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Comment by daenz | Hacker News Reader

> I think it's because nobody understands what FB is going to do with it.

I've been thinking about this Facebook acquisition for a little while, and in my mind, the only play that makes sense for Facebook is to become the login gateway to Oculus games. For many Windows games, there's Windows Live...a social-ish, login service that you literally have to register and sign in with in order to play the game. You cannot opt out. If Facebook became this... "Sign in with Facebook"... for all commercial Oculus games, they would have a guaranteed mindshare on the future younger generations of gamers. And becoming just the gatekeepers would more or less let them be hands-off with the actual Oculus direction as a company, which is in line with what's been said so far.

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Seriously? The only reason to own a VR problem is to stick in “sign in via some website that used to be popular in the old web“ button? What would it give them anyway? Drive up Facebook usage on the old web?

I don't understand why most people think Facebook is so dumb in this thread.

I don't think FB is dumb, but I do fear that they are highly amoral with respect to personal privacy... And a VR screen glued to your face is getting pretty damn personal. I feel uneasy about a guy who calls his users "dumb fucks" for trusting him to be in charge of that.

> I don't understand why most people think Facebook is so dumb in this thread.

Because Facebook is dumb. For all the talk of vision, FB is nothing more than organic growth around Zuck's desire to get lists of fellow students on his campus into a directory.

FB in 2006 is barely a different experience than FB in 2014. And none of the changes made so far can be charitably described as "smart".

For all the wealth of information they have on people, they aren't even that good at placing relevant ads or getting clicks. The main innovations FB is credited with is finding more and more ways to mine and exploit user's data.

More importantly, the things that Facebook is good at doing have little to nothing to do with building a persistent on-line world (and decades of experience have shown that in general these are not things that the bulk of people want to inhabit as a replacement for the real world. Walking around a virtual art gallery sucks in comparison to just flipping through a bunch of photos).

Facebook and innovation almost never appear positively in the same sentence.

>FB is nothing more than organic growth

You seem to be underestimating how difficult organic growth is. (In terms of product design, not engineering. And yes, Facebook circa 2006 is great product design because it was what people wanted.)

Organic growth is execution and engineering, not innovation. FB in 2006 is a good design, and magically hit upon what people wanted, an easier to use private email system with a public announcement board.

Is FB 2014 fundamentally different? Is there innovation? How about FB's other acquisitions, are they innovative or just derivative? Hint: If it's in the social space, it's just derivative. FB acquires purely to secure and reinforce this one-trick pony it's on. If e-mail was run by a single company they'd buy that too.

Innovation is not in the company DNA, especially if it doesn't support the path they're on. That's why the only outcome of this is strapping an OVR to your face and getting bombarded by irrelevant ads and "join my game?" requests, but now in 3d or some other "fitting" of the acquisition into the existing and larger "social" momentum the company is on.

... or buying companies that know how to innovate.

And then what?

It's got to be connected to the core competencies of the company, otherwise it's just a conglomerate and FB has shown zero signs that this what they intend to do. All of the language of the acquisition is that they will be using this tech to reinforce what they already do.

I'm excited to announce that we've agreed to acquire Oculus VR, the leader in virtual reality technology.

Our mission is to make the world more open and connected. For the past few years, this has mostly meant building mobile apps that help you share with the people you care about. We have a lot more to do on mobile, but at this point we feel we're in a position where we can start focusing on what platforms will come next to enable even more useful, entertaining and personal experiences.

And that's why people hate this acquisition, because OVR could have been so much more than just yet another vehicle for FB to push social. FB social could have been just one aspect of what OVR could have enabled, now it's the only thing.

Facebook has been taking their product to market for the last 8 years. What would you have them do? Change their product for the sake of it when it's still growing -- worldwide?

Innovation in tech is still laudable innovation. Cassandra. Scribe. Thrift. React. Tech that is widely used.

I don't think FB is as important to our industry as some other companies, but no, they're not dumb.

I'm not challenging FB to innovate. It's not in their DNA. FB is FB. It is what it is.

And that's why this acquisition is bad. There are no paths that FB will take with this tech that doesn't drive it right down the non-innovative path they're already on and committed to.

That's a little too hand-wavy for my taste. Like you used your jedi knight intellectual superiority to declare that FB doesn't get it and never will and you do and can clearly point it out.

Truth is, I don't know exactly what FB will do with this tech. But it seems silly to think it will only be within some narrow concept of their existing social network roadmap. I would bet on Facebook letting them stay separate and do their own thing, combining sales and marketing channels where opportunities exist. But only time will tell.

They are actually having growth problems, particularly with the younger demographic.

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