How Facebook and Oculus Could Be a Great Combination 151
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes: "Nate Swammer writes at Slashgear that with Facebook's purchase of Oculus for a cool $2 billion, the fervor surrounding virtual reality headwear quickly turned to disdain. Betrayal, confusion, and anger became the order of the day for contributors who gave Oculus $2.4 million through its Kickstarter campaign. But now that passions have cooled and looking at the issues dispassionately, the Facebook acquisition may turn out much better than anticipated for users. While many may have a fervent distrust for Facebook, this deal bodes well for Oculus, and by virtue, us.
First Oculus wasn't flush, and although Oculus may have had some hustle behind it, it may not have been enough. John Carmack, Oculus CTO, said via Twitter, 'I expect the FB deal will avoid several embarrassing scaling crisis for VR.' The headwear already famously suffered from a supply chain issue not long ago, which actually stopped it dead in its tracks. Next, in their official announcement of the Facebook deal, gaming was barely a blip on the radar. It wasn't until the very end that gaming was even mentioned, with the bulk of the post discussing 'culture' and driving virtual reality forward. There was little to indicate any big titles were coming for Oculus.
The fact is, Oculus needed help. Not technical assistance, but someone who could be their Sony, more or less. John Carmack says he has 'a deep respect for the technical scale that FB operates at. The cyberspace we want for VR will be at this scale.' Perhaps Facebook isn't the most popular choice, but they are the partner Oculus chose for their future says Swammer. 'Like Google purchasing Android in 2005, it all seems so strange right now [remember this story we discussed in 2009] — but we see how that turned out. If VR really is the next frontier, Facebook just staked their claim to a big slab of land in the heart of some virtual country they'll likely let us see someday — via Oculus.""
First Oculus wasn't flush, and although Oculus may have had some hustle behind it, it may not have been enough. John Carmack, Oculus CTO, said via Twitter, 'I expect the FB deal will avoid several embarrassing scaling crisis for VR.' The headwear already famously suffered from a supply chain issue not long ago, which actually stopped it dead in its tracks. Next, in their official announcement of the Facebook deal, gaming was barely a blip on the radar. It wasn't until the very end that gaming was even mentioned, with the bulk of the post discussing 'culture' and driving virtual reality forward. There was little to indicate any big titles were coming for Oculus.
The fact is, Oculus needed help. Not technical assistance, but someone who could be their Sony, more or less. John Carmack says he has 'a deep respect for the technical scale that FB operates at. The cyberspace we want for VR will be at this scale.' Perhaps Facebook isn't the most popular choice, but they are the partner Oculus chose for their future says Swammer. 'Like Google purchasing Android in 2005, it all seems so strange right now [remember this story we discussed in 2009] — but we see how that turned out. If VR really is the next frontier, Facebook just staked their claim to a big slab of land in the heart of some virtual country they'll likely let us see someday — via Oculus.""
Go (Score:1)
Oculus had many reasons to partner with Facebook (Score:5, Funny)
Two billion of them, to be exact.
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Now that's just crazy talk.
it's a beautiful war (Score:1)
hopefully we will not be undone by our unreality 'helmets' & other assorted deception generation media mongrelity? new reality series http://www.youtube.com/results... [youtube.com] promises return to genuine freedom for many
Rift'd (Score:4, Insightful)
I speak for everyone when I say, he is RIGHT. We NEED this COOL technology!
We need it so bad, my pants are falling down and I'm getting excited. This is facebook we're talking about right? The dating website.
I think in the end, we will enjoy our Demolition Man style sex and become enlightened in our non-fluid transfer sex of the future.
Because I want VR now... WAAAAA I can't get it NOW.
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That's the first time anyone has mentioned an application that takes advantage of the Oculus VR aquisition by Facebook. Kudos to you sir!
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I can think of lots of lucrative non-game applications for good VR.
1) virtual tourism - digitally scan all of the exhibits, and background aesthetics of rooms and exteriors in the Louvre. Charge art students / fans $50 per day to visit the museum online. It's cheaper than a trip to France, takes in more money per day, and helps those planning a real trip figure out where to go and what to see in advance. Eventually cities will offer tours of their historical districts complete with local flavor "AI characte
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3D Like buttons for everyone! +1 has no chance!
Also, imagine how much more confusing they can make the wall or timeline or fluxblog or whatever the hell they call it these days when they can add a third dimension! Not only won't you be able to find anything, you'll actually be able to get lost in the mess!
No. (Score:5, Insightful)
And color me surprised that the guy who just got a $2B cash infusion thinks this is a good idea. Gaming is barely a blip on the radar? Yeah, that's the problem, you asshole. Gamers bankrolled it; developers kept the momentum going; anticipated titles created the buzz.... but all of that barely registers against Facebook's piles and piles of money, right?
Re:No. (Score:5, Interesting)
With that said, if the drivers / SDK remain openly available, I am sure game developers will get on board. But with gaming "barely on the radar", I fear for the undoubtedly necessary collaboration between Oculus and game developers.
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If they want to do something 'social', it wouldn't be a huge surprise to see much greater emphasis on accurately capturing facial expressions of the wearer, so that those can be painted on an avatar of some kind(and emotional responses to ad
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Think "Facebook meets Second Life with better-than-1998-graphics".
Then, feel free to throw up.
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And color me surprised that the guy who just got a $2B cash infusion thinks this is a good idea. Gaming is barely a blip on the radar? Yeah, that's the problem, you asshole. Gamers bankrolled it; developers kept the momentum going; anticipated titles created the buzz.... but all of that barely registers against Facebook's piles and piles of money, right?
There's also the fact that, pending some sort of sea change, Facebook is kind of an engorged pustule on the ass of gaming. 'Social' gaming (ironically, usually rather less actually social than 'non-social' multiplayer games of almost any genre) is a horrible place where lousiness that would make the bargain bin of old blush is combined with ruthless exploitation of human weakness that would make your local heroin dealer a trifle queasy.
That's just not very encouraging. Though, that said, given that 'face
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Facebook is kind of an engorged pustule on the ass of gaming.
Facebook is kind of an engorged pustule on the ass of humanity.
Why do the gaming luminaries disagree with you? (Score:3, Insightful)
If you read what any of the more thoughtful people who have been around gaming a while, they all think the acquisition was good - Penny Arcade, Carmack, Adam Sessler - all of these guys think it was a good thing for Oculus and gamers.
Just because gaming is a tiny part of it in the distant future, does not mean it's bad for gaming - any more than a great high-resolution display is overall used by gamers a tiny amount compared to movies. In the end gaming still gets a great display, and after Facebook gamers
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They don't. I had the same thoughts before I read what they were thinking... and it got me wondering why so many people who were not as deep into the gaming industry thought as they did, when clearly the people who knew better (including myself) had different thoughts.
I think some people just have so much hate for certain companies, they can no longer think rationally. Which is a shame because we need more, not fewer, rational people on this earth who are able to get past personal dislike.
Pioneers (Score:2)
"If VR really is the next frontier " I expect OR to take a lot of arrows. Few pioneers reach old age.
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Pioneers? I've already got VR. Had it since Quake and Descent came out in the 90's. Who wants to strap a toaster to their face when they can have VR glasses that look like glasses and work on the go from their smartphones? [vuzix.com]
If it was such a big deal, the existing VR companies would already be improving on latency and price by leaps and bounds on their own over the two decades we've had consumer VR gear. It's just not that big a deal, you're still just feeding images to a brain, I don't understand the hype
Depends (Score:5, Insightful)
Can I rip the FB crap out of it? That's pretty much the question that will determine whether I want to have it. I don't really mind having FB as the manufacturer of the thing, for all I care it could be made by FB, MS or CommieNaziIncorporated, as long as it's affordable, working and free of any baggage that tries to push me towards it manufacturer.
If it's used as some kind of vehicle to push FB onto the few who don't have it and don't loathe it on principle, then I can very well do without and am retroactively glad I decided against funding the kickstarter.
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Elaborate please? I guess mine is old enough that I don't get the joke.
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How is a device on which I can install CyanogenMod locked-in to Google? Please explain.
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How is a device on which I can install CyanogenMod locked-in to Google? Please explain.
They're locked-in to Google by default. The majority of Joe Public are not going to install Cyanogenmod on their phone. Heck, even i'm scared to do it, and i'm more than capable.
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Android phones have Google lock-in,
This is simply untrue as a blanket statement. My Android phone does not use Google services and does not report anything at all to Google.
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I'm guessing you don't own a smartphone then...
If you're a nerd you can root your Android phone and get rid of the G+ stuff, assuming you own the phone and don't care about voiding the warranty. iPhone doesn't even come with any of the top five social networking apps preinstalled last time I checked.
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for all I care it could be made by FB, MS or CommieNaziIncorporated, as long as it's affordable, working and free of any baggage that tries to push me towards it manufacturer.
This implies that OP doesn't like any form of lock-in from any manufacturer. To use Google Play, you have to use, err, Google services. To use the Apple App Store you have to sign up for an Apple ID. Each manufacturer has various ways of tying you into their own ecosystem...
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Up until recently you didn't need Google Play Services to run most apps on Android, but things do seem to be moving in that direction slowly but surely.
I guess you could order a Firefox OS phone that's not tied to any major social network / identity ecosystem: http://stores.ebay.com/ztemobi... [ebay.com] Doesn't look great, but it's only 80 bucks.
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My smartphone has no connection to Facebook.
I know that you're making a point about Google, but my objection to the FB deal is not that OR sold out to a large corporation. It's that they sold out to Facebook specifically.
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As long as I can pull out FB and load Linux on it, I'll buy one.
Seriously, I think the FB blinders are a great idea...anyone who spends their day on Facebook can now be hidden away and easily identified by others, thus removing a significant portion of very dull, insulated people.
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If it's used as some kind of vehicle to push FB onto the few who don't have it and don't loathe it on principle, then I can very well do without and am retroactively glad I decided against funding the kickstarter.
Out of interest, have any of Facebook's other acquisitions been used to force users onto the FB platform? In other words, do they have a strong precedent of doing this?
In the case of Oculus spending $2b and then immediately trying to alienate its core user base by somehow pushing FB on the tiny percentage of users that don't already have it seems like it would be a weird thing to do.
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At least i am thinking it will have you sign up for a facebook account during the driver install.
They said no need for a Facebook account (Score:3)
At least i am thinking it will have you sign up for a facebook account during the driver install.
The head of Oculus said explicitly (on Reddit) that you would not have to have a Facebook account to use the Oculus,
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Why not? It fits the trend. (Score:2)
I don't know why people assume Facebook is folding in every acquisition to Facebook when that's not what they have done with any company to date.
So far Instagram and WhatsApp have had final say on what happens with their products. Facebook has given no cause to assume that anything is different than what they have said with acquisitions so far - which is that they are hands-off with the acquisitions. Thus Oculus will do what they have said they will do.
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The head of Oculus said explicitly (on Reddit) that you would not have to have a Facebook account to use the Oculus,
Yes, he did. But that he's foolish enough to believe Facebook doesn't mean anything at all.
Besides, my personal objection isn't about the risk of having to use a Facebook login. It's the risk of having Facebook datamine OR use.
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I can still create an Instagram account without FB. Although I don't particularly like the FB acquisition, chances are they will not botch the entire thing.
My guess is that FB (the company) is realizing that FB (the website) will become obsolete sooner or later (think MySpace). The company is trying to move out of their single revenue stream and diversify. You can probably see more acquisitions from FB that are not in line with the FB service.
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Are you sure that behind the scenes there is much of a difference between a FB login and an Instagram login anymore? Are you sure that the data collection doesn't all end up in the same database?
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And that would help them how again?
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Sorry. I was extrapolating from what I saw so far from FB. But hey, maybe you're right and they change by 180 by the time this product sees the light of day.
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I just love all of the optimism here on Slashdot. It is truly heartwarming.
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In that case I'm waiting for the firmware upgrade. From a third party, of course.
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Will the hardware be open? That's the important question and we should be able to find that out almost immediately. The early stages of this will be: how open the thing is to firmware upgrades. Will there be robust hardware documentation, a JTAG connector or equivalent, etc?
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Well, I think asking for JTAG compliance (let alone a connector) might be a bit too much. But we can hope.
"Feels" Unnatural... (Score:4, Insightful)
Business decision(s) aside, it feels completely unnatural that such a cool, grassroots company sold out to a behemoth monstrosity like FB.
I would really like to see FB taken down a notch (putting it nicely), and this I am afraid will draw more people to it, as this tech is very compelling. I don't want to have to use FB to play with VR on this level. Perhaps I won't have to.
Maybe Oculus did need the help referred to in the article, but couldn't there have been another way? $2B would be hard to turn down, but (imho) they could have gotten there another way, and maybe surpassed it.
just my $0.02
Will this affect their investment (Score:2)
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: and for a hardware company w/ no market share (Score:1)
I thought about your 1) but concluded no, because when companies do this, they acquire proven companies with a predictable revenue stream. Oculus is burning money and their business model relies on a bunch of people adopting new behaviors for interacting with their computers. A killer VR app is needed to make this work, even among the hardcore gamer market. FB is not the killer app for VR, so...there must be much more to this story we don't know yet for this to be the case..
For 2) I think this is on the
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3) They have an overriding strategy that includes OR as it intends to be and software that utilises this tech and will come with every unit.
Many people on this forum seem to completely forget how fundamental and low level this tech is. (mostly due to bias against FB)
This is not a gaming console. It is a VR headset in which almost EVERY VR related issue is shared by ALL applications. If they want penetration (which FB most certainly will) it will have to be available for generic (i.e. gaming) use.
They h
This is Why Notch Dropped the Deal (Score:5, Insightful)
This is precisely why Pearson dropped Occulus after the buyout. We had a cool piece of tech, and a company ready to deliver it the the place best suited to it -- video games.
Now we have a multi-billion dollar social media site willing to spend more on the marketing and propaganda budget for the deal itself than they are on the actual technology. Hence this article.
Facebook is the Walmart of the Internet. Occulus should have taken their cue from Snapper and walked away.
Re:This is Why Notch Dropped the Deal (Score:5, Insightful)
Amazon is the walmart of the internet. Look at their operation. It's ridiculous.
Further more, the notion that VR is best suited for games so short sighted I don't even know where to begin.
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That's a more fair argument to make.
I don't think Facebook has a long enough history where we can make these determinations. However, with what they've done(or not done) with WhatsApp and Instagram, I'm willing to bet Facebook isn't interested in meddling with third party development.
Further more, I don't think 3D porn is what's going to sell this thing to the masses. 2D porn didn't set the home video market on fire, but it sure did help.
VR still remains a gimmick (Score:1)
whatever people think about VR it will remain a gimmick i don't see average non gamers buy devices that cost 350 USD
Don't forget that VR is just like 3d every 10 years they try it.
Just what I need... (Score:2)
the next Anthony Wiener wannabe sending me his junk in 3D.
We have not evolved enough for this technology.
Oculus + FB = Snowcrash (Score:5, Interesting)
3. by moonboy asks: I once read, in Wired, an article that said you have an incredible headstart on everyone else for making "virtual worlds" on the Internet using your engine from the Quake games. Do you have any intention of doing this? Has anyone approached you about it? It would seem like a fantastic use of the technology with online gaming being so popular. Entire worlds online could be created virtually and very life-like with many different purposes.
John Carmack Answers: Making Snow Crash into a reality feels like a sort of moral imperative to a lot of programmers, but the efforts that have been made so far leave a lot to be desired. It is almost painful for me to watch some of the VRML initiatives. It just seems so obviously the wrong way to do something. All of this debating, committee forming, and spec writing, and in the end, there isn't anything to show for it. Make something really cool first, and worry about the spec after you are sure it's worth it! I do think it is finally the right time for this to start happening for real. While a lot of people could envision the possibilities after seeing DOOM or Quake, it is really only now that we have general purpose hardware acceleration that things are actually flexible enough to be used as a creative medium without constantly being conscious of the technical limitations. Two weeks ago, I pitched a proposal to develop some technology along these lines to the rest of the company. I may wind up working on some things like that in parallel with the next game project.
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Okay, maybe they're right. Maybe the Facebook deal is a snow crash of the Metaverse. But really, we should have built the Metaverse first.
All the dazed developers staring at random bitmaps when they've been snow crashed isn't pretty to look at.
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You can bet that someone is currently working on something like a pseudo-narcotic and that they and/or someone else is working on malware based on a pseudo-narcotic.
I doubt it'll be connected to the Sumerian language though.
It Doesn't Matter... (Score:2)
I think in a few years we'll all be having a good laugh about how Oculus doomed themselves with this move. I think there are enough people on this planet like me who are 100% distrustful of Facebook and anything they have to do with anything. I have long size made the vow that Facebook and its affiliates get zero dollars of my money and zero seconds of my attention.
We keep reading articles about how Facebook is on the way out, its core userbase of young hip twentysomethings is evaporating quickly, and soon
So all they needed was money? (Score:1)
Re: So all they needed was money? (Score:3)
Consider Oculus is "just another" VR company, with their biggest innovation being that they were crowd funded, and their product barely released and with a fairly small audience (due to price, interest, motion sickness, etc).
Being bought for more than what Google paid for YouTube.
Being bought for at least 100x more than what FB could have developed fo
You can't polish a turd. (Score:3)
You can't polish a turd. You can, however, glue another turd to it.
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Put more correctly: if you put a cup of cherries into a mixing bowl with a quart of dog turds and stirr.....
Re:You can't polish a turd. (Score:4, Funny)
Not true:
Mythbusters Polishing a Turd
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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It wasn't even poop after the processing they did.
You can do anything to X if you first transform it into Y. For example, worms can fly if you feed them to sparrows first.
I'm sick of people quoting that retarded show. They're as dumb as the twats who sing "correlation is not causation" all the time and think "exponential" is a synonym of "big". B Ark material, the lot of 'em.
It's really rather simple... (Score:4, Interesting)
The backlash is because many people who are comfortable with tech think FaceBook are the biggest bunch of douches in the tech world. The primary reason they feel that way is because FaceBook treats EVERYTHING as an avenue to generate revenue off of your personal life, treats everything as if it belongs to them, and makes decisions about privacy that any rational person would recognize as highly questionable and implements them simply because they will result in a likely revenue stream.
Who wouldn't want a company like that taking a fledgling tech darling that many people really were going to make gaming soooo much better?
"Hi, little baby unicorn, meet Darth Vader - he's going to raise you..."
For myself, I can't wait to put on my partially subsidized Oculus-berg and play Elite Dangerous and dodge asteroids textured in Vistaprint ads and a constant background subliminal audio soundtrack about whatever the latest f***ing things is that Dr. Oz is hawking...
The future of VR just got it's first sponsor. (Score:5, Interesting)
" Facebook just staked their claim to a big slab of land in the heart of some virtual country they'll likely let us see someday — via Oculus.""
Uh..."let" us see it?
This is please login to Facebook to continue we're talking about here, which is exactly what you're going to see when you power on the new and improved FaceRift; a Facebook login prompt.
And our new vision of future VR just got its first major sponsor.
If you thought the internet got annoying with "Like us" popping up every damn where you click, just wait until your new branded internet VR/3D comes out...it'll make NASCAR advertising tactics look like your neighbors garage sale.
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With a built in retina scanner that will positively ID you and follow your goddam eyeball....where did you look, how long, how frequently.
This is evil.
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With a built in retina scanner that will positively ID you and follow your goddam eyeball....where did you look, how long, how frequently.
This is evil.
Not just evil, but this is also something you assume Google isn't collecting on its Glass users today.
Picasa's face recognition was just the tip of the iceberg.
Perhaps this is insurance for FB (Score:4, Interesting)
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You underestimate the marketing scum: just as with all the sites with the FB logo, of occulus will require you to have FB account with your real name
I am just hoping for a Scanners future.... (Score:2)
As long as the dumb people heads explode, this can only become a very good thing for the world.
Pure Evil (Score:2)
It would have been nicer if it had help from a company that isnt pure evil.
not buying it (Score:1)
Ridiculous VR headgear (Score:2)
Wrong headline. (Score:3)
The headline should read: How Facebook and Oculus are Astroturfing to Make You Think it Could Be a Great Combination
Facebook and supply chain management (Score:2)
The headwear already famously suffered from a supply chain issue...
And Facebook was their choice to help with this? Facebook might be very good at some things but supply chain management isn't exactly in their wheelhouse. Facebook could provide the deep pockets to deal with problems but manufacturing isn't their thing.
The bit that made me laugh was an interview with a board member I heard recently on NPR where he said something (paraphrasing here) like "we thought long and hard about this acquisition". They were offered $2 billion for a company not worth a fraction of t
facebook is bad for oculus (Score:4, Informative)
Ways in which this might turn out OK (Score:2)
The thing that I'm hoping for is that this was a panic buy because somebody at Facebook got spooked that a killer rival VR social app might render FB gradually irrelevant. So the purchase was a defensive move only, to make sure that they leading VR hardware comes from their own house and can't be used to undercut them. I think it's quite possible they didn't have any concrete social VR application in mind. This would not be a strange move for a rich and paranoid company. I'll call this the "playing defense"
The big looser is... (Score:1)
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Hypocrite! (Score:1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
"it's a really bad idea... I have a negative opinion about that"
Well, I don't hear him complaining about getting 2 billion bucks from fb.
Gamers need to choose better their heroes (Score:1)
Check Palmer vomiting PR words at reddit (http://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/21cy9n/the_future_of_vr/) or Carmack defending datamining practices (because Amazon recomendations are so awesome) and disregarding privacy because it is oh so inconvenient (http://t.co/89l2U2oHrz).
Those people are businessmen, not heroes of the people. They are here to make the quick buck.
Screwed the pooch (Score:2)
There's no product, there's no users, there's no market share and FB isn't a gaming company.
Now, throw in FB wanting to grab, categorize and sell everything about users and having the potential to capture background conversations and recognize everyone in the room... now the corporate scab of personal information has jacked it up a notch... so, even of FB can get past the first 4 obstacles, sorry, I'm not letting it in m
Damn clickbait (Score:2)
Why does Slashdot post such nonsense? To get suckers like me to reply I guess. Google buying Android was not in the least bit strange. The way Google makes money is adverts on web searching. People start to search web on mobile phones. Microsoft Windows phones would put their rival Bing as the default search engine. Google is looking to protect its core market.
Oculus and Facebook makes no sense at all. Microsoft and the Kinect makes sense as it's a controller they can use with their XBox. Oculus and EA, Val
Doesn't matter (Score:2)
Facebook is not a trustworthy company. Oculus being owned by Facebook means that, as far as I'm concerned, Oculus Rift no longer exists at all. It may end up being a commercial success, but that doesn't make the situation any better for me, personally. It still doesn't get VR in my own hands.
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Dome kind of Goatse mirror?
Accept no substitutes!!!
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It feels like Zuck has so much money to spend that he thought he'd get himself an expensive new toy.
That is all it feels to me too.