Live data from Hacker News

Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

uploadvr.com

11–20 of 56 posts

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#11
post #9

I just wanted to buy a computer monitor for my face. I'm paying you $600, can't I just have that? :(

Software mentality is eating the world. Investors expect recurring revenue from hardware now. I hope there's still demand for no-strings-attached hardware. I'm not sure it's a viable marketing point for enough people.

The solution is liability. If you collect data about people, you are responsible for what happens to it. Additionally, If your product fails to work as intended because you intentionally added something separate from the intended purpose (like network spyware for VR hardware), then the product is defective.

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#12
post #4

From the Facebook shareholder conference call after the Oculus acquisition 2 years ago https://soundcloud.com/highway62/internal-facebook-conferenc... (Note that this is an public call, those are their official statements.) At time stamp 29:19: There might be advertising in the world, but we need to figure that down the line. That is probably where the business will come from... And at time stamp 29:50: If we are suc…

> Facebook is building the first virtual world. Think about that.

No, Facebook is a glorified chatroom with constant surveillance and ads. The only thing unique it did was to aggregate enough gravity to become the first stop for digital peasants of all ages. Facebook is not building anything virtual first here.

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#14

They are entering a new market and trying to win market share, I'm surprised at this vulnerable time they are doing this so early. I think a big segment of their target market will be more sensitive to this stuff as supposed to general population at this early stage as well.

Perhaps it's a sign that they see the battle as already won. The widespread acceptance of Facebook et al in spite of all the bad publicity about tracking is taken as tacit approval of the surveillance economy.

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#15
post #13

Well, this makes it easier for me to decide which VR headset to buy.

what are the alternatives?

Do not buy this product. You don't need it. Wait until holographic tech. is implemented without a VR headset. OR you could block specific outgoing traffic that is related to VR software on your router.

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#16

I just wanted to buy a computer monitor for my face. I'm paying you $600, can't I just have that? :(

We're seeing similar moves in other areas of technology, such as modern cars -- ever more connected, dubious phone-home behaviour, and so on. The "Internet of Things" hype will surely make it much, much worse.

This is not a healthy trend for customers/users, but if entire industries go in that direction because the $$$ signs are too attractive, the practical solution is likely to be statutory regulation.

When it comes to strengthening privacy and data protection in today's highly connected world, I personally have no problem with imposing that regulation. But until more normal (non-geek) people understand the implications and potential abuse of modern data collection and mining practices, until people realise it's not just annoying and slightly creepy ads they have to worry about, I doubt we're going to see a critical mass of popular concern for politicians to act.

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#19
Its a preposterous move in a new market and borderline insulting for a $600 product, but on one level it makes sense; if there's any demographic that's worth aggressively advertising to, its the demographic of people with the money and unrestrained enthusiasm to immediately shell out almost a grand on a first-generation luxury product.

Re: Oculus 'Always On' Services and Privacy Policy May Be a Cause for Concern

#20
Can we wait until they actually do or talk about doing something bad before making a stink about them doing bad things? This is kind of jumping at phantoms, and doing that too much will mean losing the ability to do it for real.

Here's what's going on. OVRServer_x64 is, conceptually, a device-driver component for Oculus. It does things like handle the orientation sensor input and controls which app appears on the Oculus' display. This has been around since the very first prototypes, and since it is a piece of hardware, it's not like they could have gone without.

None of the current titles in the Oculus store have in-game advertising. There's none in the first-party titles, nor in any of the third-party titles that I've tried. Instead, they use the traditional business model: pay up front. They're running a store, called Oculus Home, which competes with Steam. They know which games and experiences you buy on the store, and are probably measuring how many hours you spend in each, like Steam does.

And that's it. This statement from the article is straight up false:

> "An ad executive at Coke, for instance, could tell just how long you stared at the Coke bottle cleverly placed inside your favorite game as an in-game ad and use that data to better place it in the game for you next time."

It's false because the Oculus Rift does not contain eye-tracking (only head-orientation tracking); because the software infrastructure for measuring that doesn't exist (though I suppose someone could write it); and because that isn't Oculus' business model.

Post reply on HN