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Comment by dougmwne | Hacker News Reader

I am one of them and I have been blown away by my first headset. Most of the news about Quest revolves around mistrust of FB. That's fair, but it's still going to take billions in investment to make this tech hit it's full potential, so I am glad it's at least a US company. Maybe I would pay the Apple premium if they ever release a decent competitor.

In the meantime, I think this is the most promising new consumer technology since the iPhone. There's huge potential for social, exercise, gaming, media consumption, general purpose computing, business, art, and education. I have had many magic moments where the human-computer interaction was as natural as waving to a friend or hitting a ping pong ball. AR is going to share in most of this potential, so I view this as an early iteration of a device that will have AR and VR modes and can be used both in every day life and in the VR bubble. Eventually our phones will be obsolete.

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So why hasn't it happened yet? It's been on the market for _years_ and very little units have sold. Personally I think VR is way overhyped. The experience is fun but intense, much like a rollercoaster. I like rollercoasters, but don't want to go on one daily.

In terms of everyday HCI, there are very few scenarios where it truly beats a flat 2D screen with touch.

I believe we're on the verge of that happening. Yeah, VR has been available for way too many years, but available !== accessible. The Oculus Quest product line alone has done more for making VR accessible to the masses than any prior form of VR technology. Sure, Valve, HTC, Sony and others were there before, but their approach was more enthusiast friendly than mass market friendly, requiring additional hardware and wiring, for starters.

Sure, there are still many issues to overcome, but even with those the Quest line has managed to make a dent in the industry in only 2 years of being available. I think we all will take this seriously when Apple finally joins the game.

My theory is mostly it needed to be wireless and stand alone with inside-out tracking to reduce the barrier to entry and play.

That’s the quest 2

The Quest 2 has only been out since October 13 of last year. 4m units in the US in less than a year is a great number.

The first iPhone sold 6.1m in its first year, and it was way more expensive than a Quest 2. Last year well over a billion cell phones were sold. The Quest 2 isn't the first oculus product -- they've been at this for years. I'd say these numbers aren't great if this really is 'the future of computing' as many would have you believe.

There were 3.3 billion phone subscribers in 2007 (source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/270850/number-of-mobile-...).

It's likely that most of those 4 million users have never had a VR headset before.

The thing with VR is that you have to experience it to understand. There has not been anything like it before. Smartphones were just mobile phones with screen in place of buttons. Mobile phones were just stationary phones you could carry around and so on.

I own 2 units and I never use them… just sitting in boxes after having set them up and played for a bit. Even prior to smartphones I had a stationary phone that I used. I used a telephone plugged into my wall, I use cordless telephones, I used a car phone, I used a Nokia, I used a razor, and eventually smartphones. They all provided real value. I don’t see what I’m missing with VR, and I’ve fully experienced it.

An Oculus is at best a gaming console. An iPhone is at the very least a mobile phone, which even in 2007 was a daily necessity for most people.

And it was an ipod as well

I think this is the blackberry of VR. We haven't hit our iPhone moment yet, but we are getting close.

Something like 20% of the population will feel motion sick with no known way to combat that. It’s still a screen strapped inches away from your face, with no good input outside of video games. It’s an intense proposition, and requires a level of pay off to be worth it even if you have great resolution, fix issues with distortion, looks, passthru, etc.

Where as I have a supercomputer in my pocket that’s a pleasure to use, always accessible, cheap to expensive, and directly manipulatable. Even the blackberry (aka crack berry) was far more popular than VR ever has been. I just don’t see it outside of certain games and niches, and I’ve tried.

Wow, so the quest 2 has similar numbers to the first iPhone? That is insane actually oO not sure why you say that’s a bad thing

I believe there’s a parallel with the internet. Took a while for it to really boom. VR has the tech, it just needs more apps and adoption. But tbf it’s already great like this! There’s nothing that prevents you to buy a headset for you (and perhaps your friends) and to spend hours having fun in VR.

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