Maybe when I can get a headset that offers onboard focus-adjustment and some kind of omnidirectional treadmill I'll sink another thousand dollars into VR but until then I am done.
One day it'll end up consolidated into some equivalent of Windows/Mac/Linux, probably categorised into the same sort of "business/professionals", "artists/creatives", and "geeks/tinkerers" approximate major demographics.
If you need some hints about which platform(s) will "win", keep an eye on what I buy. And avoid them. I have a GearVR/S6Edge - on a shelf with my Apple Newton, Sinclair ZX80, and Betamax video recorder. I think perhaps my only technology win is the turntable I bought in 1985 and still use...
I suspect I'm a fellow harbinger. I thought Apple was cool in the 90s and that Microsoft was on to something in the 00s-early 10s (including Win8/Phone), so I'm at least a solid 5+ years off (or, as a positive spin, simply much too early).
[1] https://boingboing.net/2019/12/03/harbringer-of-doom.html)
Exactly, we are still in early days for VR. Many of the annoying things will get better.
And back then we had Moore's Law on our side.
So truly mainstream VR might be 20+ years from now.
But I only use my VR system for fitness, and only a few fitness oriented or active apps. It is the killer but only VR app for me.
I don't think the Go was a very good product. Facebook was right to double/triple down on the Quest, but that does leave early adopters a bit in a mess with outdated hardware (although I'm on my third quest system already).
Compare it to the PDAs (e.g., Palm Pilot) of the late 90s early 2000s. They were cool, but hard to use. Though they were popular, they were far from mainstream. Then the iPhone came out, and a few years later everybody had a computer in their pocket. VR sorely needs a similar disruption.
I don't know which thing will work out and which won't, but people telling you why they won't or will never use it is not that meaningful to me. I have seen too many things in my life that people say they will never use become quite common. I have always had my best successes on new technologies so I am always rooting for people trying to create new hardware.
FWIW I love my Quest 2 and use it every day. Your mileage will vary.
In my opinion it already is. I have an OQ2 and play whatever the golf simulator is, and a sailboat simulator in it all the time, but it's exactly the type of quick, 2-3 minute sessions that used to be mobile games or tiktok. From lifting my laptop off of my laptop to starting a race in the sailboat game takes less than a minute, and almost all of that is just load times on the game.
(The sailing game is marineverse, btw. Lots of fun when its 115 degrees out in Phoenix and too hot to go on real water)
As for the Ready Player One experience. There is a different issue to be addressed and that is the finite experience offered by modern day "games." Taking a look at Diablo Immortal and it should be clear of what little runway there is to live your life in VR. Experiences extended by lootboxes.
Even games that don't use that mechanism are bloated through artificial grinds. Economy resets and just lack of budget for story outside of 80hrs. Why even sink the development time in if you have the former to fuel profit margins?
There's a lot more to be said inside the scope of what XR is and how it will impact. And its not just comfort or accessibility preventing adoption. There is no killer app and it's the same with crypto. But that's more to do with the current limits of concepts we have relied on to get to this point.
The minute, enterprises use VR to improve productivity, everyone will switch to VR.
I'm always astounded by the lack of imagination from smart people that they get so fixated on small things while completely missing the bigger picture.
That's how you end up with Grammar Nazis, REST Nazis, TDD Nazis, Security Nazis, Code Format Nazis.
Make no mistake, society needs people who are obsessed or paranoid about little things, but they aren't the ones you look up to or go to for next generation advances.
So, as usual I'll take any HN future prediction with grain of salt and stick to people who have created Trillion $ companies or built products used by Billions.
I have a headset I bought a few years ago (PSVR), and while it’s easy enough to set up, I don’t want to rearrange my living room every time I use it.
That being said, body tracking is what made the platform click for me. Hanging out with friends from all over the world in an immersive space feels like the future.
I'm a huge VR nerd, I love collecting headsets and playing with new ways to display visuals. But I've never thought it would be a mainstream product, because of exactly what you said: you have to strap something to your head
It really isn't that immersive. Once you are into the game or story it doesn't matter whether you are reading a book, watching a TV or viewing it through VR. You get immersed regardless
My main interest in VR is playing with the idea of replacing my monitors for coding, graphic design and 3D modelling. 3D modelling in VR is already very good and better than a screen due to the hand-tracking and being able to easily manipulate directly in 3D space (not the immersive display, so much)
But I will admit that even though each time I take off the dust from my Quest I am wowed at the experience,
... each time I take off the headset I shrug and I'm like "cool".
Maybe we just need to come to grips with the fact that _as an entertainment or work_ device, it's friggin awesome - and as far as "reality" goes, it's pointless.
Now of course if it came to a point where you don't want to remove the headset.. but thankfully personally I don't have any worries.
A funny philosophical thought.. you reproduce the sense of smell, taste .. etc... Then people will be like, "umm, it's just like my real life now.. what is the point?" Other than being "transported" (for fake) and experience another place.
I think that's the main misconception with VR. There is the dream of "living another life". But it's just entertainment.
edit: I should also add that despite promising stories in the media, the ability of VR to heal trauma, to heal our nervous system, to make us better people... is still very much up in the air.. and as I am healing trauma myself I can see how VR could just as well unbalance the nervous system. I mean you're already seeing how "novelty" messes us up in social media (inifinite scroll etc)... why should we expect VR to make everything betteR?
The other issue is even if people are open to the VR device itself, I think you absolutely have to nail the experience for them the first time or else people will treat it like a fad and then never give it a go again. You don’t have a second chance to make a good impression.
These things were all essentially experiments, or at best a little taster of VR for those not ready to invest in serious (PC-based) VR. Decent VR needs a truckload of GPU power, and these early attempts to use phone hardware for VR were never going to be much good.
Making it indistinguishable from real life should be easy then.
Hooking up a Quest 2 to Steam works well and it means that you have a platform that will support numerous headsets.
Where that leaves Meta though is an interesting question.
New equipment may be too expensive and novel for home purchases, but an arcade could invest in those fancy omnidirectional treadmill and VR gloves.
The demand is there. People pay $30+ for a spin class, why not VR lightsaber zumba?
Video games in the 80s and movies started off in commercial locations before becoming cheap enough for home use. I'm not sure why VR hasn't followed their model. I've assumed it was because the tech isn't there yet.
Believe it or not but a lot of people go to group sport to be surrounded by people, not to be alone in a virtual world.
Their drivers caused what has probably been the only windows bluescreens I've seen in a decade.
Then because they can't provide individual downloadable versions (or for that matter even recover them from their build artifacts, per support) anytime something breaks following an update your SOL until they fix it, if ever. (this is part of a larger dark pattern of creating "installers" that actually are only downloaders that download whatever version is current and install it without saving the downloaded image).
I'm in the situation where about a year and a half ago they pushed an update which broke my setup, and they can't seem to fix it, nor are they apparently motivated. The solution is basically buy a new computer/reinstall the OS/whatever and see if that fixes it. I'm not the only one, reddit is full of people having various problems like this, and some have even gone so far as to create restore point style scripts for saving/restoring the install.
Their USB drivers have been trash, or they have some requirement that isn't clear, which means that its a game of plugging in the headset and sensors into random USB ports until it decides everything is going to work (maybe).
I could go on, but their software people obviously aren't up to the task of providing kernel mode code, or debugging problems in the field.
Funny bit, one of their recruiters poped me an email shortly after I gave up on their software/support teams actually being capable of fixing things. Right into the trash it went, I can't imagine working for a dev shop that can't even recover older versions of their build artifacts to do a/b testing.
Until VR headsets are as light and unobtrusive as ordinary glasses, VR will remain niche.
Honestly, I kind of suspect it's this decade's 3D TV; enormous hype, quickly followed by the whole industry pretending they were never involved in it.
AR is the real deal for the immediate future. AR has direct applications in a lot of environments.
To put it shortly, AR is something that will be truly useful within the next 5-10 years, VR is something will be truly useful within the next 20-25 years.
It is also used by architects when designing buildings and different spaces, so it can also be used in professional environment.
On the other hand, I think that all the meta thing is just corporate hype blown out of proportions. I can imagine tho that for some people their R isn't that great, or they will never have a chance to experience certain places in the world in first person. My 90 years old great-grandmother can experience Iceland only through TV documentaries, google street view or maybe VR.
It is sad that we are unavoidably headed to a world where a company like Meta monopolizes control of two of our five traditional senses (sight and sound). Their business model is based on behavior modification and I fully expect their highly-compensated employees to be endlessly creative in the application of headsets to that end. The sheer scale of R&D expenditure required to get realistic/usable VR is daunting and seems beyond FOSS capabilities. Not just hardware, but software like SLAM/VIO or image processing. I backed the Simula One headset but the disparity in development resources between them and meta is pretty astounding.
But sitting stock still, I was so distracted by big obvious pixels. I can’t imagine trying to do real work with text at that resolution.
For me, Quest 2 is very obviously a "not there yet" product that seems to mostly appeal to kids and people who don't actually care about graphics or comfort. It's hot, battery life is bad, strapping over a pound on your face for hours at a time is not fun, and the graphics are visibly bad - even just sitting still the edges are horribly aliased and the screen door effect is massively apparent. Plus the nausea for many people, and the complete lack of spatial awareness. I will say that untethered is massively better than tethered, though, even with the graphics penalty. Quest 4 (I don't think v3 will be a big enough improvement) or whatever Apple eventually releases might actually be appealing, though.
VR as a whole still has a long way to go though, for sure. You need like 8k per eye or something crazy before you're "maxed out" on what humans can perceive IIRC.
I do agree with you that the resolution is still to low to replace screens.
I can't imagine doing real work with text too, but it's enough to be immersed in realistic worlds like hl alyx.
looks like that's getting slightly better, as long as you tether to a massive desktop to fit its massive enthusiast GPU
I also have a htc vive pro + wireless transmitter + highend pc and i don't think at all that this will replace a normal monitor setup on a table.
Why?
Because wearing a headset on your head is just cumbersome.
I don't think anyone would ever sit in any outdoor setup with a VR headset on their heads because it looks idiotic, it ruins your hair and its too expensive to let it lay around.
And at home? At home people stoped wearing pants why would they give up a good display for a headset?
This is exactly what people thought of 5+ inch phone screens, and now nobody cares.
Not something I care about in both counts. And I don't think people care. In fact I was at a trade show this weekend where someone was playing a Q2 game and everyone looked really interested.
And messing up my hair, well I hardly have any :)
My prediction if this takes off: Just as in Phones right now we will see a period of mono/duopolism after which lawmakers around the world will start to decide that the public space expanded into a new field and that companies such as Meta are unfit stewards. Then laws will be written to align platforms more with whatever the local society expects. (And some people will, again, complain about that "overreach")
I am always astounded by such claims, like have you guys ever travelled outside the Western hemisphere at all?
Furthermore, the resolution on a Quest for viewing actual text for long periods of time is entirely too low, and that's not even considering the fact that it can be very difficult to get the entire virtual screen to be in focus given the fresnel lenses. What do you do your programming on, a TI 83 screen?
I expect more comments on how to influence this technology versus dismissing it as not applicable for the human race.
is it particularly surprising that people who know what goes into the sausages might be skeptical about feeding them to everyone for every meal?
More like "people who know to a degree what goes into salads act like they know what goes into sausages."
More often than not, it is about as interesting and insightful as watching Steve Ballmer staging a mock funeral for iPhone in 2010[0].
0. https://macdailynews.com/2010/09/10/microsoft_windows_phone_...
But realistically, what exactly is the appeal of it? The Metaverse? I mean, if no one can figure out how to make a fun MMORPG these days, what makes you think the "Metaverse" will actually be something people will want to spend time in? And why would Facebook be the one who actually figure out how to build some super appealing virtual world, they have 0% experience in doing this. It's gonna be boring, in immersive VR, still boring. And who really wants to wear these headsets? They always gonna be somewhat bulky.
But even if you could make it super immersive, and super fun, and totally appealing, you always gonna be one thing that's holding you back: Your real body, yes unfortunately we are all tied to these meat bags, so our dream of moving into our self created Matrix is always gonna be somewhat limited.
I mean you gotta be realistic here, no matter what we do, life will always be best experienced without a VR headset on. It might have some cool fun uses, but that's about it.
And that’s with VR still very much in the gen 1 (maybe gen 2 if you want to be generous) phase of development. Within five or ten years tech like eye and mouth tracking and partial/full body haptics (which are all already a thing, just niche) will be typical offerings.
I don’t know to what extent it’ll displace existing tech. But the popularity of it today (especially in spaces where artists and developers can do whatever they want) is real and growing crazy fast.
They don't need to build a super appealing virtual world, they just need to figure out how to get you coming back to something every day, even if you don't like it and/or think it adds negative value to your life.
"This technology is boring and going nowhere ... so I read an article all about it and then took the time to make a comment about it ..."
I'm ready to predict that these people are radically wrong. The VR adoption curve is so sharp now in the 10-15 yr age bracket that people haven't caught up to the fact it is happening yet. I say that as someone with children in that age range and > 50% of their friends suddenly have and use VR routinely. These kids are all super acclimated to spending large amounts of time in VR. These kids are "primed" to become the next wave of tech users.
HN folks, get ready to feel really, really old in 5 years from now - probably how all our parents / grandparents felt when we showed up with smart phones.
I won't let VR goggles enter my home. I'm not the only one. Maybe it's the future, but I'll hold it off as long as I can -- especially if it's Facebook, with all their ethical blindness and attention monopolizing -- that's pushing it.
Thanks won’t claim that VR is better than being outside, but to me it seems a hell of a lot better than sitting on the couch with a phone.
Will you also ban game consoles and televisions? Will you limit his internet usage to wikipedia, and only non sexual articles?
There is a lot of room between 'I don't support meta's endeavours' and 'BAN VR', and you've jumped directly on the extreme end of a scale for seemingly no reason.
However, the weird mEtAVeRsE wet dream zuck is pushing is total BS. NOBODY wants to live/work in VR. It's a fun thing to do for short periods of time for entertainment, and AR/VR is a cool tool for certain tasks (e.g. interior design).
The idea that we're gonna be flying through cyber space like some kinda Hackers (the movie) scene is just nonsense. It's honestly bad UX that people have been trying to push forever. Windows 95 had this goofy virtual world thing where you were in a room and all your software was on bookshelves and other silly shit that was a fun gimmick, but infinitely less efficient than buttons, menus, and sorted lists.
Also, unless headsets get MUCH lighter (and less sweaty) while simultaneously getting much better battery life they aren't going to be a thing people wear for long periods of time any time soon.
And while I don't use Facebook and feel uncomfortable about Meta owning the dominant virtual space, I absolutely think it will happen and prove very popular. Have you seen how much time people currently spend scrolling their phones with the little interfaces and small viewports? Lying on the couch with goggles between dinner and bedtime will be the norm soon enough, IMO - watching TV/movies, experiencing spaces, browsing content, socialising, learning, etc.
I'm willing to bet in the distant future almost all our lives will be virtual because it is simply so much cheaper than physical things.
Our video games will become more immersive, I would not be surprised if a generation or two a family holiday could be a week inside a video game.
Our work conference calls are becoming more and more immersive. I would not be surprised if work from home and work in the office eventually meet in the middle where you are physically at home but with a virtual representation sitting in a vertical office, where communication and collaboration are easy.
That doesn't change the fact that the input problem for AR/VR is not solved. Some VR is trying to solve this by integrating back in the mouse/keyboard. Others, like Elon, are trying to leapfrog to human-brain interface.
Neither of those efforts change the fact that for current AR/VR your input is lower bandwidth than a smartphone which is already lower bandwidth than mouse/keyboard.
This input bandwidth limit means that the applications for the tech are currently very minimal and means that any product being sold today is unlikely to do well.
VR is just not very "real", and I don't think we can ever make it real enough with the tech path it is on. Human brain interfaces seem like the best bet, but they are so far away that I don't think they'll be commercially available in my lifetime.
Currently though? They're all kinda shit. And there doesn't seem to be a clear incremental step from "current" to "good enough" for a GIGANTIC range of scenarios, so it seems reasonable to claim "it's not coming any time soon".
And I say all this as an enthusiast. When resolution and compute power increases a bit, I'll probably make a real effort to use VR (AR seems further away) to replace my desk/monitor(s)/etc for work. But without a ton of effort and severe tradeoffs, it's not really currently feasible.
1. Google Glass: This is the most underwhelming and lamest thing ever. Tried for 20 seconds and never thought about it again.
2. 3DTV: meh, I’dr rather watch 2D.
3. Magic Leap / HoloLens: this is way less cool than the commercials, tiny field of view, incredibly far way from something actually usable.
4. Oculus DK2: jaw dropped, holy shit moments. WOW!
That’s not to say VR is perfect. In fact, it’s far enough away from perfect I currently never use it. But it is so much more impressive and close to being amazing than these other categories.
You're creating a false dichotomy - probably unintentionally, but I find it's important to point it out. As one of these naysayers, I'm not against VR because I'm somehow skeptical of futuristic/modern technology (nuclear fusion when?), it's because I am specifically against VR/AR in the hands of a megacorp like Facebook. If all this development was happening in the open, like for example the web developed, I would be jumping on this yesterday. As someone who's dreamed of the Star Trek holodeck since I was a child, the thought of becoming an Oculus dev to pursue this dream does not excite me one bit.
Then there's also the history of each recent step forward in technology coming along with increased top-down control and surveillance. Here, it's especially important to be skeptical of Meta's influence on VR specifically. I think Meta's goal is to create a fully walled garden where they can surveil their users freely to sell ads. An App Store for VR, but with even more monitoring and advertising. This is not a future I want, regardless of the benefits of the technology itself.
Can't it just be a niche/enthusiast product for another decade or so? There's enough people that care and it to keep our afloat. It doesn't have to shift a billion units
I have an Oculus 2, and before that I've had a couple of Windows VR headsets when Microsoft was doing their push; they're all gathering dust in a box now...
It doesn’t just have to be on bike. I would say walking directions are far more valuable.
Let’s take what I say is the Peak AR Device:
Glasses with Shuttered Camera + LIDAR, Bone Conducting Audio, Haptic Feedback, High Quality Microphones, & Smart Assistant.
Often when I’m out in the city and finding a new place I would rely on my phone. Often the GPS on my phone would be screwed since I was underground and I would have to look at the streets on the map to see where I am relative to where I need to face and go. On the newer models of the iPhone I can use it’s LIDAR feature to tell it exactly where I am , but it’s cumbersome to wave your phone back and forth. An AR glasses would already be scanning around, know exactly what direction your facing , and give you visual indicators of where to go the whole trip.
Let’s say someone who speaks a different language ask’s you a question like say directions , an often enough encounter where I’m from. With the strides Apple are making in their Translate technology (with much more to go), the translated speech can appear as text right in front on your screen. Let’s say the show you a piece of paper enter in a different language. That same translate technology can show you a translated page. AR , if we get there, will be amazing and all of the technology I said above already exist in mobile form.
It's a pain to set up and get on, it has issues, but those experiences will continue to be attractive as the technology eventually fades into the background.
The fundamental flaw IMO is that VR always over promises and under delivers.
Meta will make VR indistinguishable from reality but of course we don't mean smell as part of reality.
Indistinguishable from reality but of course we are not talking about going under water, feeling water as being wet and feeling like you are floating in water.
Indistinguishable from reality but of course we don't mean a virtual massage parlor that someone could touch your back and it feels like your back is being touch.
We mean we are going to make the tech equivalent jump from a 15 inch CRT monitor to a 27 inch nice LCD monitor and pretend VR is now indistinguishable from reality because that is what the Emperor wants and the Emperor signs my checks.
To me, you either need a full body suit, disregard smell and then stand on an underwater treadmill with a motorcycle helmet on or it is all a waste of time until we have a good brain computer interface.
Maybe not tomorrow, but by 2040?
> AR/VR is inevitable.
Calling a given technology "inevitable" shuts down criticism.
There's nothing inevitable about a technology that takes charge of our two most important senses (sight and hearing) at once. I think that counts as sensory deprivation to a lot of people.
A quibble with this - the next gen is all about full color high res passthrough and many headsets like the Quest have open ear headphones so you still hear your surroundings. I think it's going to be much less isolating than the "VR is an isolating dystopia" people think.
Everyone's VR I know is in a drawer.
They aren't remotely the same.
AR/VR is inevitable
Now that the site is established, it moreso attracts people who are interested in the established, and less-so attracts people who are interested in new things. This problem tends to amplify itself, as a community that rejects new things is also going to drive away people who are interested in new things.
Now that Hacker News is established, it's just not "it" anymore. "It" is somewhere else.
But this is all just a theory. The counter to this argument is that many people on Hacker News in 2007 expressed serious reservations to Dropbox/cloud storage when it was first revealed -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863. So perhaps what we're seeing is that problem-solvers (developers) also tend to be problem-finders.
Assuming the sun doesn't engulf us first.
Reality is VR will always be distinguishable from reality.
Glasses or contact lenses could change that. I can't wear contact lenses anymore but I wear glasses all the time. Light glasses, not heavy ones.
I think I'd be more enthusiastic if:
- VR headsets weren't still so bad. Merely good VR devices is still a long way off.
- the existing VR experiences weren't still so bad
- the market wasn't completely fragmented and any purchase you make now is very short term
- any meaningful degree interoperability is still way off in the future
- the dominant player wants a walled garden where you are a powerless guest - at best
And if Zuck's walled garden is where the action is going to be at, I might sit it out entirely. Why would I invest my time being part of a community where I have absolutely no rights? That would be a really poor choice.
There are legitimate reasons why people aren't as enthusiastic as you. And it doesn't make them naysayers.
An example of this is in game development. The app library is currently so that that it has opened up a huge opportunity for solo indie developers to build simple games and end up at the top of the sales charts. And we’re talking about something that has outsold the new Xbox.
Tech people like to wax on about how concerned they are about Facebook, but these comments usually are just a chance for them to take a few swings at a favorite corporate punching bag, not because they have any particular interest in VR.
I think in many ways the HN community is going through a deep skepticism cycle where everything new is dismissed. After Zuckerberg’s huge gamble pays off and creates a bigger gold rush than mobile, this same community is going to be posting guides on how to custom program hand tracking gestures and detailed breakdowns on how the distortion correction works.
While I can't predict the future, I tend to think that VR is more of a 3D TV situation than a smartphone situation; an industry which is hitting market scaling issues ("Argh! Everyone in the world has a HD TV/Facebook account!") is pushing a new thing, to expand its market, and it's not particularly clear that consumers want it. This all feels very top-down; giant companies deciding what consumers will want next, and telling consumers they want it. This works less often than you'd think.
Now, this eventually worked for the TV industry with 4K and particularly HDR, but those were both less jarringly different from what people were used to, and had more creative support (your average film director was much more excited about HDR than 3D...)
How are you actually defining "new" here? Have you considered that you are defining "new" in an amorphous way that allows you to reject everything new that VR/AR offer?
AR allows one to create virtual objects with actual position and shape in the real world. We can see these objects in their location in the world, and interact with them. That is the abstracted case of what is truly new -- the thing that simply does not exist without AR.
From this abstract case, we can give concrete examples. When buying products online, one can discover what furniture will look like in their house, or what clothing will look like on their body -- they can better see it from every angle and the form it will take. In terms of "adult entertainment", one can literally experience a virtual person up in your face and on your body, something that is just not offered by any existing form. Shit, we can attach a virtual note to a physical object (that only select people get to see!), we can use a ping pong table without needing to own a ball, we can see "subtitles" next to a person who is talking, we can see a label next to our friend in a crowded place without having to constantly cross-reference a map on a phone screen... honestly. Have some imagination.
If you can see this list of things and say "none of that is new", then I seriously challenge you to define "new" for me, because I'm willing to bet you are not applying the same rigorous definition to smartphones.
How many UIs are 3D? How many people are using motion controls?
Spatial computing will bring about a fundamental UI/UX design refactoring of established 2D applications we just take for granted as fully baked. It won't replace them, like screens didn't replace books, but it will allow for enhanced functions we didn't know we were missing until they were in front of us and it will be offered in a more delightful human centric experience at the same time. HN dogs can bark but the caravan is rolling.
In that time I have relearned an old adage that people before my generation would know well "the last mile is the longest mile". In R&D this feels far more extreme than in running.
VR seems very similar to autonomous driving. Quest 1/2 are light years ahead of what we had a decade or so ago. At the same time it's nowhere near to the point where it's going to be a major part of my day. The Quest was mind blowing when I first used it, but I got bored remarkably fast. Most importantly, none of my problems with quest are the problems that are being solved here.
The biggest one, in my opinion, is still space. I want a 10'x10' area to run around in to even start having fun, and even in a house I still don't have an open space that supports that without moving furniture around.
The mobile phone took over our lives because it's so small and convenient. Large TVs work because we've been building homes around them for decades, and TV spaces are also communal, family/friend spaces. This brings up another issue, VR is fundamentally isolating. I get annoyed enough when friends don't look up from their phones.
The remaining obstacles for VR to conquer seem to be arguably bigger problems than the ones that self driving cars need to tackle to take over the roads.
Wait. Why? Online games exist. They're social.
I'm not really a gamer. But it's interesting why social interaction in online video games is some secondary tier to social interaction playing basketball, for example, or just talking in coffee shop - or on the phone...
Though I'd say interaction in games can easily beat "talking on the phone".
So unless they also have headsets that are interacting with you, it's likely, that both you and they want to spend time with each other in real life, and when you go into VR, you're isolated from them.
I dunno, escapist industries are pretty big, and occupy quite a big of most people's non-work waking life. Film, tv, video games, books, comics, social media, etc..
We're really getting to the point where it's mainstreaming.
I still really hate facebook/meta and don't have a lot of faith that they can make the world a better place, but I now feel like VR can add a lot of real value and is fundamentally a good goal.
I thought this for a while when my Dad (68), wife (45) and kid (5) all got into it really hardcore. They each got their own and were playing everyday, so much they had to recharge multiple times a day. I was actually a bit concerned. Then they all just completely forgot about them and now only my kid plays it, maybe once a month, for 10 minutes.
For me, the real mainstreaming point though will be when we have actual lightweight glasses or goggles rather than headsets. With AR and VR built in. And/or attachments for glasses would be even better for me since glasses are tough to wear with headsets.
When I think about who would have the time and motivation to sit in a VR world all day long I can not imagine girls or a lot of adults of some type.
I really struggle seeing anyone outside of a private space wearing it in public, in an office or public transport. It looks weird. It removes you from reality and your surroundings.
So who is left? Boys? Already single man motivation for playing the same games all day long like egoshooters etc.
Porn will be a motivation for sure.
I get giddy thinking about being able to have weekly dinners or watch movies with my family across the country and have it feel like we're actually there. This feels far off, but it seems like zuck is getting the pieces together, like the Codec photorealistic avatars [1], to make this happen.
Facetime, Zoom, etc, it's just draining not being able to hold eye contact because of camera placement. And people get distracted. And the current products, BigscreenVR and the weird cartoon avatars and VRChat, just don't do it for me.
FB will probably fuck this up, but I see the vision.
1 - https://www.theverge.com/2021/10/28/22751177/facebook-meta-c...
It's ridiculous how technology hasn't been able to replicate the 'hanging out on a couch watching Netflix or playing a videogame together' experience. All I need is the audio and video synching to work, with no feedback, and low latency conversation. I feel like you could stick a TV on your couch with a cellphone on top and accomplish this. Facebook could start by letting you do the most basic stuff like watch Netflix together. (Also it would help if Netflix wasn't 480P...)
A true 3d native window manager. where I can arrange each individual window anywhere in the 360 degree space?
Until that is solid, VR is not the productivity tool I was hoping it can be.
Just like Mobile(ios, android), Microsoft could not possibly drop the ball any harder here.
Downside: as far as I know, you need a WMR headset to use it. There might be mods to use the Mixed Reality Portal (the VR window manager) with other headsets, though.
Here's a random YouTube video demonstrating it: https://youtu.be/gPkcDg8IECU
Finally, there's an issue of who owns and controls the space you work in. With WFH, it's nice to be in a space that I fully control and can customize to my needs. If history is any guide, a VR space will become heavily monetized, if not by Meta then by someone else. And the possibilities for surveillance - either by your employer or the "owner" of the space - are now limitless. I'm not naïve enough to think that history won't repeat itself.
I've thought about building something myself but honestly all the crap in X11 is too distracting anyway and half the time I just switch to VTs to focus.
In the late 1990's I was part of an early VR motion sickness study at my uni, and I lasted about 20 mins before I refused to go any further, because I just wanted to get out before I threw up again.
So a couple years ago I was trying out all the new VR setups with the shorter head tracking->frame improvements, and I'm here to tell you I still get radically sick in any first person VR setup. 3rd person (moss, witchblood) i'm fine and can play for hours. But there is something about 1st person perspectives and i'm feeling it within a couple mins and I simply won't push myself to the point of throwing up again, its really miserable, its like being sea sick without the ability to stare at the horizon and feel better, or get quick relief upon return to dry land. It takes at least as long as I was immersed in it before I start feeling normal again.
PS: I also hate 24FPS movies, I find them really jerky even in a dark theater, with an actual projector. Especially pans just drive me bonkers, so maybe it was all the doom training/etc but I have a very low tolerance to low FPS video/games/etc.
So, VR is the training.
Same with Golf+. Avoid the virtual walking/flying stuff and just occasionally teleport. No motion sickness.
No one now has a clue as to what VR will eventually look like. Meta is clueless, VR critics are clueless. But the fact is that VR changes how we interact with the internet in a fundamental way. IMHO. :-)
I'm not an expert in the area, but resolution and HDR seem like basically solved problems - in that they're just logical progressions of where we are today. The focal depth one I didn't understand. He says normal monitors are a fixed distance, whereas in VR and AR you need to focus on different distances. But these VR headsets are just a fixed distance away, so how is that really a problem?
Fundamentally these problems are clearly necessary buticie not sufficient for VR.
In VR, dynamic depth is simulated using stereo-screens where each pupil is pointed at a dynamic focal point BUT stero-focus is not the same as lens focus. Because of this, VR produces a disjoint sensation where stereo focus changes to the simulated position but lens focus remains fixed.
You can experience the difference by holding up a finger and looking at it, then look at a distant object. Notice that you'll see two images of your finger as you focus away. That is stereo focus. Now do the same while covering one eye. Notice that the finger is now blurry but not doubled. That would be the lens focal difference.
Your eyes also focus like the autofocus of a camera and the cue from that is called accommodation.
The two should match to provide perfect perception on reality. Certainly a VR headset works with a fixed focus for everything, but to get the ultimate perception of reality without eye strain a VR headset should be able to simulate focusing distance.
(Who knows, however? Meta’s Super Bowl ad might be revealing their real intentions. In that ad a discarded animatronic Android gets to relive its past with VR. VR is good for the elderly because you can enjoy it without learning anything new. I think one of the worst things about getting old that I experience is presbyopia where you can’t focus over the whole range so you have to wear two pairs of glasses. Maybe I’d find it easier just to have it all in focus all the time.)
You can test this by looking at your hand 6” from your face so it partially blocks your keyboard a couple feet away. You’ll notice that either the keys are blurry or your hand is as you shift focus between the two.
Future gen headsets will use eye tracking to understand which object in a scene you are looking at, and make that object sharp while making other objects blurry. This helps produce more realistic depth, while also dramatically improving performance as most of the scene can be rendered in lower resolution.
HDR is trickier than you think because devices like cell phones can improve their dynamic range by just making the screens brighter- increasing the range by raising the top end- but there's a certain cutoff on how bright a VR screen can be and still be comfortable.
However, the resolution/refresh-rate needed for immersive VR/MR is not quite a solved problem. If you assume something like 100deg horizontal and vertical for each eye and something like retina (not screen door or blurry) 40-60pix/deg resolution, you're looking at 5k x 5k per eye at 120-180Hz for 2 eyes. You can't do that over a single DP 2.0 link, and it would be too power hungry anyway. That leads to a requirement for fast eye-tracking and foveal rendering (only rapidly refresh where you're looking in high resolution)... and gains you ~10x reduction in bandwidth/power.
Then you get to directly monitor the user's attention, build a DL model of their attention, optimize it for maximum interaction, and sell the model to the highest bidder.
Focal depth is one of the cues your brain uses to perceive distance, in addition to (potentially more than, depending on which cognitive scientist you listen to) binocular vision. You don't mind that monitors are a fixed distance from your eyes because you don't expect them to give you real depth (your eyes can just focus on that distance). If, however, you want something to be "indistinguishable from reality" you need to emulate changing focal depth, which means (I guess) changing the angles that rays hit your eyeballs at.
IMO that's one of the reasons that 3D movies always looked so fakey; they could emulate the binocular vision, but they couldn't emulate the focal depth, causing a perceptual dissonance.
It lays out the problems Meta had most progress in. Another very significant VR metric is FOV which was not discussed.
> He says normal monitors are a fixed distance, whereas in VR and AR you need to focus on different distances. But these VR headsets are just a fixed distance away, so how is that really a problem?
You want dynamic focus to convey the feeling of real world eye focus, and make the projected scene more natural/believable.
I think the idea is simulating depth of field by blurring different parts of the image based on where the user's eye is looking.
Identities which someone can invent for themselves which can be independent generally from geography, genetics, looks, temperament, age etc. Freedom to be whoever and whatever you want to be. Today's social VR users are often playing with their own identity right now.
It's all about image, a spectacle, a way to make personalities and reality flexible and it's a way for identity to be expressed as a kind of collection of things that can be commodified and packaged up for sale. That's the future which is looked at.
However I think we might see a genuine sub culture emerging, as a reaction against this. We can possibly see some of this in some of the language used in a few strange semi-underground youth music events today. It's not anti tech, and not anti identity at all! More like a demand to be in control of their own methods and ways of consumption. A certain ironic detachment from corporations.
It's easy to be a skeptic right now. The headsets are heavy, the experiences aren't perfect, etc. But what you see now is just the beginning. The VR skeptics and naysayers are the same people who dismissed personal computing. VR is absolutely game changing and it is just a matter of time until the technology is there to truly win over even the most die hard skeptics.
It might well work out, but it's silly to just bucket VR skeptics as generally skeptical, or "the same people who X".
I’m speaking not only of shooter/action games, but also quests, rpg, fixed-altitude (non first person) sims, third person character control in general. Basically the same games like on PC, but with a depth component and a little changes in controlling, if any.
Instead we have: jump-around and slash games; games that require to walk, move hands and point/look around, cinematic panoramic “games”, meditation “games”, and other try-and-forget lo-fi bullshit which almost no one would buy if it wasn’t VR novelty. Which fades away in just a week.
Basically, today’s VR is a tiny niche like any other flat-sales Steam niche. And it will stay so. Because most people like to sit and relax. When a job requires them to walk, jump and move their hands, they start to think about to maybe land into some office. When they want to talk to someone, they sit down. When they work with visuals, the last thing they want is to stay up and stress their hands. Hands at the belly is the most comfortable position for extended time.
How VR companies are unable to understand these basic, stupidest and already explored principles is frustrating.
Not everyone looks for lazy relaxing experiences. You mention shooters, but if you tried Pavlov you'd see how transformative this tech can be for the gaming industry. And don't get me started on horror games.
The quest 2 is also currently selling more units than xbox series X and S, and the growth rate would make every investor salivate. There are plenty of projects and startups exploring this space. Gaming is the most flashy, pr friendly application but right now the big bucks are made in the enterprise applications and here again the potential is immense.
project wingman an air combat game like ace combat is an amazing seated experience.
try it
And Facebook will get the opportunity to own the platform completely for the first time. So the soon they reach their goal, the better. Actually, it is a smart move.
When it gets to the point of comfortable, unobtrusive and affordable AR/VR/MR glasses with good hand and head tracking built in, that will be a really different experience than the current standard. Maybe throw in a couple of small convient cameras that can just plug in and adhesive to the wall for external tracking.
And with the high speed Wifi available now, or the possibility of connecting to a smart phone (maybe in a pocket or some type of necklace-like carrier), I don't think you need a lot of compute in those devices.
So imagine you just put these glasses on and get 6 virtual wide screen monitors, turn to the right and its your favorite virtual coffee shop, with people inside with fairly realistic recreations from the capture and expression and eye tracking being done by the external cameras. There is 3d positional audio as well.
Imagine with a small camera on the desk, or built into the glasses, doing finger tracking on virtual keyboards. Suppose someone makes a little 'clicky' membrane that provides a bit of tactile feedback regardless of where you press on it.
Now I only need my smart phone and a pair of glasses. I don't need a monitor or a keyboard. Once people realize that every virtual keyboard can easily be 100% customized for any application, physical keyboards may become passé.
When you have good eye and expression tracking, realistic avatars enabled by high-performance AI models, 3d positional audio, realistic environments.. then there really isn't that much difference from being there in person. And there are a huge number of advantages such as convenience and time saving, being able to instantly "travel" to a popular hangout spot even if you are 400 miles away from your friends, etc.
Pretty much everything you can do now in VR, but make it more comfortable and remove some of the friction points, better integration between applications and with the real world, somewhat more realistic, etc.
Suppose automation and robotics continue to improve. Maybe artificial muscles like https://www.artimusrobotics.com/ are widely deployed, enabling high strength-to-weight ratio mobility and much more dexterous, faster, and more general-purpose robots.
In 20 years people may look back and be amazed at how much time and energy we wasted driving around to do everything in person, and how everyone restricted the majority of their "in-person" interactions to small localities.
I remember watching TV shows in the late 90s talking about the VR revolution that was just around the corner. It seems that Virtual Reality™ is still just screens on faces. The whole article is about displays and lenses.
Regarding the 'indistinguishable from reality', a virtual reality would need to include things like smells, environmental conditions like wind and rain and thinner air, and physical sensations like pain.
In many ways we're not really sure what 'reality' is, so suggesting that one could make a virtual reality that is indistinguishable from actual reality doesn't even really make sense.
Virtual Reality is just ersatz senses.
* Full field of view.
* Not having the feel of a clunky headset on your face.
* Not having to regularly align and adjust the headset so that the visual looks right.
Carmack says all that has to be squeezed down to swim goggle size to go mainstream. Eyeglass size to become ubiquitous, like smartphones. Eventually, but it's some years out.
Meanwhile, we should see low-end standalone systems (Google Glass 3.0?) and high-end tethered systems with a base station doing the graphics.
Also the UE5 demo running on a PS5 doesn’t mean that it could push pixels on two screens at the frame rate needed for VR.
I don't understand why anyone would willingly let the monetary constraints of the physical world dictate how they interact with the world-at-large.
All of these goals can be achieved with real holographic displays. We need the equivalent of a GPU optimised for computational holography, and a display with high enough resolution to render phase coherent interference patterns (rgb omg). No lenses will be required. This is the endgame for wearable displays.
Even with the crappy compression on YouTube, you can watch a scene where you are on the beach in VR. After all, isn't that the dream? Of course you can't feel the waves splashing on your feet, but you can definitely enjoy the feeling of being in that space. However, the lack of the bright deep blue sky is really noticeable.
Likewise in games. I definitely preferred Skyrim VR on Quest via a cable over the RIFT because the blacks are much deeper (oled), but on the other end of the spectrum, the sky is always lacking in brightness.
My hunch is this is going to be hard to solve... I mean most homes today don't even have any kind of lighting that remotely reproduces the outdoor lighting.. I doubt that the small screen inside the headset will be able to simulate a bright blue sky... I mean I don't think it's just a matter of "intensity".
But who knows I am clueless, it could be that the pixel density is what prevents the screen from giving the "bright blue sky" depth of light.
But if it will be locked to an FB account then fuck that shit.
also, race to the bottom. think about the 10 lowest-quality-of-life individuals you know. what do they talk about?
I think it's a kind of tragedy of the commons. That said, things continue to be mostly OK, most of the time, for most people.
As mentioned by the other comment, the ability to read text clearly is important and missing. That holds back a lot of productivity use cases.
it also seems like a wrong goal in general because to me the entire point of VR is that it's not bound to physical reality, investing billions of dollars so you can sit on a photorealistic sofa I think defeats the purpose. I think the popularity of Minecraft, Fortnite or VRChat shows that people aren't looking for realism but interesting experiences you can't have offline, with community being the most important thing.
Solve that set of problems, and you might get to a point where you could build actually useful things in VR. Like a work environment for CAD or 3D modelling or whatever that has actual benefits over traditional interfaces.
It's weird to me that these multi-billion dollar companies are investing so much R&D money into supporting my niche hobby, but I suppose I shouldn't complain.
Personally, I don't really want or look forward to a future where people spend a lot of time in a headset, but if there were a lightweight, comfortable option it would be fun to explore experiences every once in awhile.
I also don't use my quest 2 because the fidelity just isn't good enough.
Sort of. Discomfort/nausea issues hold back VR and will be addressed by this work.
Slightly confused as to why they stuck the zuck into what looks like a plywood shed though?
But VR is not going to be a wide success, it will be a really nice 360 image viewer for when those cameras become popular and cheap. It has its place , but it is obstructive. And it cannot become a status symbol, which imho is a big driver behind iphone sales
VR is more immersive, but it's a lot less convenient than just a 2d screen and I don't see that changing.
And of course I'm not going to get a product that needs to be tied to a mandatory Facebook account.
The after-market Quest head kits for ~$20 make it much more comfortable.
https://www.scifipulse.net/richard-herd-passes-to-the-final-...
I'm personally imagining Zuckerberg as a .hack fanatic like myself and my brother were back in '03.
https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack/status/1454230235847688200...
These critics give that same example and a few others trying to prise open what Zuck and others are thinking and what it actually means for consumers
I mean, in his defense he might be pretty normal by lizard standards, I don't know. Calling him weird just seems unnecessary in that context.
>He of course wants every human interaction to be monetizable by Facebook, total control of our dopamine channels, ...
I agree. It'd be a much better future for everyone if he'd just throw his advertising biz in the garbage. Apple is going to kick Meta's ass in the long run just by virtue of their privacy stance—which isn't all that great to begin with, but it sure does beat "our intent is to sell every iota of information we collect on you."
It would be much greater if he actually cared for society and would fix what he did with facebook, addicted mobile/facebook games and fake news.
But hey now the poor can have a 1-2k high quality VR Headset with full immersion to see others in a VR Chat while living in a dumpster.
---
On a more non emotional side: Of course i like the idea of a high quality VR Headset but i'm not sure what FB thinks what this will do for FB. Those millions/billions they invested in their Metaverse will not become something great.
I'm still very confinced that VR is a novelity and nothing people will just be in all day long. Why would they?
Lets compare it to others:
Apple key notes are about new hardware, new usability.
Google IO has a ton of diversity, doing things for society. They talk about taking good pictures of people with all type of skin tones. They talk about 24/7 sustainability, better and easier security, protecting their users, skin mold detection and they have android.
What is Meta talking about? How to put all of us into a VR world with probably a ton of monetarization. Awesome \o/ the poor who can't afford their own house/home are then sitting in a cheap/bad flat, sitting in a chair with a VR Headset on?
And of course there will be a handful people playing around with this, but you know Second Live is also probably still running...
Google is one of the few companies were their Keynotes are so boring because they actually fix real life boring shit which affects us all.
If you grew up in the 90s, you probably remember hand held PCs, and Apple Newton. Those were pretty cool. I wouldn't really HAVE to have one, but those were pretty neat. Then the "PDA" appeared -- I knew many who had those and used them for business. "Regular folks" didn't really need one but they could find these devices to be pretty useful. Then Blackberry came about, and then BOOM -- the capacitive touchscreen, and the iPhone with a few killer features that drastically changed mobile computing for the last 15 years. Everyone has one.
Sometimes it takes decades for someone to "get it right" as tech matures. VR is in the pre-newton stage... if we are to compare the "final form" of VR to be what we think of smart phones now, VR is probably in the "60's or 70's era" stage of development. We probably won't see an explosion or a revolution of VR-tech for a few decades.
Some units have some of those qualities but none have all of them. I can see units having all of those qualities within the next 10 years.