There was a brief period of time where they were actually on the “right” track IMO. You’d pop the headset on, call your friend(s), and when they answered, immediately your VR avatars would be standing in the same virtual space or in your room if you’re using passthrough mode, and you could “look at” and speak to each other in a way that felt extremely natural. You’d start gesturing and naturally moving your body as you speak in the same way you would in a face-to-face chat. The same way you can be at a Halloween party and after a few minutes, you’re having a completely normal conversation with Abe Lincoln or a frog or whatever. Even though the avatars weren’t perfect, there were times that three of us just stood around for 30-45 minutes just chatting and catching up before anyone suggested playing an actual game.
To me, the main selling point of VR is that it’s the best way to feel present with someone who isn’t physically there. It’s better than a video call or a traditional online game. It’s really the closest thing to just “hanging out” with someone who’s somewhere else.
Of course, it only worked that way for a month or two before they made it so that you couldn’t gather like that unless you were inside the horizon worlds app, which everyone always hated. Typical dark pattern enshittification as usual.
This is all beside the fact that it’s Zuck, Facebook, and all the other things everyone hates, but much like the perv glasses seem to be catching on, I think Zuck’s metaverse could have been somewhat popular if they hadn’t done… basically everything they’ve done to it.
If he made thin AR glasses, that could have been neat. Should have specialized in a set of consumer glasses that is smart enough to take over basic phone use. Including a type of FaceTime but through the glasses. They could have designed a weird system that uses fancy cameras and embedded AI to construct your face in real time. They could have specialized in making them very lightweight. All the stuff you might expect out of futuristic glasses, then allowed them to take eSIM. They could have reasonably considered entering consumer phone/data services under some weird niche.
They’ve been trying to build that, and they even demo’d a prototype after spending a few billion, but it was too expensive to sell.
Slim AR displays are science fiction technology, and the best they can do right now is still quite limited compared to passthrough VR. They can’t hit nearly the same FOV or resolution yet in transparent displays, you either get readable text or a wide FOV, but not both. There’s a reason Google Glass was only a tiny thing in the corner of your vision.
He probably should have stuck with the Metaverse, I’m sure it would have worked eventually. I mean maybe, who knows…
There was a brief period of time where they were actually on the “right” track IMO. You’d pop the headset on, call your friend(s), and when they answered, immediately your VR avatars would be standing in the same virtual space or in your room if you’re using passthrough mode, and you could “look at” and speak to each other in a way that felt extremely natural. You’d start gesturing and naturally moving your body as you speak in the same way you would in a face-to-face chat. The same way you can be at a Halloween party and after a few minutes, you’re having a completely normal conversation with Abe Lincoln or a frog or whatever. Even though the avatars weren’t perfect, there were times that three of us just stood around for 30-45 minutes just chatting and catching up before anyone suggested playing an actual game.
To me, the main selling point of VR is that it’s the best way to feel present with someone who isn’t physically there. It’s better than a video call or a traditional online game. It’s really the closest thing to just “hanging out” with someone who’s somewhere else.
Of course, it only worked that way for a month or two before they made it so that you couldn’t gather like that unless you were inside the horizon worlds app, which everyone always hated. Typical dark pattern enshittification as usual.
This is all beside the fact that it’s Zuck, Facebook, and all the other things everyone hates, but much like the perv glasses seem to be catching on, I think Zuck’s metaverse could have been somewhat popular if they hadn’t done… basically everything they’ve done to it.
If he made thin AR glasses, that could have been neat. Should have specialized in a set of consumer glasses that is smart enough to take over basic phone use. Including a type of FaceTime but through the glasses. They could have designed a weird system that uses fancy cameras and embedded AI to construct your face in real time. They could have specialized in making them very lightweight. All the stuff you might expect out of futuristic glasses, then allowed them to take eSIM. They could have reasonably considered entering consumer phone/data services under some weird niche.
They’ve been trying to build that, and they even demo’d a prototype after spending a few billion, but it was too expensive to sell.
Slim AR displays are science fiction technology, and the best they can do right now is still quite limited compared to passthrough VR. They can’t hit nearly the same FOV or resolution yet in transparent displays, you either get readable text or a wide FOV, but not both. There’s a reason Google Glass was only a tiny thing in the corner of your vision.