Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together • Hacker News Board

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#491

Post by ghaff » Wed, May 19, 2021, 1:38 PM UTC

School-Cotton wrote: post #483

adam wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I immediately thought of business travel as well. Project us all in to a virtual conference room and give us a suite of collaboration tools to use while we're all there. The only thing missing is the after meeting drinks and dinner, but there will inevitably be services to put us all in a restaurant/bar environment, pipe in some bar white noise, have food sent from a local restaurant, etc. for an "in-person" virtual…

> there will inevitably be services to put us all in a restaurant/bar environment, pipe in some bar white noise, have food sent from a local restaurant, etc. for an "in-person" virtual happy hour... I honestly can’t believe this still sounds fun to anyone after a year of Zoom dystopia.

The last year has shown pretty clearly that for presented content, video works pretty well. Heck, it maybe even works better along with live chat than in person. (And, to be honest, for big events I would often watch live streamed keynotes rather than crowding into a conference center with 5,000 of my closest friends anyway.)

But everything else about virtual conferences has completely sucked and anyone running events is aggressively trying to get back to in-person. (With a hybrid component for presentations.)

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#492

Post by Theodores » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:04 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #192

abhv wrote: post #2

A good friend of mine at Google is the technical lead of this project (he has a Phd Princeton, and was a professor before joining Google). I've tried it in person and it was truly amazing. They used some very fancy tech when I saw the demo, so I'm thrilled it is finally being announced and possibly shared with a larger audience. Explanation of why it is amazing: It totally fools your perception. No glasses or goggles…

The question for me is how much it matters after the novelty wears off. I count at least 5 waves of 3D technology starting in 1851 with the Brewster Stereoscope. Each time there's a surge of popularity driven by the legitimately amazing initial experience. And each time people slowly stop caring. People were incredibly excited about Avatar, and many thought it would change the movie industry. But how many people now…

The original 3G phone spectrum auction was in part premised on the notion that we would all be placing video calls.

Personally I though VR glasses would take off when I had a go with them in the late 90's.

Today with remote working I am on the end of a microphone without a picture of myself or my colleagues in the chat.

Yet I am looking forward to being in the office.

I see what Google are trying to do but we have wave after wave of this. VR is a classic, if only we can solve the motion sickness!

On the family level those zoom calls with my niece are now plain telephone calls. Or WhatsApp messages. We stopped caring.

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#493

Post by hundchenkatze » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:11 PM UTC

apexalpha wrote: post #413

noahl wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean to be fair Google has also tried very, very hard to improve home internet access for people, to the point of setting up their own ISP and running municipal fiber networks. That's a pretty big try, and I really wish it had taken off beyond the places where Google Fiber operates. (NB: I work at Google, but this comment has nothing to do with my work.)

When it really comes down to laying Fiber isn't a job requiring innovation, it require hard man hours to pull cables. In the end Google tried to innovate around the hard work by burying cables around 5cm deep or so in stead of a meter, which turned out to be short sighted.

I thought Google was mostly buying up dark fiber (I think that's the case in my city at least). Where did they run their own, and what was the impact of the shallow runs?

edit: nvm, found it :) https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/16/18381466/google-fiber-lou...

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#494

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

hyko wrote: post #388

sangnoir wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fantastic twist would be a reveal showing that the other person (no longer) exists in the real world and is digital construct... or some forbidden knowledge is secretly interdicted and censored by big brother, body-snatching peoples avatars in real time.

Plot twist: the person behind the screen is actually sat there, everything else turns out to be a hologram!

[deleted]

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#495

Post by wpietri » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

imiric wrote: post #418

wpietri wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a clear step forward except in technical terms. Those often don't matter. For example, the big revolution in the last 20 years is not faster computers, it's mobile ones. I don't have much reason to think there is any near term "next leap from 2D video and displays". 2D renderings are more than 40,000 years old. They have improved drastically in resolution and fidelity. Computers added being dynamic and inter…

> the big revolution in the last 20 years is not faster computers, it's mobile ones Surely the improvements in manufacturing processes, faster hardware and better screens are partly responsible for that. The iPhone as a concept has existed since the 1980s, and revolutionary ideas like what General Magic tried to produce in the 90s were just too early to be successful. When Apple tried it again in the late 00s it was…

Again, you're arguing that the technology might get better. I don't disagree. I'm not comparing the technology of the ViewMaster. I'm comparing the lack of demonstrated demand/utility and the pattern of hype.

Every one of the products I named was greeted at the time exactly like you are now. The new technology was amazing! The potential was unlimited! And for the repeats like 3D movies and VR: It's different this time!

I agree it might be different this time. Nobody's denying that. Aliens might land tomorrow. What I'm saying is that because of the clear pattern of "OMG novelty! OMG possibilty!" around 3D tech that has failed repeatedly for 170 years, you can't just uncritically make the same arguments. If you want to be persuasively realistic, you have to explain why the 3D novelty effect isn't the major driver this time. Because the long evidence is that 3D displays just don't matter enough for people to stick with them.

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#496

Post by wpietri » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:40 PM UTC

adamauckland wrote: post #449

wpietri wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Replicating the experience of in-person communication much more closely That's not a problem people express much, at least not in ways where "3D" points to a solution. When I want to see people in person, it's not because of a lack of stereoscopy. I want to hug them, to break bread with them. > there's no reason to believe a revolutionary new approach and product couldn't change this There is indeed! In specific, t…

Wow, this is a pretty ableist take. Deaf people or hard of hearing exist. I've got a hearing problem where I struggle to make out what people are saying on a phone but with a video call I can add lip-reading and visual cues which helps me keep on thread.

Which is excellent, and I totally support that. But that doesn't change the market dynamics that I'm describing. We probably should live in a world where what drove the adoption of video calling was supporting the hard of hearing. But we don't, so it's not a relevant factor for the market analysis of what will drive the adoption of 3D video.

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#497

Post by wpietri » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:45 PM UTC

nickkell wrote: post #403

wpietri wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question for me is how much it matters after the novelty wears off. I count at least 5 waves of 3D technology starting in 1851 with the Brewster Stereoscope. Each time there's a surge of popularity driven by the legitimately amazing initial experience. And each time people slowly stop caring. People were incredibly excited about Avatar, and many thought it would change the movie industry. But how many people now…

I honestly think it's amazing and I'm sure the novelty would wear off, but it would still be useful. One of the things that stood in the way of 3D viewing was dedicated hardware, which is the same issue here. Although the need to wear glasses is gone, you still need to buy some serious equipment for it. Maybe at some point this will be bundled into a normal TV setup and people will just take it for granted that it's…

Anything's possible. But I want the people saying 3D TV/monitors failed because the glasses were just too burdensome to argue things out with the VR people who say that 3D is so amazing that the (much heavier!) facehugger units will take over the world.

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#498

Post by leokennis » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:46 PM UTC

silentsea90 wrote: post #140

leokennis wrote: post #117

My first thought: in 2030 when I’m calling grandma with this, I will first need to accept cookies, then accept the new Google privacy policy, then sign in to my Google account, then watch 2 20-second long pre roll ads.

We're witnessing magical tech and innovation, and here we are back to making fun of signing in, ads and cynicism about Google shutting down projects.

We're witnessing a magical tech demo here. If Google actually releases it and hinder it with ads, sign in walls etc., it's not magical anymore. If they then cancel it two years later, it doesn't even exist anymore.

We can pretend that this will be Google's magical fairytale product that will not be impacted by the above, but who are we kidding?

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#499

Post by wpietri » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:51 PM UTC

swsieber wrote: post #296

wpietri wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question for me is how much it matters after the novelty wears off. I count at least 5 waves of 3D technology starting in 1851 with the Brewster Stereoscope. Each time there's a surge of popularity driven by the legitimately amazing initial experience. And each time people slowly stop caring. People were incredibly excited about Avatar, and many thought it would change the movie industry. But how many people now…

I do. Ha ha. I really loved Dr. Strange in 3D. I'm sad 3D movies aren't really a thing anymore.

Oh, I'd bet that team did a great job with 3D. (For those who didn't see it, it was a movie with great visual effects designed to blow the viewer's mind.) But you and that movie are the exceptions that prove the rule: for most people and for most movies, it just doesn't add much. The reason people go to see something on the stage is never stereoscopy!

Re: Project Starline: Feel like you're there, together

#500

Post by ksec » Wed, May 19, 2021, 2:58 PM UTC

abrahamepton wrote: post #485

ksec wrote: post #465

I used to say Google has never done anything really great other than their search engine. And generally speaking this opinions tends to get quite a lot of upvote ( as well as some unsuccessful counter arguments ). That is why when another Google project launch or failed. I wont be surprised. This is the first time, I felt this is going to be great. Something that should have came from Apple, the humane side of techno…

It’s a pretty silly argument. Maps, android, gmail, translate, docs, mapreduce, kubernetes, tensorflow come to mind off the top of my head. Honestly it’s a stupid contention. Apple’s awesome but the list of “great” things they’ve done is what, a third as long despite existing decades longer?

It was for consumer and user facing features / products. So technicals like MapReduce and K8s dont count. And I still have reservation about k8s.

Map was probably one we had last time when it was discussed. Gmail came in as side project, unintended. Android was acquired and forced to react with iOS.