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John Carmack pushes out unlocked OS for defunct Oculus Go headset
- asim 5y agoThis will be a massive unlock for a Metaverse funded by Zuck with no affiliation with Facebook. Thanks for the hardware Zuck. Now we'll build the new world without you.
- croes 5y agoNot with a 3DOF headset
- eatonphil 5y ago> Oculus CTO (and former id Software co-founder) John Carmack I thought Carmack stepped down from being CTO a few years ago? [0] [0] https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/oculus-cto-john-carmack-to-step-down-become-a-victorian-gentleman-scientist/ https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/oculus-cto-john-carmack-to-...
- jjulius 5y agoThe sub-heading of your link says: > Carmack says he's transitioning to the role of "consulting CTO" at Oculus. So he can still be called CTO.
- eatonphil 5y agoBut that was also 2 years ago. I assumed by this time they'd have found a permanent CTO? Maybe not.
- bidirectional 5y agoWhy would the role of consulting CTO be non-permanent? It just implies a part-time approach.
- eatonphil 5y agoConsulting CTO just isn't an arrangement I hear about very often. I'm surprised part-time (if that's what it is) CTO-ing works out long-term for a tech company.
- ethbr0 5y agoMaybe it means "full time, but I reserve the right to not be CTO at a time of my choosing."
- eatonphil 5y agoWell that just sounds like most US jobs (i.e. at-will employment). And if the point is that you're clarifying with your employer that you're looking for an exit (even if it's not immediate) it probably means the employer (and maybe you are helping) is interviewing for your replacement with the goal of eventually finding it. Hence my curiosity that it's been 2 years and they haven't got a new CTO.
- jon-wood 5y agoAs a company with a strong focus on smooth 3D rendering I imagine it’s quite difficult to find a CTO who can top John Carmack, and if he’s willing to stick around then why rush it.
- kzrdude 5y agoThis is Carmack, so I'm just thinking it's a bit reversed. He's taking this job at-will and can cancel them at any time.
- eatonphil 5y agoWell at-will employment already works in both directions. :)
- cma 5y agoI think he is working closer to full time on AI, and does the VR CTO thing separately.
- bluedino 5y agoKen Silverman must be busy
- gjs278 5y agonone of these job titles matter at all
- lovelyviking 5y agoHow much one can improve a dictatorship working for the dictatorship ? Just thinking ...
- maximedupre 5y agoI love the spirit, but is there any *successful* precedence? Sure, everything is now open-sourced, but setting up the kind of infrastructure that is necessitated to keep the thing up and running seems non-trivial.
- flatiron 5y agoI don’t believe it was open sourced. This is just a firmware that gives your root access and doesn’t require any Facebook integration.
- adamhearn 5y agoThis is awesome!
- nicolaslem 5y ago> allowing for a randomly discovered shrink wrapped headset twenty years from now to be able to update to the final software version, long after over-the-air update servers have been shut down. This resonates so much with me. Each time I setup a new device that requires an Internet connection, I think about how we can enjoy booting 30 years old retro computers and how the next generation will not be able to do the same because of locked down hardware.
- AdmiralAsshat 5y agoThis is why I still try so hard to buy physical copies of games, and if there is a GOTY Edition, to have the DLC be on-disk, as opposed to being a bunch of download vouchers. I wanna be able to play the freaking game in ten years without worrying about whether the game/console's online service is still available to do some mandatory authentication or version check.
- dewey 5y ago> This is why I still try so hard to buy physical copies of games Aren't these also subject to disk rot?
- kfprt 5y agoDisk rot is slower than online service rot. The other day I tried FC3 blood dragon and it had an error because they shut the servers down. It hasn't even been 10 years.
- AdmiralAsshat 5y agoIt's certainly a possibility, but anecdotally, I have audio CDs from the late 80s that still play. Meanwhile, I have games I played 3-4 years ago on the PS3 that are severely hampered because the online components no longer work--the servers were either shut down, or in one case the company completely went under.
- mywittyname 5y agoUnfortunately, a lot of new releases need a 0-day patch to be playable. It's basically an anti-piracy/anti-early release measure. So if you really want to preserve a game on disk, you pretty much have to pick up another copy stamped at a later date to include all of the patches.
- freediver 5y agoImagining that future is about people wearing VR devices on their head (even as minimal as a pair of glasses) is hard to grasp. "In their head" would be a different matter but that is not what the current technology is focusing on (apart from Neuralink). Edit: not propagating for any such vision the future! just noticing that wearing stuff on head would be clunky and impractical for true immersion.
- InitialLastName 5y agoLeave it to the advertising-surveillance industrial complex to explore every possible route to inject outrage into subjects' brains (whether they want want it or not).
- Arrath 5y agoI'm just waiting for a lightweight pair of AR glasses that I can wear while wrenching on a hobby car that give overlays, labels, disassembly instructions akin to car mechanic simulator. If they can automagically tell me what size wrench/socket i need to grab, even better.
- jessaustin 5y agoAs hard as it is to find any service manual at all for old machinery, and then when you spend $100 to order a used manual off ebay find that the really useful pages are ripped out or covered with grease, I think a product like you describe is waiting on AGI more than it's waiting on nice AR glasses. Very few people need this product, so the intellectual labor to produce it will need to be nearly free. I've gotten to where I can identify most bolt head sizes on sight... I very rarely have to pick up more than two wrenches and usually the first one is right. Also I find that bolt sizes are typically fairly standardized on a particular machine. I occasionally work on a mini-excavator that has 10mm, 13mm, and 19mm bolts (and 8mm allen-heads), but nothing else I've found so far.
- Arrath 5y agoOh I know its a complete pipe dream, I can't help but want it regardless. I see you may not have had the joy of working on something with mixed SAE, Metric, and if you're real lucky, JIS all combined.
- nickmolnar2 5y agoWasn’t he supposed to be developing AGI?
- schaefer 5y agoThe thought of Facebook having telemetry on real time eye tracking data for a future popular Oculus VR headset in a few years is horrifying. I’ll never get over the sale of Oculus to Facebook.
- aaroninsf 5y agoMe neither. Haven't touched their hardware since and won't; would pass on jobs if that becomes an aspect.
- charcircuit 5y agoWhy? Can you rationally explain what you are afraid of them doing?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- SV_BubbleTime 5y agoHave you considered how much VR is used for porn? Totally unrelated side note, but virtamate is um, probably risky for someone who feels like they could become obsessed with porn.
- charcircuit 5y ago>Have you considered how much VR is used for porn? And what does that have to do with eye tracking? I could see it recommend more content based off what you are looking at instead of having to manually like posts. Having a hands free experience sounds like a pro to me. >virtamate is um, probably risky for someone who feels like they could become obsessed with porn. Almost all VR porn sucks compared to the flatscreen counterpart. There's also a much bigger collection of 2D stuff that exists.
- SV_BubbleTime 5y ago> And what does that have to do with eye tracking? Nothing. But the Quest2 specially also has four cameras that point out at you and your rooms. So it’s the same theme that I don’t really want Facebook seeing anything remotely related to this. > Almost all VR porn sucks compared to the flatscreen counterpart. Compelling argument.
- dyingkneepad 5y agoJohn Carmack working for Facebook is such a huge loss for mankind :(. It makes me sad every time I think about it.
- monkeytaco 5y agoHe only does light consulting for them currently. He stepped back a couple years ago to focus on his own AI research.
- ComodoHacker 5y agoMaybe he could push it to the better, who knows.
- mertd 5y agoHe does not need the paycheck. He must think this endeavor is the most worth his while, which is fine.
- amackera 5y agoI admire and respect John Carmack for his role in the history of computing (and his ongoing contributions), but I don't see how making 3D video games was really helping humanity more than this. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- sillysaurusx 5y agoCarmack made multiple fundamental breakthroughs in 3D graphics. Not only that, but he consistently positioned himself to commercialize those, which is not easy. His Quake 3 engine was the bread and butter of Id Software, generating billions in revenue. In recent times, he's done coronavirus simulations (I don't know anything else about that), and is doing AGI research. He's also a true hacker through and through. Simply having an example like his, as a model to follow, is helping humanity. I happen to be human, and I distinctly remember his .plan files influencing my decisions in a positive way since I was 13 or so. (The line about getting a hotel and accomplishing as much as possible in 2 days of focused effort was particularly impactful.)
- spicybright 5y agoI'm actually pretty nervous of how few Carmack's we have. Not at all saying they don't exist, but the job market favors engineers hopping around instead of staying at one place a while to become experts in things.
- elric 5y ago> the job market favors engineers hopping around instead of staying at one place Does it? That's a fair description of the consulting space, but I don't think it's an accurate representation of the job market as a whole. When product companies hire software engineers, they tend to aim for the long haul.
- spicybright 5y agoYou'd think. Most career advice I get is you need to jump ship to get an actual pay raise. Maybe stay 3 or 4 years. Not enough to build up deep knowledge, at least compared to older engineers imo
- samstave 5y agoA buddy of mine just joined Palo Alto networks and they gave him a 30% pay increase, as well as a $100,000 signing bonus, and then put him on a team who sold well and he got a $40,000 bonus a couple months after joining.
- c21h30o2 5y agoOne of my friends stays at his current company where he has stayed for years, despite only getting low single-digit pay increases each year.
- leetcrew 5y agoI don't think it's necessary to stay with the same company a very long time to develop "deep knowledge". on my last team there were two engineers with about 20 years of experience. one had spent all of it at that company, and the other had worked at five different companies in the same space. the former knew more about the company's code and was an invaluable resource for "why are things the way they are?" type questions. but the latter often proposed more novel (to us) solutions, drawing on his experience from previous roles. both were extremely effective engineers.
- buildbot 5y agoThis is tangential, but I really wish that their would be legislation, valid retroactively, to enable old unsupported devices to still be utilized. I think this goes somewhat beyond right to repair? Take for example digital backs for medium format cameras - these things are built in low numbers, with high end FPGAs and camera sensors, with JTAG interfaces ready to go and everything - but then forgotten about a few years later. Why not enforce the creation of some document on how one would build their own OS for it? Or how the bus from the sensor ADCs works? This all existed at one point internally, but now is lost, and most of this backs will slowly die and go to waste, even though they could easily be repurposed or repaired.
- CarelessExpert 5y ago> This is tangential, but I really wish that their would be legislation, valid retroactively, to enable old unsupported devices to still be utilized. Not at all. This is precisely on point, and directly intersects with the Right to Repair as well. It's about damn time we, as a society, put a stop to black box devices over which we have no ability to inspect, repair, or repurpose after the vendor decides to end support.
- horsawlarway 5y agoCould not agree more. At the bare minimum a vendor should not be allowed to sell a device that has digital locks if the user is not also given a copy of the keys. You can lock the device, but if I don't get a key at time of purchase, then I don't own the damn thing.
- CobrastanJorji 5y agoI'm trying to think of a situation where this is objectively bad, and I having trouble thinking of areas where this is objectively bad. The best I came up with is purchasing an elevator, which has a key for firemen. I wouldn't really want to just give everybody a copy of that key. But on the other hand, you can buy that key on Amazon for $5. It would maybe help people think about security a bit more if they bought a TSA-approved lock and it came with a TSA key with a little warning that read "Note: this key opens any TSA-approved locks, please only open your own baggage." One possibility is around DNS. A public/private keypair is basically a lock and a key. If you can't put ANY public keys on my device without giving me the private key, HTTPS is going to be problematic. Software updates become a little scarier as well, since a man-in-the-middle attack becomes MUCH easier to pull off. But perhaps the answer there is, like DNS on a desktop computer, to simply allow the user to edit those local keys. As long as there's a "Yes, I am also cool with installing unsigned software updates," then I don't see a problem.
- formerly_proven 5y agoDoes this mean you get a blob image where you can have root, or more like Carmack of old, GPLing / open sourcing the prev-gen tech? I'm asking basically: Is this free as in beer or as in freedom?
- Macha 5y ago> Accessing or using the unlockable software (“Software”) is subject to the Oculus Terms of Service or, if you use your Facebook account to access Oculus Products, the Supplemental Oculus Terms of Service and Facebook Terms of Service (the “Applicable TOS”). For clarity, Oculus Products (as described in the Applicable TOS) include the Software. We provide the Software to you for your personal and noncommercial use only on your personal Oculus Products. Installing the Software voids all warranties, express or implied, applicable to Oculus Products. In no event shall Facebook, its affiliates or any of their respective directors, officers, employees or agents have responsibility or liability arising out of or relating to making the Software available to you. https://developer.oculus.com/licenses/go-unlock-tos https://developer.oculus.com/licenses/go-unlock-tos Free as in beer
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- kactus 5y agoI hope they do the Oculus Rift CV1 next. I'm trying to sell mine because it's useless without my deleted Facebook account.
- arthurcolle 5y agothat would be dope - no chance though
- roody15 5y agoJohn Carmack is a living legend. Seriously impressive career!
- InitialLastName 5y agoHe's truly had an incredible run, but it's a shame he's let the finale be "enabled Facebook to mix eyeball tracking with advertising".
- bdastous 5y agoThis assumption strikes me as ageist.
- InitialLastName 5y agoLook at that, he's younger than I thought. In my head he was in his 60s, where "transition from leadership to 'consulting leadership' at a major company" sounds like a step towards a quieter life.
- imron 5y agoFinale?
- kreddor 5y agoI'm looking forward to the day he does it for Oculus Quest 1. I haven't used mine in a year because Facebook.
- baby 5y agotime to get the Oculus Quest 2 my friend!
- generalizations 5y agoDon't those things need a facebook account also?
- bytebolt 5y agoPlease tell me there is a way to get rid of Facebook out of quest 2
- UberMouse 5y agoThere is this https://github.com/basti564/Oculess https://github.com/basti564/Oculess Haven't tried it myself, and it has some caveats, but it does make it possible to use the Quest 2 without Facebook.
- hoboris 5y agoI'm using https://github.com/basti564/Oculess https://github.com/basti564/Oculess which works well for removing facebook. Caveats: * most of the UI is broken * you can only run untrusted sideloaded apks * some telemetry services have to be stopped after each reboot * you might still need facebook for initial setup (haven't tried it)
- baby 5y agoJust create one!
- ralmidani 5y agoMassive props to John Carmack! We also need laws to protect consumers when they don’t have an enlightened champion on their side. Part of the reason I buy Apple devices is because Apple is unlikely to get acquired or go out of business for the foreseeable future. I wish there were viable alternatives. Android devices are not an option for me, as they are more likely to be abandoned and/or contain Google/manufacturer/carrier malware, and I need to use banking and work apps. In that same vein, I have a preorder for a Framework Laptop because, at least for actual computers, I have the option of not splurging on a non-upgradeable, non-customizable Apple device. We really shouldn’t have to wait for Librarian of Congress-granted exemptions, which can be rescinded at any time and are meaningless with locked-down devices anyway.
- soylentcola 5y agoOddly enough, this is why I stopped buying iOS devices. With my old Android phones/the one Android tablet I got I was able to install something useful and pared-down once they became older and unsupported. They work fine as readers/browsers on my home network or as "fancy" remotes and local-network media players. The only old iOS device I haven't sold/tossed is an iPad 2 which is unbearably slow for most things, and I can neither downgrade the OS or install some lighter alternative. Plus it needs a new 30-pin power cable but I haven't gotten around to buying one because all the other old devices just use one of a pile of USB cables I have stashed around. As far as I'm concerned, at least in terms of repurposing older devices, iOS is like the old consoles where it's essentially stuck once there are no more "official" updates. If it boots Android, there's a decent chance I can install something custom on it years later.
- treesknees 5y agoAs long as that Android device has an unlocked bootloader, or an exploit to bypass the bootloader. The same thing can be said about iOS devices (other than perhaps a lack of 3rd party operating systems to install in the first place.)
- ralmidani 5y agoAll valid points. But I’ve made the mistake of trading in or losing all of my old Android phones which had unlocked bootloaders. Also, installing a phone OS is more intimidating to me than, say, putting Debian on a laptop/desktop. I’m happy to go into a BIOS, play with voltages, overclock, etc. but please don’t ask me to hold some combination of buttons to start a process that can easily brick my phone.
- causi 5y agoI'm really glad for what Carmack did. It's rather sad though, that support was dropped for this headset after only two years. As a reminder, the Oculus Go was released more than a year after the Nintendo Switch.
- baby 5y agoVR is advancing at an incredible pace really, I don't think it's sad.
- gokhan 5y agoCan you give some examples? What was not possible and what's possible now?
- djmips 5y agoIn this particular case, it didn't have full tracking, you could only rotate your head (the 3dof mentioned in another comment). So even at launch it was behind the times. Full tracking is so much better, even required for VR to work.
- baby 5y agoIt's honestly hard to describe to someone who's never tried modern VR, but it basically gives you full immersion. You can watch Netflix in VR, you can move around (if you have enough real-life space), you can grab and play with things surrounding you, it's just so close to real life it's mind blowing. I actually wrote about social experiences (specifically playing boardgames in VR!) within the Go[1], and you can imagine that it has evolved exponentially with the Quest and the Quest 2. I'm not sure how easy it is to get a demo, but look around you maybe malls or some arcade places will have a headset you can try. Or you can spend the $300 to get the Quest 2 :) It's honestly not that much to get a taste of the future. [1]: https://p1x3l.com/story/239/social-virtual-reality-and-the-oculus-go https://p1x3l.com/story/239/social-virtual-reality-and-the-o...
- causi 5y ago
- ajay-b 5y agoNow do the Oculus Quest
- TedShiller 5y agoNOT doing this should be illegal
- Klimentio 5y ago"but damn, getting all the necessary permissions for this involved SO much more effort that you would expect." srsly? He choose facebook, the cancer of our society, to persuite his VR dreams. What did he expect?
- f311a 5y agoI wish Sony to do the same thing for Playstation 4.
- robert_tweed 5y agoI'm going to give this a try later. One small fly in the ointment is that if like me you do not have and do not want to ever have a Facebook account, it will not be possible to load this onto the device after 2022. This is because loading the ADB requires putting the device in developer mode, which in turn requires an internet connection and an active login to your Oculus developer account. Oculus developer accounts have been deprecated and will stop working in 2023, after which time a Facebook account is required.
- flatiron 5y agoYou sure? “In part, the unlocking is an attempt to guarantee that Go hardware will continue to be fully functional well into the future, allowing for "a randomly discovered shrink wrapped headset twenty years from now [to] be able to update to the final software version, long after over-the-air update servers have been shut down," Carmack wrote.”
- robert_tweed 5y agoYes, I am sure. Look at point 2 in the instructions and follow the link. The whole process for putting an Oculus device in developer mode is incredibly fiddly and annoying. You need a verified developer account. You an app running on a phone, which in turn requires an online login. You can't just do it from a desktop PC and you certainly can't flip a toggle on the device itself. Ideally, as a follow-up to this, they will release something that allows putting the device into developer mode without requiring any of that. As of now, that does not exist.
- kotaKat 5y agoI can confirm this, I've done it with mine. Even if you do everything from the bootloader alone, as soon as you unlock the bootloader and the device factory resets, you're required to use the Oculus app to continue setup. I assume you're supposed to unlock the bootloader and... I guess, wait for someone else to release a fully defanged system image?
- gfodor 5y agoGo is a solid piece of kit. No head or hand tracking, but the benefit is low weight and power efficiency. Basically, it's an all-in-one GearVR, which is a solid minimum viable standalone VR headset for lots of things like anything that involves a large virtual TV screen or spectating things like events in VR. Nice to see that it will be an open platform now, which will provide a nice baseline for apps to target who care about ensuring their content is accessible via cheap, open devices.
- foobarbecue 5y agoCool. Now can we please have that for the Quest 2?
- yason 5y agoThis is great as such but it really should be the law.
- snissn 5y agoi think i threw mine out
- pyfan878 5y agoDo you really think that metaverse will gain momentum?
- numpad0 5y agoAnyone tried this on an newly unboxed or at least a wiped Go? I think I had to go through pairing and activation before enabling adb on Go, which instruction says is required.