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When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

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Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#91

Post by aeturnum »

When I think about VR I think about my developer friend who would never spend more than $100 on a cell phone. He'd always lose or break phones, so he just started buying the cheapest Android phones he could. His camera sucked and he'd run out of memory, but it was still a phone and we could still text him. He had a "smartphone" and all of the utility it provided even though it was cheap and low-end.

When people talk about how VR hasn't taken off like they expect, I really wonder about their understanding of technology. As a high end technology, I think VR is doing great. There are some pieces of work that people like, but the state of the technology reminds me of smart phones circa 2008[1]. Technology is getting better, but there's substantial disagreement about what a "good" experience needs. Do we need higher resolution? Easier access? Better integration? Obviously all of them are good but the point is that the field is still very much in flux and even people who have spent thousands of dollars on a nice setup are looking forward to the next generation.

I also think about LCD televisions. I don't really know what their sales numbers are over the years, but Wikipedia tells me they started selling more than CRT TVs in 2007[2]. They came on the market in the 1980s[3]. That's a ~27 year journey from being in a consumer good and becoming the dominant technology. Smartphones improved uniquely fast, and since VR is (right now) more firmly centered on luxury and leisure, I wonder if the arc of LCD televisions isn't more indicative.

I think VR will "arrive" when you can spend under $100 (maybe $200?) and get all "the good parts" of the VR experience, like my friend did with his cheap phones. It will also help if the high end is better established than it is now. It can't be used or home-made or just a part - one price for a low-frills version of what you came for. I think successful technology needs a "bottom-end" as well as a top-end and I don't think VR is very close right now. The first Oculus shipped to consumers in 2016, which puts us 4 years into my proposed ~27 year arc. That feels about right to me.

Edit: for all my skepticism about VR, writing this post has me researching the price of headsets again :p

[1] As a point of comparison, the first iPhone sold 6m units. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_(1st_generation)

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_set

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid-crystal_display

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#92

Post by bmiller2 »

jmiskovic wrote: post #66

On same note, developing VR from inside is incredible and it quickly turned into my #1 hobby. At first you are surrounded with blank space, then you slowly fill it out with whatever reality rules you can think of. I went with code-only approach (no binary assets) and built a primitive development environment that works in VR. Now I have a neat little virtual shed with different experiments and demo projects. Geometri…

Any resources you can share? Sounds amazing

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#93

Post by inventtheday »

dougmwne wrote: post #89

I very much think that folks on HN are jaded by the long wait and the unfulfilled promises of VR. I recently picked up a Quest 2 as my first VR headset and I am blown away and convinced it is the future. The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. By then, my initial excitement will have gone away and I'll have tired…

ya it's a slow burn, but I think the September '20 - September '21 period will end up seeing roughly the unit sales mentioned in their bet. Quest 2 is making a large impact.

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#94

Post by an_opabinia »

dougmwne wrote: post #89

I very much think that folks on HN are jaded by the long wait and the unfulfilled promises of VR. I recently picked up a Quest 2 as my first VR headset and I am blown away and convinced it is the future. The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. By then, my initial excitement will have gone away and I'll have tired…

> The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment.

Ironically, by getting acquired by a giant company, Quest development was set back by that many years.

The real problem isn't technology or even adoption, it's that people who work at giant companies suck at making games.

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#95

Post by jnwatson »

dougmwne wrote: post #89

I very much think that folks on HN are jaded by the long wait and the unfulfilled promises of VR. I recently picked up a Quest 2 as my first VR headset and I am blown away and convinced it is the future. The thing is, I also recognize that while it is already an incredible achievement, it's still probably 5-20 years from hitting its iPhone moment. By then, my initial excitement will have gone away and I'll have tired…

Facebook's Quest 2 is an impressive piece of tech.

One of the biggest reasons to be skeptical of VR taking off is that Facebook is one of the major players. Between the login shenanigans and their anti-competitive dealings with developers, they have an opportunity to single-handedly tank the industry.

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#96

Post by RoboTeddy »

I strongly suspect that VR will take off once it can pass through facial expressions, gaze, and other body language with high fidelity. At that point it will probably be substantially better than normal videoconference, and will take off extremely quickly (first for business meetings and perhaps social gatherings; then for virtual worlds)

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#97

Post by Ruthalas »

vadansky wrote: post #39
riazrizvi wrote: post #33

I worked for a VR/AR platform helping 3rd parties port apps onto the platform for a couple of years. Low traction seemed to be a combination of the following related problems: 1) ROI for the platform's premium was not worth it, due to... 2) lack of must-have apps, due to... 3) poor ratio of difficulty designing a great user experience vs low number of outfits trying to build that software, due to ... 4) fragmentation…

> The mouse is such an excellent precision instrument, it's going to be a long time before we have a 6 degree-of-freedom input device that can match it for precision and ease of long term use. From my experience don't most professional 3D modelers use some sort of pen tablet like a Wacom? Now I'm thinning I would love if Wacom pivoted to the VR/AR space and made a special 6 DOF pen you can use. I hope they don't go t…

Good call, Wacom is doing exactly that:

https://developer.wacom.com/en-us/wacomvrpen

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#98

Post by dougmwne »

kilroy123 wrote: post #56
janjongboom wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Oculust Quest 2 is my first VR headset, and it can cast to the TV. That helps tremendously with the social aspect, rest of the room can see what you're doing and give feedback. In addition we've been playing Eleven - a table tennis game - in multiplayer with two people in the same room (with two headsets) which is tremendous fun, but requires a second headset.

What else do you recommend with two headsets? My significant other and I are getting two Oculus headsets next week.

Try Echo VR, Population One, Blaston, Hyperdash, and Walkabout Mini Golf. There's no real advantage to being in the same physical space to any of these games, but they are all great multiplayer titles.

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#99

Post by chromaton »

dukeofdoom wrote: post #59

With so many schools under lockdown, kids staying at home. I think one application would be a virtual school. Right now when teachers teach over google classroom, the kids have their cameras and mikes turned off. And basically there is almost no interaction, and feedback as the teacher teaches. Kids don't like showing their living room environment. Also, the social interaction between kids in a school is basically no…

How's this work? In VR, the teacher can't see the kids' faces or other non-verbal communication.

Re: When will virtual reality take off? The $100 bet

#100

Post by numpad0 »

kraftman wrote: post #63
bullen wrote: post #36

The major (unpopular) reasons for VR plateau: - Fresnel lenses! - No haptic feedback? - Closed hardware/software. Unfortunately in the future electricity prices will mostly limit VR to non-realistic graphics, f.ex. Cyberpunk 2077 can't render (full blast) at 60 FPS on a 350W 3090, so to get 90FPS on both eyes you would need (if it was possible, it's not) more than 3x 3090 at a whopping 1000W! And this is at peak ever…

foveated rendering should solve this if it can be done well, as you're only rendering high quality where the eye is looking.

Last time I did a napkin math, cone size required for foveated rendering with current latency and framerate to match slew rate of human eyes basically equals to the whole FOV of typical headset that it’s pointless to implement.
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