I don’t understand why people are not capable of separating the good from the bad. Of course you can shit on FB regarding many things but this is objectively not one of those things.
Most people probably want to see a VR platform that can stand on its own profit mechanisms. Not something that is parasitically dependent on another platform's ad revenue (either directly with internal ads or indirectly via FB accounts). Instead of taking time to explore that (which is what many believed would happen after the acquisition), FB took the easy way out by bolting existing revenue systems on, which then in turn kills any motivation to explore options.
Similar kinds of worries always play out for technologies/platforms that are good but aren't profitable yet which then get acquired. Will the new owners help the technology stand on its own, or will they take the easy way out and treat it as a mechanism to bring new users onto their existing revenue stream.
More revenue streams to support it is better than fewer, at least at this stage of its development.
It's why many people wished to see that rather than an acquisition (where the new owners can do what they want) for Oculus. Back in the day, FB tried to placate these worries by suggesting that even with an acquisition they would try to behave like a VC and keep Oculus more-or-less independent. At this point it is clear that that dream is over.
People aren't angry, just disappointed. Eventually we will all lose hope on these things. Heck, many already have.
FWIW the Quest and Index have largely solved this problem. There are still certain experiences in VR which require more motion-sickness acclimation, such as roller coasters or fast-moving shooters. However, 1:1 motion experiences no longer cause problems for even the most sensitive players, in my experience.
I've demoed current VR hardware to highly sensitive friends and family members without issue. The same friends and family couldn't tolerate earlier generations of VR for more than a few minutes.
I'm referring to the fact that 3D will always inherently have a floor of non-acclimatable users that TV doesn't. People experience motion sickness from TV also, but it can be mitigated by sitting further back. There's fundamentally no similar option in VR if the immersion alone is disorienting; the immersion is the point.
I'd love to see actual data on the issue. Until then, I'm optimistic that VR's floor of non-acclimatable users is similar to or smaller than the same for regular video game consoles.
Here's a worst-case hypothetical reason why: people will watch porn on VR. Maybe not everyone, but a lot of people. Even people who wouldn't want to watch it regularly are likely to get curious and check it out at least once to see what it's like. Now, raise your hand: who wants Facebook having access to their porn habits?
Oculus-the-tech is cool. Oculus-the-Facebook-client is completely dead to me. No way, no thanks.
The worst part about VR is that it's so intoxicating with its immersion that once you take it off you feel sad that this is where you really live, not a nice place. It gave me joy and took me away, but it also made me sad about my real life. It gives you a fantasy and more people should realize that multimillionaires and billionaires don't need virtual reality, they're living what you're putting on your face. I'm sure that includes the porn too.
Personally, I absolutely love the Quest's price point, form factor, and overall software quality. At the same time, I despise Oculus as a brand and Facebook as a company for all of the above. I'm prepared to jump ship the split second an alternative is available.
Considering HTC was able to launch what is arguably a better product within the same year as oculus I fail to see what facebook brought to the table besides dark patterns and forced privacy violations.
The Quest 2 is an incredibly attractive device, and I basically can't imagine ever getting a wired VR headset at this point. From my perspective, Facebook made both the most attractive device and the best software ecosystem. I suspect Oculus as a standalone company could not have managed that.
That said, introducing ads to paid apps is a really bad idea. It's going to totally undermine consumer trust, and kneecap the ecosystem they built.
(And yes, I also had a visceral distaste when having to finally make a Facebook account to be able to use the Quest 2. But I can recognize that unifying the account infrastructure is the correct engineering choice, there's no need to assume malice).
But where they're looking to make the money is from getting a cut from software sales, again just like consoles. Advertising is a garbage business compared to owning a popular software platform like that.
Let's do some back of the envelope calculations. Let's say you can show 10 ads per hour, the average VR user uses 30 minutes of VR per day, a CPM of $10, a 50% platform vs. app cut of ad revenue, and a device lifetime of 5 years. I think these are all generous estimates.
10 ads / hour * 0.5 hours / day * 365 days / year * $10 / 1000 ads * 50% * 5 years = $45.60 total ad revenue for the lifetime of the device.
They cannot be subsidizing this for $400 and expecting to make it up on ads. The numbers just don't add up. (But I don't think they're selling it for a multi-hundred dollar loss at all.)
On the other hand, in 9 months of using the device I've bought about $150 in software, with Facebook's cut probably being about $45. Except that is over 9 months, not 5 years. This is where the money is.
This isn’t 4 year olds mindlessly watching YouTube, these are the ideal demographic to sell stuff. At even 3.5x your ultra low estimate FB is at 1/2 the retail price of the device. Massive subsides are an easy choice for FB assuming VR doesn’t die off quickly.
Still even using your numbers a drop from 350$ to 300$ is a big deal before considering other revenue from app sales etc.
Isn't the vast majority of FB usage on mobile, where ad blockers aren't even close to being as popular as on desktop ( and they still are probably used by a minority of people)
... so they can show ads on it.