4 ms·

> It has so much economic potential that it hurts not being in the space already (working on that though) As someone not familiar with the area, could you elab

by mayank 9y ago

> It has so much economic potential that it hurts not being in the space already (working on that though) As someone not familiar with the area, could you elaborate on some examples of what you think the economic potential is? To an outsider like me, being able to overlay virtual objects on a scene seems like a nice curiosity, not particularly an engine for commerce. Edit: specifically, I was curious about areas where AR offers a (financially) meaningful advantage over traditional HUDs (for example).

gpsx 9y ago
To me the benefit of AR is not just overlaying virtual objects on the physical world but specifically highlighting real objects in your field of view. Granted, this does just come down to placing a virtual object on the physical world. I can give a specific example that is perhaps of not so great financial advantage, but I think this kind of thing will be useful - using AR to give you directions to build IKEA furniture. You are sitting in front of a pile of materials and the AR will tell you to put _this_ bolt (highlighted) in _this_ hole in _this_ piece of wood. You would not have directions on a piece of paper but rather using the actual objects.
- tinco 9y ago
  I feel the key AR advantage will be that we don't have to spend half our time glancing down on tiny rectangles anymore. The Oculus is already less than an order of magnitude away from competing with regular LCD panels. Google glass and maybe that magic leap thing give us hints that it will eventually happen for mobile. No more displays, now that's something I would pay for.
  - JKCalhoun 9y ago
    I would rather no-more-displays by way of voice command. If Siri advanced enough, I would love to leave my phone at home and bring only my Apple watch.
  - goatlover 9y ago
    Problem is that not everyone will want to wear something over their eyes on a regular basis if they don't need to.
    - sjg007 9y ago
      It'll be glasses then contacts.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- empath75 9y ago
  Do you think that's plausible with ar kit?
pryelluw 9y ago
Its to the smartphone what television was to radio. Adds a whole new dimension of information delivery. That's the financial advantage.
- Nullabillity 9y ago
  Huh? The smartphone added portability and (most importantly) two-way communication. AR adds... distraction, I guess?
Impossible 9y ago
One of the financial uses for AR is the ability to show a user how a product will fit in their life before they've purchased it. This has a lot of potential for any large purchases that need to fit in your home (furniture, appliances, renovations, TVs, etc.), and once we have access to high quality full body tracking it could be applied to fashion as well. Lowe's innovation lab is doing a lot of this already on a variety of different devices for both at home and in store (https://blogs.windows.com/devices/2016/03/18/microsoft-hololens-and-lowes-working-to-redefine-your-next-home-renovation/ https://blogs.windows.com/devices/2016/03/18/microsoft-holol...). Beyond that, with AR you can make certain classes of digital goods and marketing "exist" in the real world. The margins for AR merchandise will be significantly higher than real physical merch, although I'm guessing the prices will be a lot lower. Selling virtual items that you can see in real life opens up a lot of cool and fantastic options as well as more mundane stuff or a mix between the two. If AR becomes ubiquitous it gives big tech companies a lot of data that no one currently has. Specifically you would have a detailed, 3D map\point cloud of most of the real world at various points in time. You could build an awesome developer platform on this, use it for VR tourism, simulation, license it to film or games producers, etc. There are already many use cases for industry and enterprise customers when it comes to training and data overlays for workers. A boring, but lucrative use case happens when resolution and tracking get good enough and assuming the form factor gets to eye glass size. AR could potentially replaces all conventional screens and be more comfortable to use than smartphones. Note I'm using AR more broadly and including Google Glass\HUD style stuff, ARKit\Vuforia SmartPhone AR, and Hololens or Magic Leap style MR or "holograms".
FullMtlAlcoholc 9y ago
I think you're missing a more important use case, namely, being able to layer contextual information over objects in your field of vision. Use cases in industry abound. On a trip to the doctor's office, your physician can overlay your medical file and get pertinent information about you. If you are a politician holding a fundraising dinner, AR + facial recognition will supply you with the biographical information, social media profiles, voting records, donation history, etc. of the people in the room allow you to schmooze ever so effortlessly and ever more efficiently. AR tailor made for athletes could do a number of physiological measurements like heart rate, VO2, etc. (with wearables or implanted sensors) that could combine to produce some sort of stamina bar, allowing for more effective substitution patterns. An activity like paintball can will feel closer to an actual military engagement or a video game if a minimap that includes your teammate's location will be in the corner of your vision. The Terminator franchise did a great job of showing it's utility by giving Arnold "Terminator vision" in shots from his POV. Video games also make extensive use of OSD. A 1st person shooter's OSD really shows the advantages of AR. Advances in computer vision and networked IoT devices will be a multiplier for AR's utility. Imagine an app that overlays your vision with the mathematical patterns of nature: illustrating the Fibonacci sequence in the leaves, petals and seeds of plants or in the way tree branches form and split. It could highlight all of the phenomenon that exhibit golden ratios. It could show the equations of motion for objects moving or spinning in your field of view or detail the biomechanics of the elegant dancers of the Bolshoi ballet. In a way, you get to experience what the mind of a Leonardo Da Vince or John Nash might be like, like you are able to get an insight into the mind of a genius.
- lioeters 9y ago
  That was an insightful comment, thank you. Like a few others in the thread, I was skeptical of AR's practical potential - the demos/apps I've seen so far felt like "a solution in search of a problem" - but your examples and concise summary helped me to imagine the range of possibilities. The ability to "layer contextual information over objects in your field of vision".. I see, that is the crux of it, to further integrate the "real world", the sensory experience of a person, with the global web of information and computing. Great examples you gave of industries that could utilize this, in healthcare, political/social/interpersonal sphere, athletic or intellectual/educational/artistic uses. It conjures a vision of near future where people enhanced with AR - or maybe "augmented senses" - would have distinct advantages over people without access to such layers of contextual information.

by mayank 9y ago

gpsx 9y ago

To me the benefit of AR is not just overlaying virtual objects on the physical world but specifically highlighting real objects in your field of view. Granted, this does just come down to placing a virtual object on the physical world. I can give a specific example that is perhaps of not so great financial advantage, but I think this kind of thing will be useful - using AR to give you directions to build IKEA furniture. You are sitting in front of a pile of materials and the AR will tell you to put _this_ bolt (highlighted) in _this_ hole in _this_ piece of wood. You would not have directions on a piece of paper but rather using the actual objects.

tinco 9y ago
I feel the key AR advantage will be that we don't have to spend half our time glancing down on tiny rectangles anymore. The Oculus is already less than an order of magnitude away from competing with regular LCD panels. Google glass and maybe that magic leap thing give us hints that it will eventually happen for mobile. No more displays, now that's something I would pay for.
- JKCalhoun 9y ago
  I would rather no-more-displays by way of voice command. If Siri advanced enough, I would love to leave my phone at home and bring only my Apple watch.
- goatlover 9y ago
  Problem is that not everyone will want to wear something over their eyes on a regular basis if they don't need to.
  - sjg007 9y ago
    It'll be glasses then contacts.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
empath75 9y ago
Do you think that's plausible with ar kit?

pryelluw 9y ago

Its to the smartphone what television was to radio. Adds a whole new dimension of information delivery. That's the financial advantage.

Nullabillity 9y ago
Huh? The smartphone added portability and (most importantly) two-way communication. AR adds... distraction, I guess?

Impossible 9y ago

One of the financial uses for AR is the ability to show a user how a product will fit in their life before they've purchased it. This has a lot of potential for any large purchases that need to fit in your home (furniture, appliances, renovations, TVs, etc.), and once we have access to high quality full body tracking it could be applied to fashion as well. Lowe's innovation lab is doing a lot of this already on a variety of different devices for both at home and in store (https://blogs.windows.com/devices/2016/03/18/microsoft-hololens-and-lowes-working-to-redefine-your-next-home-renovation/ https://blogs.windows.com/devices/2016/03/18/microsoft-holol...). Beyond that, with AR you can make certain classes of digital goods and marketing "exist" in the real world. The margins for AR merchandise will be significantly higher than real physical merch, although I'm guessing the prices will be a lot lower. Selling virtual items that you can see in real life opens up a lot of cool and fantastic options as well as more mundane stuff or a mix between the two. If AR becomes ubiquitous it gives big tech companies a lot of data that no one currently has. Specifically you would have a detailed, 3D map\point cloud of most of the real world at various points in time. You could build an awesome developer platform on this, use it for VR tourism, simulation, license it to film or games producers, etc. There are already many use cases for industry and enterprise customers when it comes to training and data overlays for workers. A boring, but lucrative use case happens when resolution and tracking get good enough and assuming the form factor gets to eye glass size. AR could potentially replaces all conventional screens and be more comfortable to use than smartphones. Note I'm using AR more broadly and including Google Glass\HUD style stuff, ARKit\Vuforia SmartPhone AR, and Hololens or Magic Leap style MR or "holograms".

FullMtlAlcoholc 9y ago

I think you're missing a more important use case, namely, being able to layer contextual information over objects in your field of vision. Use cases in industry abound. On a trip to the doctor's office, your physician can overlay your medical file and get pertinent information about you. If you are a politician holding a fundraising dinner, AR + facial recognition will supply you with the biographical information, social media profiles, voting records, donation history, etc. of the people in the room allow you to schmooze ever so effortlessly and ever more efficiently. AR tailor made for athletes could do a number of physiological measurements like heart rate, VO2, etc. (with wearables or implanted sensors) that could combine to produce some sort of stamina bar, allowing for more effective substitution patterns. An activity like paintball can will feel closer to an actual military engagement or a video game if a minimap that includes your teammate's location will be in the corner of your vision. The Terminator franchise did a great job of showing it's utility by giving Arnold "Terminator vision" in shots from his POV. Video games also make extensive use of OSD. A 1st person shooter's OSD really shows the advantages of AR. Advances in computer vision and networked IoT devices will be a multiplier for AR's utility. Imagine an app that overlays your vision with the mathematical patterns of nature: illustrating the Fibonacci sequence in the leaves, petals and seeds of plants or in the way tree branches form and split. It could highlight all of the phenomenon that exhibit golden ratios. It could show the equations of motion for objects moving or spinning in your field of view or detail the biomechanics of the elegant dancers of the Bolshoi ballet. In a way, you get to experience what the mind of a Leonardo Da Vince or John Nash might be like, like you are able to get an insight into the mind of a genius.

lioeters 9y ago
That was an insightful comment, thank you. Like a few others in the thread, I was skeptical of AR's practical potential - the demos/apps I've seen so far felt like "a solution in search of a problem" - but your examples and concise summary helped me to imagine the range of possibilities. The ability to "layer contextual information over objects in your field of vision".. I see, that is the crux of it, to further integrate the "real world", the sensory experience of a person, with the global web of information and computing. Great examples you gave of industries that could utilize this, in healthcare, political/social/interpersonal sphere, athletic or intellectual/educational/artistic uses. It conjures a vision of near future where people enhanced with AR - or maybe "augmented senses" - would have distinct advantages over people without access to such layers of contextual information.