Comment by freyir | Hacker News Reader

Comment by freyir | Hacker News Reader

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> It has been said many times, that something else will come around ... I think Facebook is here to stay.

Now that we've decided Facebook is here to stay, it's soon to be overthrown.

Initially, people expected Facebook to be replaced by a better looking or more exclusive version of Facebook (the way Facebook was a better looking and more exclusive version of MySpace). That never came to pass.

The next big threat was the shift to mobile. Mobile was a huge window of opportunity for potential competitors, because Facebook's itself made a slow transition to mobile. Facebook staved this off by identifying and acquiring threats (Instagram, WhatsApp, and a bid for Snapchat).

Its biggest threat remains the emergence of a new platform. I imagine that's why Zuckerberg made such a big gamble on VR; if VR could possibly be the next platform, he felt he needed to own it. It's starting to look like consumer demand for VR was way oversold, but maybe an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Another possibility is people will simply gradually lose interest in Facebook/Instagram. I deleted FB years ago and can't imagine going back, but apparently I'm not part of a bigger trend in this regard.

I don't think consumer interest in VR was oversold. The current options are doing quite well in the early adopter space, and I think we're on track for mass adoption in 5-10 years.

Only a few people had plasma/lcd screens when they first launched. Only a few people had the Internet in 1991. VR has only been in consumer hands for a few months.

> I don't think consumer interest in VR was oversold.

Some companies and people had very unrealistic expectations about VR when they entered the space. 5-10 years seems like a realistic timeline for potential mass adoption.

> Only a few people had plasma/lcd screens when they first launched

Only a few people had 3D TVs and Segways when they first launched. Unlike the iPhone, only a few people ever had the EyePhone [1]. It remains a question whether a critical mass of people will want VR. I've witnessed many people experiencing VR where it's like "Wow, this is totally amazing" for the first five minutes, followed by complete disinterest after 15 minutes. I think that suggests that there's something there, but there are also some barriers that haven't been identified and addressed yet.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VPL_Research#The_EyePhone

The barrier is strapping something to one's face. People don't want that.

I tend to agree. But why don't people want to strap something to their face? Is it the physical discomfort of the straps and the weight of the headset? That can be incrementally improved.

Is it the way the display cuts them off from the outside world? Some degree of immersion is desired -- people sit in dark theaters to watch movies -- but maybe VR is too much. I think it's fitting that Facebook/Zuckerberg thinks VR is the future of social networking. A "social" product that makes you feel more isolated.

I think they would have to get to the point where they are similar to regular sunglasses[0]. And the set up would have to be as simple as picking up a remote and turning on the tv. IOW, when someone puts on the VR glasses, they auto connect and start up immediately with little user intervention. Anyone other than a geek/nerd/techie, doesn't want to 'fiddle' with something to use it. They want it TV remote easy.

[0] Though I still tend to think that even this would not be enough for most people - see 3D glasses/TVs.

There is no killer app in VR so far that would lead to mass adoption. Software is clearly missing. It may bd solved later on but it will take time.

Well there's VR porn apparently now - and porn has always been on the forefront of technological advances.

There is no way my mum or my grandparents will buy a VR headset in the next 5-10 years and use it every day. Not a chance.

VR is 50-100 years from "mass adoption" when the headsets are as light as sunglasses are today, either that, or when my kids grow in a culture of VR. A full generation at least.

I think you are largely mistaken.

I work for a Not-for-Profit in Health Care / Aged Care and we have bought Samsung VR headsets to take into the Aged Care Homes and the elderly people there have absolutely love the experiences they had.

Personally, I feel as though I'll accidentally think of the elderly as less human than the young, and forget that they can be open to new things as well. The more I've realized it about myself, the more I feel I begin to see it in others too.

I don't believe I was making the mistake of thinking of people a little older than me as being less human. I have elderly friends that are avid gamers and love thier smartphones, tablets, and Facebook (which I consider to have had mass adoption).

VR headsets I put in the same category as the Microsoft Kinect or the Nintendo Wii. They are kind of fun, impressive technologies, but ultimately they are kind of a pain to use.

> ... Kind of a pain to use.

This. The inertia it takes to actually use it has to become as low as flipping on the TV and channel surfing. Having to locate a headset, strap it on, etc. is not what people are willing to do. Also, people don't like things on their face.

My parents would buy it in a second if it made long-distance hangouts with their grandchild more immersive.

Plasmas were tens of thousands of USD when they came out.

Let's put a pin in this comment and revisit it in 5-10 years. I don't have much faith in VR being a consumer favorite. They've never been found of having to put stuff on their faces.

> They've never been found of having to put stuff on their faces.

Obvious counterexamples are eye glasses and sunglasses. There is some tradeoff between utility and discomfort where it becomes viable, but it's not clear whether the technology can get there in 5-10 years.

And facemasks which are very popular in some places.

Being popular isn't the same a being liked.

I worked in the eyeglass business through college. A not insignificant number of people dislike wearing glasses. They are treated as a necessity in order to see, but there's not much enjoyment there (other than style, but that only goes so far).

I've had higher hopes for Kinect. But now Microsoft is shutting it down, with the IoT spirit of taking the software away from the few adopters they got over the six years.

I think everyone had high hopes for Kinect. When it launched, it was the fastest selling consumer device of all time, and it looked for a while like it would help open the XBox platform up to a new audience of casual gamers who weren't into epic-sized shooting games.

What did for Kinect wasn't really anything Microsoft did so much as the market deciding that they wanted the smartphone to be the centre of their universe for gaming with the TV a peripheral. That that would turn out to be the case wasn't at all obvious in 2010.

True, but I still hate the idea of taking away Xbox Fitness from paying customers ("you can keep using the content you paid for for 6 more months!").

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