I agree, personally I think VR has interesting applications in gaming and other areas that we haven't seen yet. But you're never going to get my mom to spend money on VR.
Augmented Reality has plenty of use cases - in more areas than the consumer space. For example, the demo that Microsoft showed off yesterday with testing out how furniture looks before you buy it could be huge. Or how about an app that has you stand in front of a mirror and try on clothes - online?
AR is life++; VR is reinventing life. The former will almost inevitably come easier and find more success, at least initially.
We'll see how personal they can make Play With Your Grand-Kids on the Other Side of the Country™, before I make that call.
I've got no interest in VR that costs any serious amount of money, but hell, I'd go buy a VR headset and high-end video card tonight if it could offer me that. Maybe they'll come up with a way to stitch it together from old Polaroids.
I actually think VR telepresence is a lot more intriguing to me than just playing cooler looking video games. I mean...the game stuff is the easiest thing to do first because you've already got established frameworks in place for the creation and rendering of complex 3d environments. But when you start getting into depth cams or light field cams combines with more advanced and ergonomic display hardware and high speed networks, you're moving toward having the pieces in place to allow people to virtually be someplace else and communicate with others in a way a webcam can't replicate.
Definitely interested to see how that field looks in 10-15 years.
The way the writers even notice the technology compared to it's transparency/ubiquity today is quaint.