7 ms·

Anyone remember that Next Big Thing was supposed to be 3D TVs? I think VR is similarly misguided (ie, will never go mainstream but will have a healthy niche).

stingraycharles 5y ago
VR seems more interactive and way stickier, I don’t think you can necessarily compare it to 3D TVs, in the same way a computer and TV are very different. Having said that, I’m also skeptical of the whole metaverse thing, as we had that stuff a long time ago already (Second Life) and it was a flop. VR needs to become extremely ubiquitous and hassle-free for such a thing to work.
- pratnala 5y ago
  Idk if it is just me but I find VR headsets just tiring after a point.
  - tentacleuno 5y ago
    Quite a few people do here. I doubt I could wear them for extended periods either. I personally have to take a break after wearing headphones for a few hours, I couldn't imagine wearing a VR headset of all things.
- tentacleuno 5y ago
  > as we had that stuff a long time ago already (Second Life) and it was a flop A flop? I remember watching a documentary a while back saying some people were totally addicted to it. I'm not sure if they're still afloat these days, though. Might go the way of Playstation Home (which I genuinely liked!).
  - wayoutthere 5y ago
    Most of the draw was that you could design your own avatar. There were a lot of furries.
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    I'm sure that you can find people who are huge fans (addicted as a news article might call them) to any technology or gaming product. The world is huge. There are, for example, people who loved Windows Phone and Zune. But just because a product has a fanatical core doesn't mean it'll eventually take off - or even maintain viability.
  - jpindar 5y ago
    Second Life is still active almost 20 years later, I don't know why people keep using the past tense.
  - throwaway6532 5y ago
    >I remember watching a documentary a while back saying some people were totally addicted to it not necessarily a good thing
brtkdotse 5y ago
A non-trivial percentage of the population get motion sickness easily. VR is a non-starter for them.
- prometheus76 5y ago
  Then there's the sweating and the standing in the middle of the room for hours(?) and the weird, clunky, dissociated controls.
- jhanschoo 5y ago
  I think this is something that can be solved with more investment into electronics, alternative optics and display (e.g. Google-glass style display), as well as UX research.
  - brtkdotse 5y ago
    I don’t see how. Motion sickness is a discrepancy between visual stimulus and signals from the vestibular system. If you show people motion and the don’t feel the motion, they will get motion sickness (to varying degree)
    - jhanschoo 5y ago
      There are many VR applications that don't need to move the view separately from user input. Exercise programs for example, and a lot of office telepresence probably falls into this.
- zmmmmm 5y ago
  I'd be curious what that percentage is now. The tech has improved enormously, as have developers understanding of what to avoid software-wise. Not a single person (dozens) I have shared my Quest with had this problem.
  - brtkdotse 5y ago
    Cursory googling says 1/3 of population
hyperbovine 5y ago
I think this is a great analogy in that there are fundamental physiological limits on how much 3D TV the human body wants to watch, and the answer is “not much”. All the VR/AR products I have seen fall into the same boat—a bit of a lark to use for an hour or so, beyond that, no thanks. It is a fundamentally different experience than reading a screen or listening to earbuds, and I don’t mean that in a good way.
- zmmmmm 5y ago
  > It is a fundamentally different experience than reading a screen It's an interesting thing to say because, one of the pending killer apps for VR is liberating us from our clunky rectangular meatworld screens that can't travel with us. It's still too low resolution now in affordable hardware, but it's at a tipping point and it is going to be quite exciting to see it cross that. I wouldn't rule out that in 5 years from now, a sizeable percentage of the professional computing workforce is using VR just for this reason alone.
  - sekh60 5y ago
    Then we can cram people into even smaller cubicles.
    - xmcqdpt2 5y ago
      Bold of you to assume you'll get the minimal privacy of a cubicle's partitions. The VR office is probably going to be open concept, like a bunch or chairs in a room.
      - lambic 5y ago
        Comfy chairs at least?
        traviscj 5y ago
        BYOC :-(
verinus 5y ago
First thing I thought about too. Metaverse is not a utopia but a dystopia! edit: typo
dwaite 5y ago
3D has come and gone many times over the history of cinema, from the red/cyan glasses, the (Pulfrich) glasses with a single shaded lens, shuttered glasses and polarized screens. While the image quality and frame rate have improved, there are still fundamental limitations on the technology. One common pushback is that some people will get headaches due to scanning the scene, trying to focus on objects at their false depths. 3D film is a pain, way more than double the work. So most 3D content actually was made 3D in post rather than filming with multiple cameras. Still, the way you would frame a scene to be 'interesting' in 3D is different from how you would do so in 2D. This usually results in being able to 'tell' whether a movie you are watching was primarily made for one market or another. VR adds something other than image quality - it adds the ability to be immersed in the content. However you still have the same issues: - So far, we don't have consumer headsets that enable you to actually focus on the objects in the scene. For example, you can't hold a piece of paper up to your face to read the fine print. - Trying to capture certain kinds of media is infeasibly expensive in VR, both from a post-production cost perspective and a data size expectation. Live action basically is too difficult. The latest incarnation of 3D movies were in a sense a clever business maneuver - it created a premium tier of movie experience and got many theaters to start upgrading their older projection equipment and screens to newer digital alternatives. For home use, 3D movies were weird because they didn't follow the traditional hype curve. A lot of early adoption was by families, where unfortunately the shutter glasses still tended to be too expensive for young hands. But that market has the same thing - manufacturers will eventually take technology and reduce it down to cost, so how can you compel people to buy the newest fancy screen where you still have a good margin? Note several television manufacturers are now trying to proceed advertising and sales revenue, which is why smart TVs have now taken over - a 15-30% cut on a HBO Max subscription adds up to real money quickly over their typically poor margins on the sale of the set.
- littlecranky67 5y ago
  100% agree with your point. I don't believe in a broad VR future. A movie, just as an open-world video game, lives of its content and storyline. I watched Avatar in 3D and it was great, but not because it was 3D, because it is a good movie. Even in 2D this would be very enjoyable. Same holds true for video games. I don't think Witcher 3 would have significant more success if it was in VR or the experience would be orders of magnitudes better just because of VR. Same as any shitty game with bad story, unlovely crafted characters etc. will not be good just because it is VR. If the Metaverse means I can watch hatespeech + antivaxx posts, pictures of peoples lunch on a 3D canvas or cat videos, I pass.
emsy 5y ago
The first part of your reply doesn't line up with the second. In what way are 3D TVs a healthy niche? They are mostly dead. I also can't remember anyone actually using their 3D TV or buying a TV because of its 3D capabilities (most TVs at that time had the feature anyway). Whereas stores stocked up on Quest during the holidays because of demand. I don't think your reply accurately describes reality.
bin_bash 5y ago
> Anyone remember that Next Big Thing was supposed to be 3D TVs? No. I remember TV companies pushing it since it was cheap for them to include and they hoped people would think of it as the "Next Big Thing", but consumers and especially reviewers during the aughts saw right through it. Even in the 90's I remember it being seen as a short-lived novelty more than anything: https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-05-02-9705020368-story.html https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-05-02-970502... Regardless what you think of VR I think there are clearly far more bulls than 3D TV ever had.
DebtDeflation 5y ago
Also, this isn't the first go round with VR. Google Glass launched publicly in 2014 and the original Oculus Rift launched in 2016. I remember tons of discussions around enterprise adoption of VR in 2016-2017 with use cases ranging from immersive marketing campaigns to technicians using them to troubleshoot equipment.

stingraycharles 5y ago

VR seems more interactive and way stickier, I don’t think you can necessarily compare it to 3D TVs, in the same way a computer and TV are very different. Having said that, I’m also skeptical of the whole metaverse thing, as we had that stuff a long time ago already (Second Life) and it was a flop. VR needs to become extremely ubiquitous and hassle-free for such a thing to work.

pratnala 5y ago
Idk if it is just me but I find VR headsets just tiring after a point.
- tentacleuno 5y ago
  Quite a few people do here. I doubt I could wear them for extended periods either. I personally have to take a break after wearing headphones for a few hours, I couldn't imagine wearing a VR headset of all things.
tentacleuno 5y ago
> as we had that stuff a long time ago already (Second Life) and it was a flop A flop? I remember watching a documentary a while back saying some people were totally addicted to it. I'm not sure if they're still afloat these days, though. Might go the way of Playstation Home (which I genuinely liked!).
- wayoutthere 5y ago
  Most of the draw was that you could design your own avatar. There were a lot of furries.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  I'm sure that you can find people who are huge fans (addicted as a news article might call them) to any technology or gaming product. The world is huge. There are, for example, people who loved Windows Phone and Zune. But just because a product has a fanatical core doesn't mean it'll eventually take off - or even maintain viability.
- jpindar 5y ago
  Second Life is still active almost 20 years later, I don't know why people keep using the past tense.
- throwaway6532 5y ago
  >I remember watching a documentary a while back saying some people were totally addicted to it not necessarily a good thing

brtkdotse 5y ago

A non-trivial percentage of the population get motion sickness easily. VR is a non-starter for them.

prometheus76 5y ago
Then there's the sweating and the standing in the middle of the room for hours(?) and the weird, clunky, dissociated controls.
jhanschoo 5y ago
I think this is something that can be solved with more investment into electronics, alternative optics and display (e.g. Google-glass style display), as well as UX research.
- brtkdotse 5y ago
  I don’t see how. Motion sickness is a discrepancy between visual stimulus and signals from the vestibular system. If you show people motion and the don’t feel the motion, they will get motion sickness (to varying degree)
  - jhanschoo 5y ago
    There are many VR applications that don't need to move the view separately from user input. Exercise programs for example, and a lot of office telepresence probably falls into this.
zmmmmm 5y ago
I'd be curious what that percentage is now. The tech has improved enormously, as have developers understanding of what to avoid software-wise. Not a single person (dozens) I have shared my Quest with had this problem.
- brtkdotse 5y ago
  Cursory googling says 1/3 of population

hyperbovine 5y ago

I think this is a great analogy in that there are fundamental physiological limits on how much 3D TV the human body wants to watch, and the answer is “not much”. All the VR/AR products I have seen fall into the same boat—a bit of a lark to use for an hour or so, beyond that, no thanks. It is a fundamentally different experience than reading a screen or listening to earbuds, and I don’t mean that in a good way.

zmmmmm 5y ago
> It is a fundamentally different experience than reading a screen It's an interesting thing to say because, one of the pending killer apps for VR is liberating us from our clunky rectangular meatworld screens that can't travel with us. It's still too low resolution now in affordable hardware, but it's at a tipping point and it is going to be quite exciting to see it cross that. I wouldn't rule out that in 5 years from now, a sizeable percentage of the professional computing workforce is using VR just for this reason alone.
- sekh60 5y ago
  Then we can cram people into even smaller cubicles.
  - xmcqdpt2 5y ago
    Bold of you to assume you'll get the minimal privacy of a cubicle's partitions. The VR office is probably going to be open concept, like a bunch or chairs in a room.
    - lambic 5y ago
      Comfy chairs at least?
      - traviscj 5y ago
        BYOC :-(

verinus 5y ago

First thing I thought about too. Metaverse is not a utopia but a dystopia! edit: typo

dwaite 5y ago

3D has come and gone many times over the history of cinema, from the red/cyan glasses, the (Pulfrich) glasses with a single shaded lens, shuttered glasses and polarized screens. While the image quality and frame rate have improved, there are still fundamental limitations on the technology. One common pushback is that some people will get headaches due to scanning the scene, trying to focus on objects at their false depths. 3D film is a pain, way more than double the work. So most 3D content actually was made 3D in post rather than filming with multiple cameras. Still, the way you would frame a scene to be 'interesting' in 3D is different from how you would do so in 2D. This usually results in being able to 'tell' whether a movie you are watching was primarily made for one market or another. VR adds something other than image quality - it adds the ability to be immersed in the content. However you still have the same issues: - So far, we don't have consumer headsets that enable you to actually focus on the objects in the scene. For example, you can't hold a piece of paper up to your face to read the fine print. - Trying to capture certain kinds of media is infeasibly expensive in VR, both from a post-production cost perspective and a data size expectation. Live action basically is too difficult. The latest incarnation of 3D movies were in a sense a clever business maneuver - it created a premium tier of movie experience and got many theaters to start upgrading their older projection equipment and screens to newer digital alternatives. For home use, 3D movies were weird because they didn't follow the traditional hype curve. A lot of early adoption was by families, where unfortunately the shutter glasses still tended to be too expensive for young hands. But that market has the same thing - manufacturers will eventually take technology and reduce it down to cost, so how can you compel people to buy the newest fancy screen where you still have a good margin? Note several television manufacturers are now trying to proceed advertising and sales revenue, which is why smart TVs have now taken over - a 15-30% cut on a HBO Max subscription adds up to real money quickly over their typically poor margins on the sale of the set.

littlecranky67 5y ago
100% agree with your point. I don't believe in a broad VR future. A movie, just as an open-world video game, lives of its content and storyline. I watched Avatar in 3D and it was great, but not because it was 3D, because it is a good movie. Even in 2D this would be very enjoyable. Same holds true for video games. I don't think Witcher 3 would have significant more success if it was in VR or the experience would be orders of magnitudes better just because of VR. Same as any shitty game with bad story, unlovely crafted characters etc. will not be good just because it is VR. If the Metaverse means I can watch hatespeech + antivaxx posts, pictures of peoples lunch on a 3D canvas or cat videos, I pass.

emsy 5y ago

The first part of your reply doesn't line up with the second. In what way are 3D TVs a healthy niche? They are mostly dead. I also can't remember anyone actually using their 3D TV or buying a TV because of its 3D capabilities (most TVs at that time had the feature anyway). Whereas stores stocked up on Quest during the holidays because of demand. I don't think your reply accurately describes reality.

bin_bash 5y ago

> Anyone remember that Next Big Thing was supposed to be 3D TVs? No. I remember TV companies pushing it since it was cheap for them to include and they hoped people would think of it as the "Next Big Thing", but consumers and especially reviewers during the aughts saw right through it. Even in the 90's I remember it being seen as a short-lived novelty more than anything: https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-05-02-9705020368-story.html https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-05-02-970502... Regardless what you think of VR I think there are clearly far more bulls than 3D TV ever had.

DebtDeflation 5y ago

Also, this isn't the first go round with VR. Google Glass launched publicly in 2014 and the original Oculus Rift launched in 2016. I remember tons of discussions around enterprise adoption of VR in 2016-2017 with use cases ranging from immersive marketing campaigns to technicians using them to troubleshoot equipment.