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Comment by azinman2 | Hacker News Reader

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.

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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

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