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Comment by cheschire | Hacker News Reader

Meh? Everything you described has been occurring over the internet for 30ish years already. We didn’t need Facebook or VR for it.

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Of course.

We definitely don't need fb. VR though, is another mode. We don't necessarily need it, but having it does give us something new.

VR has much more feeling of "presence" than just video calling, or texting. I've been doing meetings in VR for a few months now and it beats Zoom etc. hands down IMHO, being able to look around, coalesce around a whiteboard, positional audio - it may look a bit cartooney, but for me it's less draining than video conference and more engaging.

Yeah, but I actually think zoom meeting aren't the ideal proving ground. It's a head-2-head between two tools that can do the job, with certain advantages to both.

For hanging out with a younger sibling, zoom doesn't work too well. Video (or audio only) calling enables only a certain kind of interaction. In the physical world,we play tennis, have dinner, cook together, etc. We don't just sit in front of each other and talk intensely all the time.

VR opens this up a little.

It seems to me as if you're simply missing the fundamental difference in that you don't understand (likely because you haven't experienced it firsthand with a friend or loved one) the value of physical/social presence enabled by VR. There are two things so far VR does that 2d doesn't, 1) you feel like you are really in the room with someone even if you are not, 2) boobs look 3D in VR porn.

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