- All The President's Men
It would have been really interesting to see what Oculus could have become without getting bought. I do think they were a little neat idea, not at all ready for Facebook sized projects.
When I was 20, I preordered a pixel 2 after watching the launch presentation from my university library. One of the "bonuses" for doing so was Google's new headset you put your phone in for a VR experience, along with a new controller.
This "Daydream" only lasted a few years (in software support), but it was a pretty good physical implementation of the "strap your phone to your face for budget VR" concept. I used it more than I'd care to admit for watching movies on a virtual big screen. It'd always give me a big headache between the eyes after an hour and a half, but it was fun every now and again.
A day at the fair.
It even convinced me to buy an Oculus CV1 when those were being heavily discounted!
I never ended up using the CV1 as much as my Daydream, which is saying something. The appeal of VR just isn't that great to me. It's something I find myself wanting to do maybe once or twice a year. Now, never, since the CV1 only ever worked well with Windows, and I can't be bothered to keep a Windows install exclusively for VR (I've tried and failed multiple times with the Linux runtimes).
Not nearly enough drive to deal with base stations, wires, or controllers. And even with the newest headsets that do away with all those, not worth the cash or effort to put on, or the space the headset takes up. Not for "once a month" trips to the fair.
It's insane to me that Meta dumped so much cash into VR. Their fever dream of working in VR gives me a sense of dread and migraine just thinking about it...
"Put on your headset and go into an office meeting!"
It really boggles the mind.
The problem with VR in general is that only children, Gen Alpha, are into it as a demographic. Meta failed to take this into account to reposition Meta VR as either their NES or Roblox into their marketing. They were marketing something only children appreciated to adults who couldn’t see the potential. All adults see is a giant bucket that they don’t want to put on their face.
Don't they screen to hire people who already know that?
There was a time when big tech widely hired dor entry-level jobs.
Also, cramming for the design portion of an interview, and doing it for real, and interacting with the architects/design documents are 2 very different things
The product is the stock price.
Viewed through that lens, keeping the hype going at all costs makes sense.
you could do this forever!
That's what meta(verse) was suppose to build.