme take, venting off some inner fears and frustrations?<p>There are many use cases where this can add value. People these days live far from their families, what's wrong with connecting in a better/different way if desired?<p>Not everybody wants or can stay with their families for whole life and that's fine, something about personal freedom and right to self-determination, desire for massive personal growth that exposure to different cultures invariably brings in, adventures and so on.
It's adding another dimension to video calls, this isn't solving any major problems in the world. It won't bring in billions in revenue either.
I used to think this. But as I’ve aged and grown wiser, I think perhaps everyone should consider the large negative impacts of moving so far away from family. Technology can’t solve all the problems.
> something about personal freedom and right to self-determination<p>This has to be satire, god emperor Zuck and his megacorp Meta fighting for our personal freedoms and right to self-determination. You're already living in an alternate universe apparently
Yeah, pesky technology disconnecting us. Best to go back before cars where nobody could move anywhere. See you Sunday in church
This doesn't make sense. It's the baby out with the bath water.<p>Yes! actually cars did have a plausibly negative effect on connection. in the before times you couldn't travel far so you didn't. and you saw your family ever day of your life. It's not all it's cracked up to be sure, but we're talking logistics.<p>Now with cars you can go wherever! And people move continents away and are told to make the family trip once a year at thanksgiving to do the family thing. Can you believe that with more optionality comes paradoxically fewer "chosen" options. See Netflix.
I agree with the general sentiment. I also think we forgot how to enjoy quality time together and these “solutions” will make matters worse. But in some scenarios, like what I described, which is just spending time together, it can help
we are decades away. its why carmack quit to pursue other avenues. the chasm between the state of the art (gaming) and where VR currently is (essentially, mobile) is too big not seem shitty in comparison. The then-recent proliferation of Arm and SoC made the industry think it was possible, they even convinced Carmack, but the bandwidth just isnt there. The innovation required on the software side is massive - so theyll just wait for hardware to get better.
Would you care to explain what you mean by "the bandwidth just isn't there"? VR is more than just mobile devices; all currently available VR headsets can also do PC VR, whether via a wired DisplayPort link or a wired or wireless network connection.<p>As I see it, the only absolute upper limit for VR is the resolution and frame rate of the VR headset displays, as well as the quality of the optical stack. Rendering of the graphics can be done by anything from a single high-end GPU in a PC up to a beefy server in the cloud—although in that case, of course, network latency and video compression will impact the experience.
realistically speaking; wired VR is much too much faff.<p>unless it’s a niche thing (simulation, high end gaming), the future is undoubtedly free headsets like the Quest 3 and Apple Vision- for convenience in handling and setup, conformity and freedom of use.
The tech is 100% there for a fancy video call. The major issue is, beyond that, the tech is quite expensive to run and build and despite enabling novel experiences they aren't compelling enough to reach critical mass and justify the cost.<p>The work to make or even use a proper VR app or game is so so much more than the flat equivalent and there are only some added utility for spatial input. Tech can certainly improve some of that...<p>But a VR video call is solved... You can do it mostly out of the box with an AVP but who is going to buy a $3k device for yourself and anyone you want to call and then have a couple calls and never use it because its not worth the hassle to strap it on.
The tech that requires a weighted mask to be strapped to your head while you are tethered to either a power pack or a compute device or both? And you can't imagine why it didn't reach critical mass? No, the tech is definitely not there for mass appeal. If you think the hardware is 100% there, I'd suggest you step outside of the echo chamber, take a deep breath, and touch grass.
I'm sort of embarrassed to ask this, but what is the point of this (and I'm genuinely asking)?<p>I get that it can scan a physical space and then I can see a digital reproduction of that space on VR goggles...but then what? Do I just stand there looking around the space?
As someone who worked in VR a decade ago, I can tell you that the few use cases that were earning us actual money (as opposed to hype and continuous POCs) were niche apps and tools for specific industries.<p>A common one is VR visits for real estate companies and travel agencies, for example. Also virtual previews for investors and C-suite execs in meetings where there was a ton of money involved - think someone trying to sell the creation of a whole neighbourhood and this is a fancy version of a powerpoint slide for their pitch.<p>This tech could probably have saved us a good amount of work, though It's still a head scratcher why Zuck thinks this is the one thing in which to bet the company's future.
> A common one is VR visits for real estate companies and travel agencies, for example.<p>Yes. There's a mini-industry doing this for real estate.[1] Some systems let you place furniture in the 3D model.<p>Versions of this idea go all the way back to Apple's "Quicktime VR", which was a chain of spherical images through which you could navigate.<p>It's a long way from a fun metaverse. (Doing a big metaverse at all is difficult. Making it fun is even harder.)<p>[1] <a href="https://go.matterport.com/RealEstate3DTours.html" rel="nofollow">https://go.matterport.com/RealEstate3DTours.html</a>
> why Zuck thinks this is the one thing in which to bet the company's future<p>Lack of imagination and willingness to rely on someone else's judgement - other than the cyberpunk authors he read as a teen?
I’g just going to say I’d much rather he be fascinated by that than basically anything else.
> > why Zuck thinks this is the one thing in which to bet the company's future<p>> Lack of imagination and willingness to rely on someone else's judgement<p>Perhaps, but given that his financial and investment judgement so far has netted him $250b, I think he gets the benefit of the doubt.
Earlier today I said a "leader" sometimes would rather an entire team quit than admit a mistake. Others would rather light a billion dollars on fire than admit a mistake.
It seems to recreate the absolute low point for Wade in Ready Player One, when he's deeply unhappy and only has the sort of nostalgia you'll get from a photo-realistic but ultimately empty representation like this.
Meta tried to make VR into a mass-market product but currently VR technologies are only successful in very specific niches and use cases.<p>One of those use cases is training in industrial settings like factories, mines, or construction sites. It is a lot cheaper and safer to have workers take their first steps in a VR environment rather than on the actual location.<p>At the moment, a lot of this training is implemented as custom 3D applications using e.g. Unity. I imagine that something like Hyperscape would make it much easier and faster to create and share VR environments for this purpose.
"Visit your local cafe, now in VR. Meet your friends in local spaces, without leaving your home!"<p>Either way, I don't see this taking off. I'm surprised they're still pursuing VR.
Is it though? Zuck has a very coloured history and is not really the innovator he wants to think he is.<p>He seems to have an obsession of breaking free of Apples control.
I'm afraid to ask for this but I wish I could use something like this for work. Why are we all commuting? I'd like to put on a company issued VR headset and be transported to an office. Just literally recreate the office experience.
Why recreate the office?<p>I get that some people have a psychological mindset to "be in a place so as to do work" but offices are a compromise on so many things, most notably space.<p>Now you have tech to create entire wondrously imaginative virtual worlds and you want to recreate a bland little open plan box to cram avatars into?
I guess you could ask, why offices look like they do? they could already be imaginative spaces but companies mostly opt for "bland" spaces. Probably because if you're going to combine the preferences of 30 people in one space you have to settle for something pretty far down the common denominator tree, which is always going to be "bland".
True, but when each person is individually fed their vision and sound you don't necessarily have to compromise.<p>Set some specifics, like open space, chair, table/desk. And you could have Hogwarts theme while I have a viking feasting hall.
There’s at least 8 of such work space apps on Meta Quest, they have whiteboards, you can do stuff together all while in a room in the middle of Alps or in space.
Except with the extra weight of a headset, eye strain, and the uncanny feeling of moving without moving.
There was a demo app showing artists' studios in very high detail. It was really neat.<p>I imagine if you ever want to "hang out in VR", it would be nice to do it in your own virtual living room, instead of the imaginary virtual spaces.<p>The technology is neat. I don't know that either of those justifies the R&D effort. So just try to enjoy that neat technology exists for its own sake.
We know you love the office space so much, we built the technology to perfectly recreate it in VR so you can still come in, hang out and work there, remotely from home!
Likely, you'll want this sort of thing for easy VR video production. Once you have a backdrop scanned, you could more easily film the action with a directional camera.<p>At that point you can have a very convincing VR performance with cheap hardware. That handles much much more viewer IPDs and head positions etc, than one of those expensive omni-directional camera rigs.
The huge application for this I think is video games. Instead of having to create every small detail by hand, you can just create the space in real-life and then have that rendered.
Ironically this is currently very ill suited to gaming. (However, I personally think there's plenty of use cases beyond gaming. Including "it's just intrinsically cool to be somewhere that no longer exists")
Somewhat ironic but for a certain type of person its actually way easier to throw together a simple set than to build convincing 3D art. Once could imagine a point and click adventure built this way but I wouldn't expect that is really a major use-case.<p>That said, the more general aspect of "accessible, user generatable content" is a better way to look at it.
Can’t tell if that’s a joke
I would love to time travel back to some of my old apartments
I guess other people with a headset can view your spaces.
Meta has been working on this for a while. I believe one of their primary use cases was for AI training. e.g., to train robots on real world locations before letting them loose.
AR porn will rake back those billions, lol
Imagine if you could go back and visit all the apartments you've ever lived in. I would pay big for that. That's worth more than a lots of cameras and pictures taken
What's the point of a photograph?
Can think of plenty:<p>Online meetup for Disney fans: each week in a different scan of the park<p>Online consultation with interior design or architect: takes place in you existing house and saves travel for someone billing $x hundred an hour.<p>Online highschool reunion planning meeting with people spread over the world: takes place at the highschool or potential venues<p>Deployed military personel meeting remotely on his anniversary with his wife: takes place where they had their first date<p>I thought we would have already had this with photogrammetry back in 2016 when the Vive released with a camera, but that usually involved too much cleanup and optimizing geometry and couldn't be done automatically, along with the issues with reflections. I was also really surprised Google Earth VR didn't add in multiplayer soon after launch for similar use cases.
VRML was one of my early computing interests. I’m actually excited for more ways to share 3D spaces with folks!
In 2000, I was 10 when I downloaded a web page with an applet to walk into a cell. But a VRML player was a whopping 10mb and it would have jammed up the phone line for hours and costed a fortune.
remember even back THEN, they said VR would change how we work. I guess its just a common misconception we keep making
I don't want Meta knowing about every object in my home, seems creepy to me
This one is actually quite interesting: there's direct uses for any ability to rapidly extract digital representations of physical spaces.
As far as I can tell, this technology isn't novel. It's just Gaussian splatting from the looks of it.
Like spying on the room around the person and trying to advertise to them more Funko Pop dolls?<p>What are the other direct uses?
I can think of a few:<p>* Surveys (I had the county come in once in my sort-of legal rental appartment when they were legalising them, they needed to make a floor plan and fire safety recommendations)<p>* Real estate, which already uses 360 degree photo's and simplified 3d floor plan models<p>* Video games. Very generic usage.<p>* Virtualised museums, but those would likely need extra work to make all the placards etc readable<p>* Street View next level, also indoor navigation.
Oil companies have been using VR rooms for decades to explore, and understand, and map underground deposits and formations.<p>(I first saw it in 1999, when it was considered old hat. I can only imagine how much more advanced it's become.)
And how many of those does Meta have existing revenue and distribution model for?<p>Its pretty safe to assume that the primary driver of this is data hoovering for selling ads, everything else is just PR spin from the Meta thinktanks.
They send me surveys which show they have preoccupations which are... weird.<p>They're not happy to have a successful game store, they want me to use a VR headset to determine my schedule. Which I guess is alright, if I can also access my schedule with a desktop computer or a phone. Why I'd want to use VR to determine my schedule is beyond me, I think a 'minority report' kind of interface could be possible but it is 2025 and you'd think people would expect a conversational recommender that works everywhere.
I knew a guy 20 years ago who was doing a PhD trying to 3D scan caves.<p>Caving is one of those things where not many people get to go there and any damage is irreversible. Combined with other information, such scanning could provide invaluable information for geology.<p>But yeah, not in my house. I already used Valetudo to ensure my robot vacuum doesn't send info about my house anywhere. Why the hell would I do a high detail scan and upload it?
When they first showed this off a few years back it was for AI training, e.g. training robots on real world locations.
Remodeling a kitchen for one.
This would be much more interesting if it didn't just capture one "dumb" point cloud, but actually discerned the separate and unique objects -- eg, giving the user the ability to interact with them in VR as one would IRL.
On one hand, meta has a bad reputation for being a toxic pip factory where employees can be laid off any time. On the other hand, they are consistently coming out with innovations in VR/glasses at a time when the industry is going crazy over openai funny money. Are toxic work practices actually good for innovation?
Semi related, is horizon worlds still a thing? Is it being developed? Are there active users?
Surprisingly it is. Thought it was dead in the water especially against VRChat. But it is continuously worked on and if I did get that right it will get a new engine as well. Accidently hopped into some worlds recently as they are (annoyingly) promoting it heavily in the quest library. And there are plenty of worlds with many players, 99% of which being small kids it feels.
I'm eager to see this become more widely available, at least once such spaces can be shared. Not yet available to me, but hopefully soon.
I have confidence that Meta will find a way to make this user experience horrible and exploitative.
Even if this fails, Meta will end up with quite a substantial stash of real-world spatial data. Tailwind for their AI training initiatives.
Initially read this as hyper escapism but then realised it wasn’t about AI, just 3D.<p>Strange how all the major technologies atm are concerned - at least partly - with escaping reality.
The article misses that people have been doing this sort of thing for years at this point. The innovative part is making it easier to scan the room: <a href="https://scaniverse.com/quest" rel="nofollow">https://scaniverse.com/quest</a>
Remains to be seen if Meta's new VR technology has legs.
VirtuGood Technologies has been selling this technology for decades. Nothing new to see here.
Somewhat related is 3D / LIDAR scanning tech of overlapping photo captures using Matterport: <a href="https://matterport.com/" rel="nofollow">https://matterport.com/</a><p>It's popular with real estate agents. Not quite "virtual reality" but it also doesn't need expensive glasses. It does seem like future smartphones with AI may be a decent cheaper substitute for $6000 Matterport cameras.
As a home-buying shopper, Matterport on a listing is fantastic and makes me 10x more interested in the property.
I think the same content could be viewed with either VR headsets or phones or computers, see<p><a href="https://scaniverse.com/@UP8" rel="nofollow">https://scaniverse.com/@UP8</a>
WOOO, I can make a VR copy of my messy apartment! Come check out the peeling paint and the mysterious stain on the ceiling!
Its hilarious to me how people in these comments still give Meta the benefit of the doubt and think the core feature of this is anything other than blatant data harvesting.
The Zuck really doesn't want to let go of the MetaVerse does he?
There is some sense in it and I’m surprised by all the naysayers here.<p>For starters, Quest is by far the biggest selling VR/XR headset. So he is already seeing some success here.<p>And as we’ve seen before, Facebook isn’t going to dominate forever. It makes complete sense throwing large sums of money at future technology while you still have large sums of money to burn.<p>Chasing new technology when you’re already behind and your revenue is decline is a guaranteed way to fail.<p>Moonshots like this you waste a tonne of money when that money is comparatively cheap anyway. Plus it keeps people talking about your business, which is never a bad thing.
They have lost $68 billion (not spent, lost) on this project [0]. For that money they could have bought EA, owned its cash flows and still have $8 billion left over.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/df26fc4c-5488-4994-b2b8-be4bfbda2724" rel="nofollow">https://www.ft.com/content/df26fc4c-5488-4994-b2b8-be4bfbda2...</a>
Critically, in my estimation: Facebook/Instagram is delivered on phones, browsers, and PCs not owned by Meta. Boardroom politics could tank huge chunks of their business model without recourse.<p>Meta establishing VR and the underlying ecosystem, building a moat, makes lots of long term sense (if they succeed).
And i happy for that. Someone has to bite the bullet to push the VR tech.
Right, but why?
Why not? A lot of technologies exist despite no clear application initially, only taking off decades later. Lithium ion battery research started in 1960s, yet no commercial applications until at least 20 years later, and only really took off with smartphone - [0]<p>HN crowd often criticizes big tech for milking ads and the lack of innovation. Meta deserves credit for sinking their own money into future techs like VR.<p>By the way, Exxon the oil company funded early research of lithium ion battery tech by Dr. Whittingham, clearly not for short term benefits.<p>[0] - <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_lithium-ion_battery" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_lithium-ion_bat...</a>
Because someone needs to pour the money in to get us to "Ready Player One" level game immersion.
But is there much of a demand for it? VR has been a feature of video games for over a decade now, last time I used it I thought it was good enough (that was 6-7 years ago), technology wise. But it's nowhere near as popular as e.g. regular displays.<p>Any movie depictions of VR are fully immersive - Ready Player One (at least the film) takes some liberties in depicting the game world as if it's immersive, even though the guy plays with VR glasses and force feedback gloves/suits, all current-day technology. Most others have a direct brain interface. Some (Star Trek) model a realistic immersive environment around the player, but both of those are very much science fiction still.<p>There's some brain / tech interfaces, but if I recall correctly the brain has to learn to handle the signals first, there's no way to create a perfect, instant link.
I don't think it needs to be perfect for there to be massive demand, but it does need to get a lot better than it currently is.<p>Games where you are stationary (racing simulation, mainly) are better suited to it. Gran Turismo 7 in PSVR2 with a Logitech racing wheel was a ridiculously immersive experience. I played through the whole game in VR and it was one of the best gaming experiences I've had and certainly the most immersive, particularly as a diehard car guy. But racing sims are fairly niche.<p>Outside of racing sims, it's still immersive, but any games with character movement give me immediate motion sickness, the movement is too clunky and disorienting.<p>If they can figure that out at a reasonable price point the demand will be there because the immersion is just night and day against a screen.
> last time I used it I thought it was good enough (that was 6-7 years ago), technology wise.<p>Many of us didnt. I wouldnt call low resolution and low PPI (significantly lower than desktop displays) "good enough." Not to mention terrible optics. I would use my current device a lot more if it could match the "viewable" resolution of my desktop displays, but currently, it can not.
The people who wish for these worlds are either complete shut in, terminally online or already spending 8+ hours a day playing video games and walking past their lives.
They are also e.g. architects and designers who get amazing new tools to check their work and present it to clients. What is more honest than getting to walk through e.g. a life size mockup of a building? Now you can do that before the ground is even broken.
No. We're fairly normal actually.
The numbers don't lie though, statistically nobody wants VR, we haven't even reached the numbers they were predicating for 2016, 10 years later ...<p>> It says 96 million VR headsets will be shipped in 2020<p><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/paullamkin/2016/02/17/wearable-tech-market-to-be-worth-34-billion-by-2020/" rel="nofollow">https://www.forbes.com/sites/paullamkin/2016/02/17/wearable-...</a><p>Turns out they sold half as much.... in 5 years: <a href="https://startupsmagazine.co.uk/article-over-51-million-vr-headsets-shipped-last-5-years" rel="nofollow">https://startupsmagazine.co.uk/article-over-51-million-vr-he...</a><p>> the VR/AR market will reach $182 billion in revenue, including hardware and software/content, by 2025 and bypass television.<p><a href="https://www.startbeyond.co/media/idcvrrevenuereport" rel="nofollow">https://www.startbeyond.co/media/idcvrrevenuereport</a><p>Meanwhile: "The global virtual reality (VR) market size was valued at $16.32 billion in 2024"<p>I don't know anyone with a social life who care about these toys, the only people I know of who are semi interested already spend 6+ hours a day gaming.
I don't care how many people want it. I personally never claimed it was going to be a huge mass market thing. It's big enough to be sustainable.<p>Stupid claims by people trying to pump investment hype have no bearing on my interest in the medium.<p>> I don't know anyone with a social life who care about these toys, the only people I know of who are semi interested already spend 6+ hours a day gaming.<p>The people I know with an interest in VR are mainly artists and other forms of creatives. We must move in different circles.
> I don't know anyone with a social life who care about these toys<p>On the other hand, I do. Isnt it crazy that like, different people have different experiences? Who would have thought!
Meta alone could have solved like 50% of famines/heavy malnutrition currently happening in the world if they used their metaverse budget to do something useful. And they'd still be so rich they wouldn't know what to do with the leftovers.<p>No one "needs" to push for that bullshit metaverse, the real world isn't shitty enough, yet, apparently they're dead set and achieving that, for people to wish to live in a computer.
It would be interesting to see how much of a difference a lump sum of $50 billion would make, or not make, to long term world hunger.<p>It’s a lot of money, but the WFP has spent more than that in the past 10 years on the problem.<p>A lot of the issues with world hunger aren’t easy solved by throwing more money at it. Politics, logistics, corruption etc. It can’t be solved without money either, of course.<p>Not to say that money couldn’t be better spent elsewhere than the metaverse.
If you take money for what it should be - a measure of work invested towards achieving a result, then yes, I suppose we could get a lot done with people employed out of that 50B working towards the goal of ending the world hunger. Heck, I'd even argue building a moon base with that money would have been a better investment than the crap the "magnificent 7" is pushing on us.
You don't understand how money works.<p>They are not burning money, they are employing people like you directly or through 3rd party partner companies. The beneficiaries can decide themselves how to spend money. They can live a good life or help others.
Money buys labour. That labour could be in service to ending world hunger. That labour could be in service to creating bullshit. Both approaches leave workers with money in their pocket, letting them engage in that game of prisoners dilemma we call charity.
Still living in the 80's?<p>Seems like you are the one with an outdated model of how money works.<p>Over the last couple decades it has been moving up at an ever increasing rate instead of down.
Ah yes, they're just redistributing the money, the trickle down economy right ? They're basically a non profit humanitarian association at that point
Profit or loss is out of the equation.<p>Somehow Facebook getting a huge amount of money. They are distributing that money to a million people (directly or indirectly to employees, share holders, employees of 3rd party partners). Some people are getting billions and some are getting $100s.<p>Instead of handful of people in Facebook management deciding to be humanitarian, you now have a million people deciding what to do with their portion. It is that simple.
As soon as I've tried the VR experience myself for something I actually found useful/entertaining (VR sports), I was immediately sold on the idea. I can't wait for this tech to get better and better
why not? As good as the options have become, for many purposes they are still not quite there yet
Metaverse is a huge deal among Zune owners and Quiby subscribers.
I was in LA in 2015 at the peak of the VR hype, I don't think zuck got the memo that it flopped hard between then and now.
He should've just spent the money to buy Roblox, Fortnite or Minecraft. Second Life at a stretch.
The FacebookVerse.
so that is why they werent giving access to the color cameras in oculus 3 to apps<p>i want my point cloud scanner dammit
I just hope we’ll be able to download and keep our files, rather than have them hold hostage… it would be nice to use this as a personal archival of houses and pass them down like a family album.<p>Now there’s a sad sad thought - imagine if Kodak required monthly subscription to vote your photos
A fundamental problem with Metaverse is that their parent companies (Facebook, Insta, and as far as Whatsapp it's a clear antitrust case) don't work<p>People don't see posts from friends. The site spams you to death. They hijacked your email address, and replaced it with a facebook.com address. They've lied rather a lot about things generally<p>And that company is now the one presenting a Metaverse/VR/AR/whatever<p>It should be DOA just based on reputation, never mind the technical merits
Imagine scanning a cooking courses and be able to move in the space to watch cooking technique in any angles, would be awesome
I learned to cook from 360p Youtube videos in 2007 and don't see how watching preparation from a different angle would make a difference.
That would be magnitudes more data i think. As cheap as storage is i don't think anyone is ready for that.
I can just see it now - Trump, Netanyahu and Zuckerborg teaming up to provide Gazans with VR headsets running videos of virtually reconstructed Palestine. Genocide, what genocide?
Meta is the Yahoo of current platforms. It happens to all of them eventually...
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Rendering takes a few hours means humans are building it at least partially.
Hmm I swear I saw something like this demoed. I think it was an independent thing but also think Apple has it too with their VR headset.