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Magic Leap, a Startup That Has Raised Over $2.3 Billion, Has Sold Just 6,000 Units of Its $2,300 VR Headset -- Far Below 1 Million Units Its CEO Initially Hoped (techcrunch.com) 115

Posted by msmash from the surprise-surprise dept.
Magic Leap just announced that they're in the midst of closing a Series E round of funding, but it sounds like they're going to have to clinch that investment with some pretty troubling sales numbers for their only device on the market. From a report: The Information is reporting [paywalled] that Magic Leap managed to sell just 6,000 units of its $2,300 Magic Leap One headset in its first six months on sale, a figure made worse by CEO Rony Abovitz's internal claims that he wanted the startup to sell at least one million units of the device in the first year, a goal the report states he was later convinced to rethink -- Abovitz later projected the company would sell 100,000 units in the first year. The report adds that Magic Leap's second-generation VR headset is "years away from launch" and the startup recently laid off dozens of employees. Magic Leaps counts Google, VC firm Andreessen Horowitz, Alibaba, Qualcomm, AT&T, Japan's NTT Docomo, and the government of Saudi Arabia among its investors.

Further reading: Magic Leap Finally Demoed Its Headset And It Is 'Disappointing'; Magic Leap is a Tragic Heap, Says Oculus Cofounder; Oculus CTO Carmack Downplays Consumer AR, Calls Magic Leap Overhyped; and The Magic Leap Con.
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Magic Leap, a Startup That Has Raised Over $2.3 Billion, Has Sold Just 6,000 Units of Its $2,300 VR Headset -- Far Below 1 Milli More

Magic Leap, a Startup That Has Raised Over $2.3 Billion, Has Sold Just 6,000 Units of Its $2,300 VR Headset -- Far Below 1 Milli

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  • Haha (Score:4, Funny)

    by ArchieBunker ( 132337 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @03:56PM (#59492600)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    • Re:Haha (Score:4, Informative)

      by im_thatoneguy ( 819432 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:37PM (#59492770)

      Who could have possibly seen this coming!? They were clearly super legit!

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

      • The CEO told them he hoped that the business might bring in $2 billion in revenue.
        They bought in at a price appropriate for a company that already was consistently bringing in $2 billion or more every year.

        It's kinda like Tesla. The stock is priced as if they have selling 15 million cars per year. Maybe that will happen 20 years from now, but right now they are selling thousands of cars, not millions. 20 years from now, Tesla stock might be worth as much as people are laying for it today - if management

        • Except Tesla is bringing in $7B/quarter in Revenue and increasing that revenue about 40% year over year.

          Honda is making about $35B/quarter. If they keep their current growth that's only 5 years to catch Honda, not 20. And as battery prices drop if they can keep their margins, they'll be turning a net profit much higher than that very soon.

          And that's all ignoring the tech. Can they deliver FSD? That will completely rewrite the company valuation. Can they lower the price of their solar roofs? That will

          • Tesla may at some point make money like Honda does.
            If so, the Telsa stock would still be overpriced. The current stock price is higher than Honda.

            Also, probably Honda will continue to do what it has always done - grow. The assumption that it probably will is built into Honda's price. Yet Tesla is still STILL more expensive.

            Tesla might turn out to be a great company. It's very difficult to argue its not way overpriced, though - the price is as if Tesla were already the world's largest car company, when I f

            • Tesla may at some point make money like Honda does.
              If so, the Telsa stock would still be overpriced.

              Those statements show you have no idea what the stock price is related to. It has nothing to do with *current* business, it has to do with *future* business. This is why stock prices spike up after a company gets a fine or spike down when something completely unrelated to the company happens, or when Musk opens his mouth.

              The stock price of Tesla does not reflect profits today. It reflects possibilities of that company in that industry under that leadership. Honda made $5bn last year in profit. Yet given the

        • It's kinda like Tesla.

          If "kinda" means the same thing as "totally the fucking opposite of," then sure.

          • Both stocks are priced as if what the leadership HOPES might happen, will definitely happen. Without any expensive problems along the way.

            With both companies, you're making an even-money bet that you flip six heads in a row. It COULD happen. It would be a good bet at 1/64th the price.

            • That's not how the stock market works.
              The price is based on how many people think
              that they can make a profit if they buy now and sell in a year.

  • Hope the CEO Knows better than to... (Score:3)

    by cayenne8 ( 626475 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @03:59PM (#59492608) Homepage Journal

    Magic Leaps counts ..... the government of Saudi Arabia among its investors.

    Man, I hope the CEO knows better than to fly over Istanbul, Turkey for a visit at the Saudi Embassy for a conference.

    :O

    • The Saudi government has a long history of terrible investments that don't pan out and they probably don't care anyways. When you can just pump more money of the ground you tend not to be very careful with how you spend it.

      • When you can just pump more money of the ground you tend not to be very careful with how you spend it.

        I have to admit, one VERY compelling thing about moving from oil to greener energy, means cutting off that cashflow to that part of the world that they get from oit.

        At that point, I think most of the rest of the world can just start ignoring them and letting them do what they wish to each other, and just get out of all that mess.

        Hell, if they started promoting the 'green deal' in that manner they might g

        • When you can just pump more money of the ground you tend not to be very careful with how you spend it.

          I have to admit, one VERY compelling thing about moving from oil to greener energy, means cutting off that cashflow to that part of the world that they get from oit.

          Hear, hear! Rendering the Middle East - Saudi Arabia, in particular - irrelevant to the world's power struggle would be a significant step towards a less violent world.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by aliquis ( 678370 )

          At that point, I think most of the rest of the world can just start ignoring them and letting them do what they wish to each other, and just get out of all that mess.

          That's not happening as they are all let into Europe and typically ends up about here (Sweden.)

        • At that point, I think most of the rest of the world can just start ignoring them and letting them do what they wish to each other, and just get out of all that mess.

          And nearly half a billion mostly-still-desperate people will go "quietly in the night," somehow magically no longer susceptible to being led by the [usual range of lying scoundrels] found anywhere, and no longer influencing or traveling to other regions. Besides which, those countries currently enjoying petroleum exportation aren't the ones producing waves of refugees but they sure will be when their oil-fueled economies collapse

        • The problem is the other half of problem is the US military and arms manufacturers. I doubt they will allow any sort of peace to be maintained, it just isn't in their business/funding interests.

        • I have said that massive investment in green and nuclear is the best way of choking Islamism to death for years. That and getting Muslim men laid, so send in the whore army.

          On the other hand much of the Lithium for batteries are in Banana republics which open another can of worms.

  • i wonder what shorts taste like (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    https://slashdot.org/comments.... [slashdot.org]

    what is it with irrational exuberance for stupid nerdy toys? It's a novelty. Always was, always will be.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      This is Slashdot, always been irrational. Though 5 years ago it was irrational support for anything, now it's irrational hatred for anything.
  • Who decided we all need VR headsets, goggles or anything VR/AR/Whatever-R?

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by jellomizer ( 103300 )

      VR and 3d Displays is one of those technologies that look good on paper, but in real life rarely pan out.

      For most games, we actually gain extra enjoyment with the feeling of safety being behind a screen.

      There is a VR demo out there where you are walking on a plank on top of a building. The people who do this actually get real fear because the experience is too real for them. While doing this on screen you may get some excitement but the actual fear isn't there.
      For a quick game you will get a quick rush. F

      • Re:Why? Why?! WHY OH DEAR GOD WHY?! (Score:5, Funny)

        by Strill ( 6019874 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:32PM (#59492754)

        VR is not "too much" immersion. It's all relative. Did you know that when movies first came out, when there was a scene with a cowboy shooting a gun, audience members would pull out their guns and shoot at the screen? Obviously movies are way too immersive for people to enjoy. We should just read books.

        • Re:Why? Why?! WHY OH DEAR GOD WHY?! (Score:5, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:46PM (#59492824)

          Did you know that when movies first came out, when there was a scene with a cowboy shooting a gun, audience members would pull out their guns and shoot at the screen? Obviously movies are way too immersive for people to enjoy. We should just read books.

          Instructions no clear enough, I shot my book.

        • I had a similar experience the first time I read the works of Anaïs Nin.

        • Your point about it being relative and personal acclimatization is good, but it still could be true that there is such a thing as too much immersion, as a practical matter. The market as it exists is the market as it exists, and many factors determine whether 3D immersion is such a positive things as to be worth thousands of dollars for the hardware.

          I actually watched the movie The Martian in 3D and I think that format decreased relative to what watching a 2D version would have been. It just made me a lit

      • For most games, we actually gain extra enjoyment with the feeling of safety being behind a screen.

        Possibly. On the other hand, I'd dearly love some way to get peripheral vision in my games. Field of view tends toward tunnel-vision in every first-person computer game I've ever played....

      • I've done the plank demo, and it is pretty intense. I've been thinking about getting a Rift, but I'm not sure I want life-size deathclaws getting in my face.

      • For most games, we actually gain extra enjoyment with the feeling of safety being behind a screen.

        Sorry but this is an absolutely stupid statement. Gaming has for the best part of 30 years been an exercise in enhanced realism and immersiveness, with some of the best selling titles being the ones that excel in both. Games are a form of entertainment, and people are entertained in different ways. Just because you don't like scary movies doesn't mean there aren't those people out there who actively go out of their way to get excitement.

        There is a VR demo out there where you are walking on a plank on top of a building. The people who do this actually get real fear because the experience is too real for them. While doing this on screen you may get some excitement but the actual fear isn't there.

        That's not a VR demo, that's one of the scenes from a game called "Face

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ljw1004 ( 764174 )

        For most games, we actually gain extra enjoyment with the feeling of safety being behind a screen... For prolong gaming you will probably PTSD.

        I've spend hundreds of hours in VR, playing music games and Minecraft especially. I've not had much time to play video games (aged 45, young kids, demanding job) but what time I had, I preferred to spend it in VR. The games I like are ones that don't cause PTSD, maybe for the reasons you describe.

        I agree with your premise "the current crop of violent scary games will be too immersive for many people in VR". You concluded that VR wouldn't work. Another conclusion is that the kind of games we play will change

    • Re:Why? Why?! WHY OH DEAR GOD WHY?! (Score:4, Interesting)

      by alvinrod ( 889928 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:38PM (#59492776)
      No one did, but the current market for screens (televisions, tablets, phones, etc.) is fairly well established and hard to break into and there's a question if you'd even want to at all because some parts of that market are running on razor thin margins for most of the players that getting filthy rich is a pipe dream even if you're already in the market.

      So someone comes along and thinks that rather than trying to compete with the 800 lb. gorillas on their own turf that it would be much easier to invent an entirely new product category where not only is there no incumbent advantage, but a first mover might even be able to become an 800 lb. gorilla in their own right, if not at least a 250 lb. gorilla that might make for an attractive acquisition.

      Unfortunately in this case the market decided that they really didn't need VR headsets, etc. and the idea doesn't pan out. But sometimes the world decides that it does need your page rank algorithm, your portable digital music player, or whatever crazy product you've come up with and you wind up looking like a freaking genius for being so brilliant.

      I think there's a market for a million high-quality VR headsets, but just not when they cost $2,300 a piece. There are plenty of people that figure out how to become an industry giant not because they've made a new and transformative product, but because they figured out how to make or improve some existing product at significantly lower costs. I'll be that they'd have easily sold a million units if each headset only cost $300.
      • My first *R experience was a full room video game shooter thing about 30 years ago. Not a chance in hell I'll ever remember the name. So the tech is at least that old and probably older. It's been released and failed several times since then. It's not new. People obviously don't like it. I don't get why they keep trying to sell this stuff to consumers. I can see non-consumer uses but none for the typical pedestrian on the street. Does not compute! Bzzzzt!
        • I guarantee that the full room video game shooter from 30 years ago cost a hell of a lot more than $2,300. I recall seeing a few things over the years that l suspect are about the same idea. There was one I saw at a mall probably over 15 years ago and they wanted $10 just for 15 minutes on play. I'd probably look at that kind of proposition today as a waste of money even though I've spent more than $10 on a drink at a bar before.

          The problem isn't that the technology is bad or that people don't want it. T

        • Re: Why? Why?! WHY OH DEAR GOD WHY?! (Score:4, Informative)

          by barc0001 ( 173002 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @05:41PM (#59493026)

          The tech does get better over time and more immersive. I too tried a VR thing in the early 90s that was a hang-glider simulation, it was fuzzy and the headset was enormous but it did convey the feeling of "being there". Fast forward to last year and I tried out a friend's Vive. It was 100x better than the experience I had in the 90s, and fixed 95% of the problems with the hardware bulk. The experience was compelling enough that I ended up buying one as well. I use it a couple hours a week, mostly playing Beat Saber, Arizona Sunshine and a few other games.

          That said there's still loads of room for improvement. The 1st gen Vive I have distributes all the weight to the front of your skull and holds it there with glorified elastic bands, having to put on headphones afterward and not tangle them is a bit of a hassle when putting the visor on or taking it off, the resolution could be a bit better - and most of all - I wear glasses so managing to jam them in the visor and have them sit comfortably and usably is a bit of a black art. That is something that is a problem for a lot of people and I'm surprised it hasn't been addressed with a bigger blackout foam region on the headsets. All it would take is an extra inch on each side and even aviator style frames would fit without a problem. The weight problem, band problem and headphone problem all seem to be improved with the Valve Index, but I'm not in a position to drop that much on an upgrade just yet. Will have to wait for the price to come down.

          Is VR for everyone? Probably not. Does it have a niche? Yes.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by imidan ( 559239 )

            I'd like to have a VR setup for gaming, but I didn't buy the first gen oculus or vive because I wanted the hardware to mature a little before I got one. For gaming, I'm certainly not paying $2,300 for a VR headset. I rebuilt my main desktop during the summer, and the whole machine didn't cost that much.

            I've been working with several groups that do visualization of science data in VR, and I'd also consider buying VR gear to work in that area, but, again, not for that much money. I'm not 100% convinced that V

            • $2300 is way overpriced for VR. High-quality AR - where it projects onto a clear visor - is much more expensive, but good VR systems can be had for $300-$500, depending on sales and the exact setup you want. Even the bleeding-edge, top-of-the-line nothing-takes-full-advantage-of-this-hardware-yet commercial VR is usually under $1000.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by imidan ( 559239 )

                I spent a little time at a conference with a NASA group that was using the Microsoft AR (HoloLens) to place themselves on the Martian surface to help them make decisions about how to route the Mars rovers (or rover, I guess... this was Opportunity, when it was still going). They let us have a go at using the gear to move around on Mars, which was fun.

                As I said, I'm interested in potential research applications of VR and AR. Someone else in this thread mentioned that Vive has some newer hardware out now, so

            • Not sure where you're getting the $2300 price tag, my Vive bundle cost $800 CDN. You could probably find one used for a few hundred less from someone else who upgraded - though if you go that route you'd want to get the replacement kit for the foam cushions (don't want to be sticking someone else's face sweat on yours...).
              A new Vive Cosmos bundle is around $950 CDN and has higher spec than what I've got, so once you get the headset, and as long as your machine meets the spec, you're good to go. I

              • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

                by Anonymous Coward

                Not sure where you're getting the $2300 price tag

                Perhaps from the *title* of this thread?

                I remember folks not reading the article, or even the summary, of threads they post in. Now it seems even the title isn't being read before posting.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by imidan ( 559239 )
                Yeah, not $2,300 for the Vive, but for the Magic Leap. My machine is up to spec these days for the Vive, including the video card. I haven't been following Vive's improvements recently, so maybe I'll take another look. Thanks.

    • Re:Why? Why?! Even geeks don't want it. (Score:4, Funny)

      by flyingfsck ( 986395 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @05:23PM (#59492970)
      The lack of sales restored some of my faith in humanity.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      It is an ongoing mental issue with some people. Whenever this hype fails again, they creep away for a decade or so and then they try again, never realizing that the technology is _still_ not mature in any way and, more importantly, that it still does not have any real mainstream application.

    • Who decided we all need VR headsets

      Nerds, geeks, and people who actually want the technology we have been fantasizing over while reading sci-fi novels like Ready Player One to succeed. We're getting there too. It's really starting to get to the point where there's two kinds of people in the world: Those people who think VR/AR is a gimmick, and those people who've actually used it.

      • Uh so you are looking forward to living in a digitally driven dystopian society as seen in Ready Player One? I read it. I saw it. That's as close as I'd ever want to get to it. Or maybe I'm seeing this wrong. Do you think the world is already so horrible that escaping into a giant video game 24x7 is the only way out? This is baffling.

        • To many people the world of Ready Player One was utopian rather than dystopian. Hand in your geek card. Right now.

        • Uh so you are looking forward to living in a digitally driven dystopian society as seen in Ready Player One? I read it. I saw it. That's as close as I'd ever want to get to it.

          Look I hate Trump as much as the ... wait ... no we are talking about VR here, why is it that you completely ignored my point about a futuristic product and took the entire discussion in the direction of politics and socioeconomics not at all related to the capabilities of a VR system in that book?

          Do you think the world is already so horrible that escaping into a giant video game 24x7 is the only way out?

          Do you think the world is so horrible that you actively ignore it while arguing here on the internet with a complete stranger? Maybe the world is so horrible that you would prefer to sit down in front of Netflix.

          Y

          • I went to RPO because you brought it up. Anyway, if such a technology did exist and was easily available to the average consumer I think it would lead to a great many people "plugging in and tuning out". There have already been a few public cases of people literally dying at their keyboards, leaving their infants unfed, or divorcing over in-game events. Now give them a 24x7 world that takes over all their senses and provides video game quality super hero powers and tell me we're not getting a step closer

        • Do you think the world is already so horrible that escaping into a giant video game 24x7 is the only way out?

          People do that now, with normal computers and monitors, VR is not going to change that. I know a few people that live in front of their computers, the only reason they go to work is because they need to pay bills, so that the rest of the time they can sit behind their computers. What difference would it make if they used VR to do the exact same thing?

          • Yes, I did note that's happening now. My point is that it will only get much worse if we had ready player one quality world instead of keyboard and mouse to escape with. A full immersive experience would be far more addictive to far more people than the flat keyboard/mouse/monitor experience available today. Although now that I think about it, the entire digital world would likely turn into a planet sized whore house given what we saw happen in Second Life. At least the sex crimes unit at the local PD c
      • You sound like those 3D TV pundits from a decade or so ago. Always must be people just haven't tried it, can't possibly be the tech just aint there yet.
  • I salute you bro... 2.3 Billion? WE are in sock-puppet territory with these valuations. Definitely time to get short the entire S&P, because there is waaaay too much stupid money sloshing around.

  • They're doing it wrong! (Score:4, Funny)

    by leonbev ( 111395 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:09PM (#59492656) Journal

    If the dot bomb boom taught us anything, it's that you're supposed to artificially jack up your user counts by basically giving the product away during your initial seed rounds.

    If they sold these things for $299 (who cares if they actually cost $3,000 to make... you're a Silicon Valley startup, biznitch!), they would probably have over 100,000 users by now. THEN you can come up with a scam for extracting profits from those users for your Series E funding, dummies.

    • I want to build a next-generation game console on magic technology, with a major feature set to appeal to both modern and retro enthusiasts--including modern- and retro-style programming.

      I've been speccing it out to compete with modern consoles in its modern mode, but at around $100 price point.

      You see all kinds of people trying to break into the game console market. It's not just that they're unknowns; it's that they're unknowns with no game library and a $700 device that basically runs Linux and has

    • The current crop of Unicorns are scams (Score:5, Interesting)

      by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:39PM (#59492786)
      There's two scams at play:

      1. Pension raiding. This one's a bit convoluted. Public pensions are being allowed to buy into these high risk tech companies (Uber, Lyft, Magic Leap, etc). They promise high rates of return but are high risk. Private investors pump them up to get the Pensions, which are run by... wait for it... private investors... to invest. When they collapse fast moving private investors will bail leaving slow moving public pensions holding the bag. The tax payer then steps in to guarantee the Pensions, or not. It doesn't really matter to the private investor who just got either a ton of pension money or a ton of taxpayer money. They win, we lose.

      2. 2008 style Credit Default Swaps. So after 2008 laws were put in place to prevent banks from taking a bunch of bad loans and packaging them up into a phony "investment". Those laws were repealed between 2016-2018 (the astute can guess how/why). But it would attract too much attention for this kind of insanely risky investment to be done with mortgages again, so they're doing it with business loans. Expect 2008 2, Electric Boogaloo to be 1000x worse, BTW.

      This isn't like the .com boom when the super rich opened up their coffers from fear of losing out on the next big thing. These are nasty, nasty scams being perpetrated at an insane level. If we had a functioning gov't this crap wouldn't be allowed. We don't. The next crash is going to suuuuuuuck.
    • You're right about the price point. I think they're still in "dev kit" mode and also selling to business users. The painful reality about the $2300 price is that was already subsidized by the VC money and is selling the device at a loss as you advocate at the $299 point. Perhaps they're pricing it high during this phase to preserve the future opportunity to sell it at scale at a lower price when there might also be content available.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DogDude ( 805747 )
      That's why real estate is so high. There's nowhere else to invest money in the US these days. Nobody makes anything any more except for "apps".
  • The name, "Magic Leap". Did that fool people?

    What if a company was named, "You will get rich!" Do people not think deeply or do research before they invest?

    • It was originally going to be named "Magic Leap of Faith", but the evangelicals claimed first dibs

    • If their only revenue is the ~$14 million from headset sales, I think that "Magic Leap" may refer to investors staging a reenactment of Black Tuesday.

  • VR is fucking retarded (Score:2, Insightful)

    by geek ( 5680 )

    It's the dumbest shit since 3D TV sets. The whole fad needs to die.

    • Re:VR is fucking retarded (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Strill ( 6019874 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @04:27PM (#59492734)

      If you're comparing VR to 3D TVs, you obviously have never actually tried it.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Scutter ( 18425 )

        Properly-done VR is amazing. And not that crappy cardboard thing you put your phone into that just spreads a flat image over two lenses, but real 3D VR with full immersion. If they ever manage to get the hardware compact enough, it has unlimited potential.

      • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

        by geek ( 5680 )

        What part of that was a comparison you fucking idiot?

      • Tried it plenty of times, They are both half baked fads at this point. 3D TV's are dead, VR still has a chance if they can improve it enough before the Fad factor wears off again.

      • I believe he/she is only comparing the fad-ness of the two.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Nidi62 ( 1525137 )

      It's the dumbest shit since 3D TV sets. The whole fad needs to die.

      I think we will get to VR eventually, but it will be a while. It'll be mostly useful for situations where the user can be static, such as racing games or flight sims. Immersive movies would be amazing though. Imagine a VR versions of the opening scene to Saving Private Ryan, hearing bullets cracking past your head and looking around and seeing people drop everywhere, or riding a chariot down the streets of ancient Rome, or sitting inside a minisub hovering over the wreck of the Titanic.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Mashiki ( 184564 )

        Some of that stuff has already been tried, besides the serious problems that the audience has(nausea, vomiting, headaches, disorientation), the outlay costs are insanely expensive and outside of niche experiments they've never caught on.

        • besides the serious problems that the audience has

          *had*. Early VR suffered from latency and frame rate issues. These days unless you actively suffer from motion sickness in real life VR is perfectly fine. In my case I can't stand being on a boat, yet I have no problem flying a spaceship or walking around in VR. Go figure.

          the outlay costs are insanely expensive

          I actually think my VR headset is about the cheapest component in my gaming machine. Certainly it cost less than my GPU, CPU, Memory, and mo... actually my motherboard was cheaper. It's cheaper than my monitor though.
          If you think VR is "in

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Mashiki ( 184564 )

            *had*. Early VR suffered from latency and frame rate issues.

            *has* some of the biggest complaints from users are still the same problems from 20 years ago.

            If you think VR is "insanely expensive" you have no business playing games. Hell I spent more on a 3D accellerator in 1997 than I did on my current headset.

            No it's insanely expensive. AR headsets are on the cheapish side rolling at only a mere $200-600 still, nearly all VR headsets on the market are over $500 and I just built a middling rig for $500 video card, mobo, CPU and ram.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

        It'll be mostly useful for situations where the user can be static, such as racing games or flight sims

        VR is not even useful for those - because unless you calibrate it perfectly, if you're trying to reach for a switch or lever or yoke, it's not going to be in the right place. People who try end up with very amusing YouTube videos of someone flailing trying to feel for one of the controls because the system isn't properly calibrated in space.

        It's only good if you're sitting on the couch with a controller i

    • It's AR not VR. And that's actually part of the problem. AR is the future... some day. Just not with Magic Leap's tech.

    • I played a racing sim with the Oculus and the steering wheel/pedal combo which was fun. A really strange sensation to be sitting in a chair and feel like you're moving in a car.

    • +1. Most folks spend their TV watching time mostly staring at their phones and only half tuning into the TV. Any sort of headset prevents the most common use model and will fail. Sure there will be niche industry and fanboi applications, but expect near zero longer term adoption rates among the masses.

      • +1. Most folks spend their TV watching time mostly staring at their phones and only half tuning into the TV. Any sort of headset prevents the most common use model and will fail.

        So based on what you just said, console gaming has failed. Using PCs has failed. Netflix and chill has failed.
        Is your view of most folks real or are you trolling. Do you not know any ... people?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by caseih ( 160668 )

      Have a Vive, and it's an amazing tool for architecture and engineering design. So far we've modeled three different houses and various renovations in VR for homeowners before anything gets touched. It's good enough to give you a real good sense of the final product. Light switches in the wrong place, window is too low, don't want that cupboard there, etc. After I renovated my kitchen, it was exactly as I expected and planned, as I'd seen in VR many times. What was guessing before with tape on the floor

  • LOL. "Series E funding" means "Dad, I need some more money to make rent this month."

  • More a Wile E. Coyote Leap.

  • Didn't anyone ever tell you to LOOK before you leap?

  • Maybe they should try advertising it?
    I know this is a little old school, but maybe if they told people what it was and how to use it more people would be interested in dropping $2000+ on the thing?

    I don't know, just spitballing here.

  • .. this title too short?

  • The market is limited to those who are well-heeled enough to plop down $2,300 for a toy, who would also be interested in this product.

    There area apparently at least 6000 people in that set. I have no idea what was in the pipe from which they dreamed up the delusion that that set contains millions, but it was no doubt the Really Good Stuff.

  • And I missed it?

    I think 6000 initial sales for a $2K entertainment item with very little media for it is doing pretty good.

  • When the prices come down to $100 to $200, then it might take off. But its just too costly, because you have to also update your Rig and Graphics Card.
    So the costs start going up fast.
    Soon every one will update their Rig and graphics cards independently of the VR and when Xbox and PlayStation start supporting these devices then it will start to gain traction.
    And when the game companies start putting out Call of Duty VR then it will take off.

    Another issue with VR is that people like to do other real world th

  • IMO, for VR as we know it to gain mass, 'middle-class appliance acceptance' a few things need to happen first:

    1. The displays simply need to get better. On my Oculus Rift headset (which I dropped about 800 bucks for) I have been unable to get past the 'screen door' effect (where you see the screen before you see the VR world if that makes any sense). VR headset makers simply can't skimp on the screen, at all. I would gladly pay more for a headset that has the pixel density required to not be able to see
  • I have never imagined myself using VR devices, as currently conceived and implemented, for more than a few minutes at a time. They are bulky, clumsy, uncomfortable, inconvenient, and just a pain in the neck - quite literally for most normal necks. For those of you familiar with the movie "Brainstorm": if VR devices are ever developed and manufactured as in this movie - it wasn't strictly about VR, but you know what I mean - at a reasonable price, they will probably create a market of billions. As long as th

  • AR will NOT work (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Cyberax ( 705495 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @06:59PM (#59493252)
    I said it multiple times. I’m going to say it again here.

    No AR system will work until there’s a technology that can precisisly manipulate the phase of light. This is needed to make AR objects blend with real ones.

    Without it you basically can have a glorified HUD, stuck in one focal plane. You can play tricks, like having two moveable focal planes but these are just that - tricks.

    • No AR system will work until there’s a technology that can precisisly manipulate the phase of light.

      Nothing about the words "AR" state that it needs to create a perfectly manipulated 3D space. A glorified HUD *is* a form of AR.

  • AR, not VR (Score:3)

    by MtHuurne ( 602934 ) on Friday December 06, 2019 @07:09PM (#59493276) Homepage

    Their headset projects an image on top of what you normally see, so that makes it AR instead of VR. Which only makes it harder to sell a lot of units, since there aren't many compelling AR applications (yet?).

    When Magic Leap was shrouded in mystery, they got a lot of press, in part because of the huge sums of money they raised. But once people got hands-on experience with their headset, the hype faded as the performance didn't live up to expectations. Maybe it will be great a few years from now, but it's unreasonable to expect millions of people to play the role of the early adopter that sinks a lot of money into a new technology that's not quite ready.

  • Sign me up, I'll take 2 of them!

  • I was excited by gesture based navigation when MagicLeap first demonstrated its augmentation in apps and I was starry-eyed an OS would integrate the method. Frickin' Minority Report was nearly a decade old by that point. I needed that augmentation to enhance desktop workspace habits with which I aspired to integrate physical working surfaces, doggone it. But NoOOOO...Magic Leap's year to year announcements were dismaying from its inception...the only serious indication of immersive paradigms was FaceBook's

  • ...but there's no way I'd shell out $2300 for one.

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