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Really though? Facebook makes money by displaying targeted ads to users. What data from the Quest is being used to target ads? I’m not familiar with anything re

Really though? Facebook makes money by displaying targeted ads to users. What data from the Quest is being used to target ads? I’m not familiar with anything related to this in Facebook’s product for ad buyers, and can’t think of anything particularly useful that they could be doing. You could think of Oculus as an effort to increase the amount of user attention inventory Facebook has in supply to rent out to advertisers. Also, they are positioning themselves as an intermediary for transactions in the future VR economy by being platform owner (a la Apple owning the App Store). My guess is the long-term plan is to make money here by displaying ads in VR and by getting a cut of goods and services sold though VR (see: Ready Player One).

ianlevesque 6y ago
What is it with HN and trying to read between the lines so hard? There's literally an Oculus Store app store for quest games. Probably they are just making money on game sales, like every other game console has for 35 years.
- wlesieutre 6y ago
  I do worry that Facebook will figure they might as well double dip on sales and advertising; future headsets are probably going to have eye tracking (ostensibly for foveated rendering and better avatars), and combining in-world advertising with exact data on how long people looked at them is a pretty compelling sell for what is fundamentally an advertising company. They spent like 15 minutes of the presentation talking about how ethical they're going to be (re: AR glasses) and how trust has to be earned, but their ethics track record isn't exactly stellar.
  - lowdose 6y ago
    It's Facebook version of doublespeak.
- xnx 6y ago
  I agree that being a game platform would be enough to be profitable, though their biggest dream must be to be the ultimate gatekeeper/taxman to what goes into your eyes. Aside from injecting thoughts right into your brain, what is more important than a screen that blocks out everything else you see? (phone, laptop, and TV are worth zero when you're wearing goggles).
  - petre 6y ago
    And the next thing you know firemen are running around burning books, like in Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.
- shajznnckfke 6y ago
  I’m skeptical the Facebook would bother to invest so many billions into VR just for the chance of being part of the competitive game console market. It makes sense to think about how it fits into the long-term strategy for their main cash cow, ads. If there’s a future where internet/app usage hours shift toward VR, Facebook doesn’t want to be left in the dust like Myspace when users switch to a new social network. Even if they can keep users on a Facebook-owned VR app, they don’t want to wind up paying a 30% tax to some platform owner.
  - wlesieutre 6y ago
    I hope that the platform as a whole don't start stuffing ads everywhere, but I'd be shocked if there weren't some monitization plan for Facebook Horizon
  - jayd16 6y ago
    > being part of the competitive game console market You mean being part of the many billion dollar game industry by controlling the highest growth sector in that industry with vendor lock in and rent seeking for any game sold in that new market? Yeah...who would want that...
    - shajznnckfke 6y ago
      Sure, but that would also apply to other companies who could have bought Oculus. I think the way it fits into Facebook’s overall company strategy explains why they would bid the most.
      - jayd16 6y ago
        Hmm, who would have bid more? Google has its own tech and doesn't like making content. Apple doesn't like making content and only recently got into original video content. Microsoft has its own tech. I don't _think_ Facebook had a lot of computer vision expertise at the time and it makes sense they'd want to buy into that. Amazon was a choice I guess?
- kichik 6y ago
  If it were truly just about the games, they would let you keep using Oculus login. Why else would they force you to use a Facebook login? If they only cared about store profits, logins wouldn't be required at all.
  - evan_ 6y ago
    no idea if this is the reason but they are being pretty forward about banning malicious users (cheaters, creeps) and you can't do that effectively if you just ban the throwaway user.
    - kichik 6y ago
      Interesting. But don't you have to attach a credit card to buy and play the game? They can use that to identify repeat offenders and probably other things as well. Other platforms solved the issue without accessing my entire social graph.
  - bserge 6y ago
    Just make a separate/dummy Facebook account. That's what I use.
- renewiltord 6y ago
  It's just run of the mill conspiracy theorists. I remove them from my feed and move on.
- throwaway423342 6y ago
  do you work for FB? within FB people 'assume good intention'. outside FB not so much. think about why
- wincy 6y ago
  Also remember that Mark Zuckerberg himself demoed the Samsung Oculus headset to everyone. That was a really big deal at the time. It's possible that this is a pet project he's adopted and really wants to see succeed. However, practically, it's a great jumping off point for AR and we know that Apple is experimenting with Augmented reality headsets that are tied to your phone. Facebook might just be trying to get ahead of the game, betting that the next step past phones is VR/AR.
- gibolt 6y ago
  You could imagine a future where VR/AR is the equivalent of Mac or Windows, iOS or Android. The platform is the asset
- xeonoex 6y ago
  It's not just HN. I think it's pretty fair to be concerned about facebook's tracking, given the level they already go to on their site. I just spent $1000 on a Valve Index, since there is no way I am strapping 4 facebook linked cameras to my head.
dx87 6y ago
You could advertise similar games based on what they're already playing.
- dylan604 6y ago
  You're thinking too small. By owning a Quest 2, you're signalling that you (or your parents) have disposable income they are willing to spend on electronic devices. Yes, it clearly shows you're a gamer. So if you're a gamer, you probably drink Mountain Dew and eat Doritos. Based on your FB profile, you probably like certain types of shoes. 75% of other people with matching criteria purchased something, so let's shove that in your face as well to see if we can't get it up to 80%. Oh, you play games between the hours of xxx, so you must be a teenager. Let's target ads to get your parents money.
  - shajznnckfke 6y ago
    That info seems like table stakes for Facebook. It doesn’t take the many billions invested in Oculus to find any of that out.
    - dylan604 6y ago
      Sure if that was the only data point. however, this is just one more thing they will use to refine the data they are sucking in about you every second. At this point, why would they not do it? It's in their DNA.
  - phonon 6y ago
    https://funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/4640768/Xbox+one+greentext/ https://funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/4640768/Xbox+one+greent...
Tossrock 6y ago
They may not be exposing the data they're collecting to ad buyers today, but it's a safe bet they're collecting it. You can extract a lot of signal on ad effectiveness based on what people look at via head pose, and once eye tracking is in - nominally for foveated rendering, of course - it will be even stronger.
rado 6y ago
What data? All the data!
croes 6y ago
What data? Movement range, size, speed,reaction time. With touch controllers you can even track the stress resistance, because people tend to tighten their grip if stressed. And there a lots of companies like Cambridge Analytica that can use that data to push their agenda even better. Easier game for people like the Koch brothers.
pritovido 6y ago
Data from a VR is extremely useful. First it measures your fitness level. Those devices have high quality acceleration and gyroscope sensors. They could know your visual and acoustic acuity. They measure what games you play, for how long, at what time. With these data and processing done by AI created by engineers they can extract and know more about yourself than you do. We know from Snowden that places like the NSA collect and save data expecting technological changes in 5-10 years in the future for processing that data. The technology for processing does not need to be ready yet. This is extremely useful for Advertisers and secret services. This is not what you say you are, this is what you are.
- underwater 6y ago
  That's a bit of a stretch. Facebook uses data to improve ad targetting on their own platforms. They're not selling your HR or fitness data to your insurance company or anything crazy like that. Facebook generated $29 per user in the US last year. A small bit of extra info about people's gaming habits is not going to improve ad targetting enough to make up for a $100 gap in price.
  - GekkePrutser 6y ago
    They're not selling that data yet. But it's clear from the reviews the $100 was mainly achieved by cost-cutting. They may still lose some money on it but that's just an investment in becoming market leader in VR.
- KaiserPro 6y ago
  Currently VR data is not very good for anything really yet, because we have no scalable way to understand it. "raw" VR data is about 10 megabytes a second of black and white infrared video. plus audio and position data of either controllers or hands. After its been processed it can give you a sparse pointcloud of your living room (which is not overly bad) but thats not something thats done by facebook, yet. With a bit more work you could get a dense pointcloud. Unlike AR which will need a bunch more processing on device to get position and geo data, VR is mostly just slam
macawfish 6y ago
Biometric data can and will be used to analyze and predict people's behavior in unprecedented ways.

ianlevesque 6y ago

What is it with HN and trying to read between the lines so hard? There's literally an Oculus Store app store for quest games. Probably they are just making money on game sales, like every other game console has for 35 years.

wlesieutre 6y ago
I do worry that Facebook will figure they might as well double dip on sales and advertising; future headsets are probably going to have eye tracking (ostensibly for foveated rendering and better avatars), and combining in-world advertising with exact data on how long people looked at them is a pretty compelling sell for what is fundamentally an advertising company. They spent like 15 minutes of the presentation talking about how ethical they're going to be (re: AR glasses) and how trust has to be earned, but their ethics track record isn't exactly stellar.
- lowdose 6y ago
  It's Facebook version of doublespeak.
xnx 6y ago
I agree that being a game platform would be enough to be profitable, though their biggest dream must be to be the ultimate gatekeeper/taxman to what goes into your eyes. Aside from injecting thoughts right into your brain, what is more important than a screen that blocks out everything else you see? (phone, laptop, and TV are worth zero when you're wearing goggles).
- petre 6y ago
  And the next thing you know firemen are running around burning books, like in Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.
shajznnckfke 6y ago
I’m skeptical the Facebook would bother to invest so many billions into VR just for the chance of being part of the competitive game console market. It makes sense to think about how it fits into the long-term strategy for their main cash cow, ads. If there’s a future where internet/app usage hours shift toward VR, Facebook doesn’t want to be left in the dust like Myspace when users switch to a new social network. Even if they can keep users on a Facebook-owned VR app, they don’t want to wind up paying a 30% tax to some platform owner.
- wlesieutre 6y ago
  I hope that the platform as a whole don't start stuffing ads everywhere, but I'd be shocked if there weren't some monitization plan for Facebook Horizon
- jayd16 6y ago
  > being part of the competitive game console market You mean being part of the many billion dollar game industry by controlling the highest growth sector in that industry with vendor lock in and rent seeking for any game sold in that new market? Yeah...who would want that...
  - shajznnckfke 6y ago
    Sure, but that would also apply to other companies who could have bought Oculus. I think the way it fits into Facebook’s overall company strategy explains why they would bid the most.
    - jayd16 6y ago
      Hmm, who would have bid more? Google has its own tech and doesn't like making content. Apple doesn't like making content and only recently got into original video content. Microsoft has its own tech. I don't _think_ Facebook had a lot of computer vision expertise at the time and it makes sense they'd want to buy into that. Amazon was a choice I guess?
kichik 6y ago
If it were truly just about the games, they would let you keep using Oculus login. Why else would they force you to use a Facebook login? If they only cared about store profits, logins wouldn't be required at all.
- evan_ 6y ago
  no idea if this is the reason but they are being pretty forward about banning malicious users (cheaters, creeps) and you can't do that effectively if you just ban the throwaway user.
  - kichik 6y ago
    Interesting. But don't you have to attach a credit card to buy and play the game? They can use that to identify repeat offenders and probably other things as well. Other platforms solved the issue without accessing my entire social graph.
- bserge 6y ago
  Just make a separate/dummy Facebook account. That's what I use.
renewiltord 6y ago
It's just run of the mill conspiracy theorists. I remove them from my feed and move on.
throwaway423342 6y ago
do you work for FB? within FB people 'assume good intention'. outside FB not so much. think about why
wincy 6y ago
Also remember that Mark Zuckerberg himself demoed the Samsung Oculus headset to everyone. That was a really big deal at the time. It's possible that this is a pet project he's adopted and really wants to see succeed. However, practically, it's a great jumping off point for AR and we know that Apple is experimenting with Augmented reality headsets that are tied to your phone. Facebook might just be trying to get ahead of the game, betting that the next step past phones is VR/AR.
gibolt 6y ago
You could imagine a future where VR/AR is the equivalent of Mac or Windows, iOS or Android. The platform is the asset
xeonoex 6y ago
It's not just HN. I think it's pretty fair to be concerned about facebook's tracking, given the level they already go to on their site. I just spent $1000 on a Valve Index, since there is no way I am strapping 4 facebook linked cameras to my head.

dx87 6y ago

You could advertise similar games based on what they're already playing.

dylan604 6y ago
You're thinking too small. By owning a Quest 2, you're signalling that you (or your parents) have disposable income they are willing to spend on electronic devices. Yes, it clearly shows you're a gamer. So if you're a gamer, you probably drink Mountain Dew and eat Doritos. Based on your FB profile, you probably like certain types of shoes. 75% of other people with matching criteria purchased something, so let's shove that in your face as well to see if we can't get it up to 80%. Oh, you play games between the hours of xxx, so you must be a teenager. Let's target ads to get your parents money.
- shajznnckfke 6y ago
  That info seems like table stakes for Facebook. It doesn’t take the many billions invested in Oculus to find any of that out.
  - dylan604 6y ago
    Sure if that was the only data point. however, this is just one more thing they will use to refine the data they are sucking in about you every second. At this point, why would they not do it? It's in their DNA.
- phonon 6y ago
  https://funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/4640768/Xbox+one+greentext/ https://funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/4640768/Xbox+one+greent...

Tossrock 6y ago

They may not be exposing the data they're collecting to ad buyers today, but it's a safe bet they're collecting it. You can extract a lot of signal on ad effectiveness based on what people look at via head pose, and once eye tracking is in - nominally for foveated rendering, of course - it will be even stronger.

rado 6y ago

What data? All the data!

croes 6y ago

What data? Movement range, size, speed,reaction time. With touch controllers you can even track the stress resistance, because people tend to tighten their grip if stressed. And there a lots of companies like Cambridge Analytica that can use that data to push their agenda even better. Easier game for people like the Koch brothers.

pritovido 6y ago

Data from a VR is extremely useful. First it measures your fitness level. Those devices have high quality acceleration and gyroscope sensors. They could know your visual and acoustic acuity. They measure what games you play, for how long, at what time. With these data and processing done by AI created by engineers they can extract and know more about yourself than you do. We know from Snowden that places like the NSA collect and save data expecting technological changes in 5-10 years in the future for processing that data. The technology for processing does not need to be ready yet. This is extremely useful for Advertisers and secret services. This is not what you say you are, this is what you are.

underwater 6y ago
That's a bit of a stretch. Facebook uses data to improve ad targetting on their own platforms. They're not selling your HR or fitness data to your insurance company or anything crazy like that. Facebook generated $29 per user in the US last year. A small bit of extra info about people's gaming habits is not going to improve ad targetting enough to make up for a $100 gap in price.
- GekkePrutser 6y ago
  They're not selling that data yet. But it's clear from the reviews the $100 was mainly achieved by cost-cutting. They may still lose some money on it but that's just an investment in becoming market leader in VR.
KaiserPro 6y ago
Currently VR data is not very good for anything really yet, because we have no scalable way to understand it. "raw" VR data is about 10 megabytes a second of black and white infrared video. plus audio and position data of either controllers or hands. After its been processed it can give you a sparse pointcloud of your living room (which is not overly bad) but thats not something thats done by facebook, yet. With a bit more work you could get a dense pointcloud. Unlike AR which will need a bunch more processing on device to get position and geo data, VR is mostly just slam

macawfish 6y ago

Biometric data can and will be used to analyze and predict people's behavior in unprecedented ways.