Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans • Hacker News Board

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#41

Post by filoleg » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:17 PM UTC

nprz wrote: post #19

Are there other companies making progress in the augmented reality space? I've tried the Hololens v1 and was completely underwhelmed. The field of view is far too small and not impressive or immersive at all. Is the v2 much better? When will we get what Magic Leap was initially promising?

Hololens V2 is still not average-consumer-ready, but it is leaps and bounds closer to it than v1.

I tried both myself, and the biggest improvements in v2, in my opinion, are:

* Field of view. That’s the biggest one, as it felt like just a staring into a small rectangle with v1. With v2, I was actually able to read a NYT article in a web browser rather comfortably, moving the web browser around the room and such, with no significant field of view limitations felt. The limitations are still there, but you rarely ever hit them, while with v1 it was more like “almost the whole time you are using the device”. And it felt really annoying.

* UI/UX. Everything is much more intuitive and smooth to operate. After the initial 5-10 mins, i didnt feel any jankiness and was able to perform all operations with no struggle. Also, v2 works without that annoying clicker/pointer device (that was pretty much a must for v1) rather well, just by tracking hands. And i would say it is even more precise without that device than v1 was WITH the device.

* Ergonomics. The headset is lighter, feels more comfortable, doesn’t require as much fiddling around to get it sit well on your head. The flip up/down visor is such a great quality of life improvement, I am baffled that current consumer VR devices like Oculus or Vive haven’t implemented it. Especially since it would provide way more utility for VR than AR, because VR completely blocks out the real world.

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#42

Post by core-questions » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:19 PM UTC

DonHopkins wrote: post #16

gamegoblin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume they must have had a killer demo. 1. Put the goggles on some investor's head (in a normal looking room, but with known lighting and spatial properties...). 2. Show them some flashy demo that has some limitations, but promise that with their investment, they will be able to remove those limitations. 3. Investors, who probably lack the deep knowledge of optics to know that those limitations aren't so trivial,…

Now with COVID-19, they really DO have a killer demo: 1. Put the goggles on some investor's head. 2. Investor catches COVID-19 and dies. Nobody wants to share VR or AR gear any more. The whole idea of location based VR / AR entertainment centers is deadly now. If it's so great you can't believe it without trying it yourself, and nobody wants to stick their head in a device that anybody else has been drooling and coug…

Don't be such a wuss. None of that is something a little Lysol can't fix, and these places should have always been using such (though I imagine they don't).

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#43

Post by creato » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:20 PM UTC

geerlingguy wrote: post #13

gamegoblin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume they must have had a killer demo. 1. Put the goggles on some investor's head (in a normal looking room, but with known lighting and spatial properties...). 2. Show them some flashy demo that has some limitations, but promise that with their investment, they will be able to remove those limitations. 3. Investors, who probably lack the deep knowledge of optics to know that those limitations aren't so trivial,…

Reminds me of Silicon Valley's fictional Keenan Feldspar and his VR demo (likely based on Magic Leap): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8MAV9jhf04

Surely that was their take on Palmer Luckey and Oculus?

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#44

Post by azinman2 » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:21 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #29

slg wrote: post #2

Does this officially place the Magic Leap's consumer device on the list of the biggest vaporware products in the history of the tech industry? I don't know whether there was some tech hurdle they could never get over or if they were just straight up selling a fantasy from the beginning, but this result has seemed to be the likely destination for years.

I think it's less of a tale of "vaporware" (I mean, Magic Leap has something that actually exists, even if it's not successful) than yet another cautionary tale of startups taking WAAAYYY more money than they need. There was simply no reason for them to need this much cash before they proved market fit. I mean, has there ever been a successful company that gorged on funding before they needed it that eventually becam…

The issue is the problems they were trying to solve required boiling the ocean. They did manage to boil a good bit of it, but didn’t see it thru all the way — their tech was very expensive and not that good in the end.

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#45

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #29

slg wrote: post #2

Does this officially place the Magic Leap's consumer device on the list of the biggest vaporware products in the history of the tech industry? I don't know whether there was some tech hurdle they could never get over or if they were just straight up selling a fantasy from the beginning, but this result has seemed to be the likely destination for years.

I think it's less of a tale of "vaporware" (I mean, Magic Leap has something that actually exists, even if it's not successful) than yet another cautionary tale of startups taking WAAAYYY more money than they need. There was simply no reason for them to need this much cash before they proved market fit. I mean, has there ever been a successful company that gorged on funding before they needed it that eventually becam…

[deleted]

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#46

Post by drewbeck » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

Imo enterprise and military were always going to be the first successful applications for this tech. Smart money will stay in those lanes until the tech is mature.

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#47

Post by azinman2 » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

sergiotapia wrote: post #32

prepend wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it’s up there, but still Google Glass takes the cake (or maybe General Magic). Glass did release limited versions of stuff, unlike Magic Leap, but I think they spent way more money than Magic Leap. Magic Leap raised $2.6B [0]. Although I have no idea how much Google spent, I suspect it’s more than this when you factor in the barges and rollout plan that they had and didn’t use at all. [0] https://www.crunchba…

Glass was killed by a single word: "glasshole" - I've never seen anything else so utterly destroyed so quickly.

It wasnt that word that killed glass...

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#48

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

Ididntdothis wrote: post #3

This is such a weird company. They created big buzz over years and it seems they are just fading away quietly with nothing to show for the money they took in. Reminds me a little of Theranos (although not as criminal). Why do these investors keep pumping so much money into a company that has nothing to show? I thought they do due diligence.

[deleted]

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#49

Post by jayd16 » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

slg wrote: post #2

Does this officially place the Magic Leap's consumer device on the list of the biggest vaporware products in the history of the tech industry? I don't know whether there was some tech hurdle they could never get over or if they were just straight up selling a fantasy from the beginning, but this result has seemed to be the likely destination for years.

I don't know if that's really fair. Their devkit is subjectively on par or slightly better than the Hololens. Its not vapor but might just not be a hit.

Re: Magic Leap reportedly slashes jobs and steps away from consumer plans

#50

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

slg wrote: post #2

Does this officially place the Magic Leap's consumer device on the list of the biggest vaporware products in the history of the tech industry? I don't know whether there was some tech hurdle they could never get over or if they were just straight up selling a fantasy from the beginning, but this result has seemed to be the likely destination for years.

[deleted]