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Is it just me? I would rather just pay for stuff and be done with it rather than have my attention and sensorium sold to the highest bidder.

Nextgrid 5y ago
But this doesn't satisfy the advertising industry's greed.
Cthulhu_ 5y ago
That's a very anti-capitalist statement of you, do you even want others to get rich? Would you deny them their wealth? I am shook. /s of course
haxiomic 5y ago
Support the companies that offer this an encourage others to do the same - I worry about a future where VR is monopolized by Facebook and held there by network effect
- bogwog 5y ago
  > I worry about a future where VR is monopolized by Facebook and held there by network effect That's why it's awesome that Valve is so heavily invested in VR to counter that. They might not have more money than Facebook, but they have more than enough to compete with them. Plus, they have the expertise in video games that Facebook doesn't. It's just a shame that Valve is by all accounts a highly dysfunctional company.
  - ascagnel_ 5y ago
    The problem any competitor will have fighting FB is entry price -- FB is the only player right now that sells a standalone unit and that unit is one of the cheapest, if not the cheapest, headset on the market with a $300 MSRP. Everyone else is far more expensive and requires a PC with a discrete GPU (or game console, in the case of the PlayStation VR), so the total cost of entry ends up being far higher. What Valve is doing with the Index is really cool, but they're still operating as if they're trying to sell to VR enthusiasts, while Facebook is cornering the market by trying to sell to the general public.
    - wlesieutre 5y ago
      Oculus Quest 2 is the most popular headset on Steam's hardware survey, and that's only counting the ones who have it hooked up to their computer https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Software-Survey-Welcome-to-Steam https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Softw...
    - bogwog 5y ago
      > The problem any competitor will have fighting FB is entry price I don't think that's true. The main problem right now is that VR is still (even after all these years) an unproven/experimental consumer product. It's like buying a game console in the 70s-80s compared to buying one today. Back then, video games were still largely experimental and you were more likely to get garbage than gold. Today, designers know what works/doesn't work, and consumers can be confident in their purchases. VR is not like that yet. A "VR Game" is still a vague and uncertain term, and consumers can't have confidence in it yet. There are some great VR experiences out there, but there are many many more garbage ones. I think that a company focusing on finding a good fit for VR is going to be better off long-term than one just trying to corner this early market. Example: If Valve figures out the "secret sauce" for VR games (much like Nintendo did in the early console wars), it's not going to matter how cheap Facebook's headsets are. People (including Oculus owners) will flock to Steam for the superior experiences while Facebook scrambles to make clones. With a failed "platform", Facebook will ultimately lose. If anything, Facebook's investments to flood the market with cheap headsets (possibly even subsidizing them) could end up helping Valve in the long term, since it just means more potential Steam customers, and it gives Valve the opportunity to experiment with the high-end stuff without worrying about the market completely dying in the meantime.
paulcole 5y ago
Personally, I don’t mind ads. I like buying things and like seeing things I don’t know about that I might want to buy.
- dncornholio 5y ago
  This is true. But I don't like seeing the same ad over and over again. I don't like seeing ads of stuff that I've already bought and I especially don't like to watch a commercial for the thousandth time for a video I'm not sure even is worth watching. I can agree that ads are not necessarily bad.
- croes 5y ago
  Do you like being tricked to buy things you don't need? Ever heard of Edward Bernays? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays
  - paulcole 5y ago
    Yeah, I don’t mind it. Realistically I need almost nothing but yet I buy a lot of things. Probably got “tricked” a few times but don’t particularly care.
- tomjen3 5y ago
  I too like to buy things, but interrupting me to offer me things I might like is really wasteful. Allow me to submit things I want to buy and then let companies suggest things based on that.
  - paulcole 5y ago
    I don’t always know what I want to buy. Faster horses and all that…
    - tomjen3 5y ago
      True enough. I guess maybe the site could be made to let me share my current pain points?
tempodox 5y ago
But then it would be so pointless to require an FB account before you can use it at all. Wouldn't that be a pity.
Agentlien 5y ago
My first response when seeing this article was that I'm, yet again, so happy I did not get an Oculus. I'm very happy with my Vive Cosmos and it works without a Facebook account and hasn't shown me any ads so far.
- croon 5y ago
  I get what you're saying, but honestly the Quest is in a whole other league, as a product. I had an original Vive, and understand that Cosmos has higher fidelity etc, but the Quest inside-out-tracking is good enough, and can be used with or without a PC, with or without a cable to said PC, the resolution is great, and the compression on the PC interfaces while noticable is, again, good enough. I sincerely don't miss the lighthouses and cables, and can make a new area in any part of the house, at any time. I just wish it wasn't owned by Facebook. But there's no competitor, unfortunately.
  - Agentlien 5y ago
    I understand where you're coming from and ignoring the Facebook aspect the Quest would perhaps be the product for me, though I can't say I see much of an advantage of it over my current system. Cosmos also has inside out tracking so no beacons and I honestly don't mind the cables. I never really notice them when I play. I did with the original Vive when I tried it at work, though. As for the PC, I'm an avid gamer and graphics programmer for a AAA studio. My VR is set up in my home office so I have access to a more than adequate PC, anyway. What I really do mind is a lack of graphical fidelity. Cosmos was the first option I tried which really felt good enough for me (the original Vive always felt cool but not quite there) and I know Quest has very similar resolution. But noticeable compression artifacts sound like something that would really bother me.
nindalf 5y ago
It’s not just you, but you are a tiny minority. You’ve expressed a sentiment that’s very popular on HN, but not among the general population. Take YouTube - a popular ad supported service with a premium tier. How many people are willing to pay to remove ads? Less than 1%. Even on HN I don’t think that number would be more than 10%.
- serf 5y ago
  >Take YouTube - a popular ad supported service with a premium tier. How many people are willing to pay to remove ads? Less than 1%. I think that's an inaccurate assessment of 'people who don't want to see ads', given that statistics put internet wide usage of ad-blockers at around 42%.[0]. Maybe it's just that no one wants to pay their captors for golden ear-muffs and blinders when they themselves are the ones responsible for the poor user experience. [0]: https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users
  - selfhoster11 5y ago
    > Maybe it's just that no one wants to pay their captors for golden ear-muffs and blinders when they themselves are the ones responsible for the poor user experience. I vehemently refuse to pay for YouTube Premium for that exact reason. I get ads that amount to something like "You know how we just stuff ads down your eyeballs constantly? You know how it's really annoying? For just X.99 a month, we'll no longer do that!" These enrage me to the core. Now that I have NewPipe and other methods of watching YouTube without ads and artificially freezing the stream when I switch away from the app, the official app is useless.
    - recursive 5y ago
      I don't understand this. Would it be better if YouTube "Free" didn't even exist? No one's forcing anyone to use youtube. How is this different from any subscription service that has a hobbled "lite" version?
      - 5y ago
terlisimo 5y ago
Amazon recognizes this :) Kindle with ads: 120 EUR. Kindle without ads: 140 EUR.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
It's absolutely not just you. Those people would put ads under our eyelids if they could get away with it. We need to actively fight against this by somehow blocking all these ads with no exceptions. Drive their return on investment as close to zero as possible.
jokoon 5y ago
Most consumers are okay with it and tolerate large doses of advertising.

Nextgrid 5y ago

But this doesn't satisfy the advertising industry's greed.

Cthulhu_ 5y ago

That's a very anti-capitalist statement of you, do you even want others to get rich? Would you deny them their wealth? I am shook. /s of course

haxiomic 5y ago

Support the companies that offer this an encourage others to do the same - I worry about a future where VR is monopolized by Facebook and held there by network effect

bogwog 5y ago
> I worry about a future where VR is monopolized by Facebook and held there by network effect That's why it's awesome that Valve is so heavily invested in VR to counter that. They might not have more money than Facebook, but they have more than enough to compete with them. Plus, they have the expertise in video games that Facebook doesn't. It's just a shame that Valve is by all accounts a highly dysfunctional company.
- ascagnel_ 5y ago
  The problem any competitor will have fighting FB is entry price -- FB is the only player right now that sells a standalone unit and that unit is one of the cheapest, if not the cheapest, headset on the market with a $300 MSRP. Everyone else is far more expensive and requires a PC with a discrete GPU (or game console, in the case of the PlayStation VR), so the total cost of entry ends up being far higher. What Valve is doing with the Index is really cool, but they're still operating as if they're trying to sell to VR enthusiasts, while Facebook is cornering the market by trying to sell to the general public.
  - wlesieutre 5y ago
    Oculus Quest 2 is the most popular headset on Steam's hardware survey, and that's only counting the ones who have it hooked up to their computer https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Software-Survey-Welcome-to-Steam https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Softw...
  - bogwog 5y ago
    > The problem any competitor will have fighting FB is entry price I don't think that's true. The main problem right now is that VR is still (even after all these years) an unproven/experimental consumer product. It's like buying a game console in the 70s-80s compared to buying one today. Back then, video games were still largely experimental and you were more likely to get garbage than gold. Today, designers know what works/doesn't work, and consumers can be confident in their purchases. VR is not like that yet. A "VR Game" is still a vague and uncertain term, and consumers can't have confidence in it yet. There are some great VR experiences out there, but there are many many more garbage ones. I think that a company focusing on finding a good fit for VR is going to be better off long-term than one just trying to corner this early market. Example: If Valve figures out the "secret sauce" for VR games (much like Nintendo did in the early console wars), it's not going to matter how cheap Facebook's headsets are. People (including Oculus owners) will flock to Steam for the superior experiences while Facebook scrambles to make clones. With a failed "platform", Facebook will ultimately lose. If anything, Facebook's investments to flood the market with cheap headsets (possibly even subsidizing them) could end up helping Valve in the long term, since it just means more potential Steam customers, and it gives Valve the opportunity to experiment with the high-end stuff without worrying about the market completely dying in the meantime.

paulcole 5y ago

Personally, I don’t mind ads. I like buying things and like seeing things I don’t know about that I might want to buy.

dncornholio 5y ago
This is true. But I don't like seeing the same ad over and over again. I don't like seeing ads of stuff that I've already bought and I especially don't like to watch a commercial for the thousandth time for a video I'm not sure even is worth watching. I can agree that ads are not necessarily bad.
croes 5y ago
Do you like being tricked to buy things you don't need? Ever heard of Edward Bernays? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays
- paulcole 5y ago
  Yeah, I don’t mind it. Realistically I need almost nothing but yet I buy a lot of things. Probably got “tricked” a few times but don’t particularly care.
tomjen3 5y ago
I too like to buy things, but interrupting me to offer me things I might like is really wasteful. Allow me to submit things I want to buy and then let companies suggest things based on that.
- paulcole 5y ago
  I don’t always know what I want to buy. Faster horses and all that…
  - tomjen3 5y ago
    True enough. I guess maybe the site could be made to let me share my current pain points?

tempodox 5y ago

But then it would be so pointless to require an FB account before you can use it at all. Wouldn't that be a pity.

Agentlien 5y ago

My first response when seeing this article was that I'm, yet again, so happy I did not get an Oculus. I'm very happy with my Vive Cosmos and it works without a Facebook account and hasn't shown me any ads so far.

croon 5y ago
I get what you're saying, but honestly the Quest is in a whole other league, as a product. I had an original Vive, and understand that Cosmos has higher fidelity etc, but the Quest inside-out-tracking is good enough, and can be used with or without a PC, with or without a cable to said PC, the resolution is great, and the compression on the PC interfaces while noticable is, again, good enough. I sincerely don't miss the lighthouses and cables, and can make a new area in any part of the house, at any time. I just wish it wasn't owned by Facebook. But there's no competitor, unfortunately.
- Agentlien 5y ago
  I understand where you're coming from and ignoring the Facebook aspect the Quest would perhaps be the product for me, though I can't say I see much of an advantage of it over my current system. Cosmos also has inside out tracking so no beacons and I honestly don't mind the cables. I never really notice them when I play. I did with the original Vive when I tried it at work, though. As for the PC, I'm an avid gamer and graphics programmer for a AAA studio. My VR is set up in my home office so I have access to a more than adequate PC, anyway. What I really do mind is a lack of graphical fidelity. Cosmos was the first option I tried which really felt good enough for me (the original Vive always felt cool but not quite there) and I know Quest has very similar resolution. But noticeable compression artifacts sound like something that would really bother me.

nindalf 5y ago

It’s not just you, but you are a tiny minority. You’ve expressed a sentiment that’s very popular on HN, but not among the general population. Take YouTube - a popular ad supported service with a premium tier. How many people are willing to pay to remove ads? Less than 1%. Even on HN I don’t think that number would be more than 10%.

serf 5y ago
>Take YouTube - a popular ad supported service with a premium tier. How many people are willing to pay to remove ads? Less than 1%. I think that's an inaccurate assessment of 'people who don't want to see ads', given that statistics put internet wide usage of ad-blockers at around 42%.[0]. Maybe it's just that no one wants to pay their captors for golden ear-muffs and blinders when they themselves are the ones responsible for the poor user experience. [0]: https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users
- selfhoster11 5y ago
  > Maybe it's just that no one wants to pay their captors for golden ear-muffs and blinders when they themselves are the ones responsible for the poor user experience. I vehemently refuse to pay for YouTube Premium for that exact reason. I get ads that amount to something like "You know how we just stuff ads down your eyeballs constantly? You know how it's really annoying? For just X.99 a month, we'll no longer do that!" These enrage me to the core. Now that I have NewPipe and other methods of watching YouTube without ads and artificially freezing the stream when I switch away from the app, the official app is useless.
  - recursive 5y ago
    I don't understand this. Would it be better if YouTube "Free" didn't even exist? No one's forcing anyone to use youtube. How is this different from any subscription service that has a hobbled "lite" version?
    - 5y ago

terlisimo 5y ago

Amazon recognizes this :) Kindle with ads: 120 EUR. Kindle without ads: 140 EUR.

matheusmoreira 5y ago

It's absolutely not just you. Those people would put ads under our eyelids if they could get away with it. We need to actively fight against this by somehow blocking all these ads with no exceptions. Drive their return on investment as close to zero as possible.

jokoon 5y ago

Most consumers are okay with it and tolerate large doses of advertising.