5 ms·

This has happened. You can pick up an oculus quest 2 for $150-$200 on Craigslist in most major US metros.

pdimitar 5y ago
Those are not glasses.
vehemenz 5y ago
I think this speaks more to their decline and gimmicky quality than their ubiquity. People try it out VR, have fun, and are over it quickly. If we look on Steam, less than 5% of users have a VR headset. And Steam users are outliers already. There are probably more CRT monitors in use than VR headsets.
- ahelwer 5y ago
  I don't know, I really think we're at an inflection point with VR. People have realized nobody will buy a tethered headset, so things are either streamed over wifi from your computer or compute is on board; both work really well. Screens are getting extremely high-res and high-refresh for not that much money. You don't need a very powerful computer to drive them unless you're gaming, and the real killer app is replacing your work setup. I think of that photo of the dude from 1980 with all the electronics equipment - microphone, camcorder, disc player, mobile TV, boombox, etc. - things that are all replaced by a smartphone everyone carries in their pocket. I think it'll be the same with my home office: desk, chair, monitors, monitor stand, microphone, webcam, computer - all will be replaced by a VR headset. The only thing it doesn't replace are input devices like keyboard & mouse, and pointing devices might get replaced by eye tracking. A common prediction is that the majority of knowledge workers will be in VR full time by the end of the decade, which honestly seems reasonable to me.
  - withinboredom 5y ago
    I think before anyone will be spending a day in VR, they’ll need to solve the motion sickness problem. I know people who puke within 30s of being in VR, violently.
  - vehemenz 5y ago
    You could be right. It's just a little less obvious to me what problem VR solves, as opposed to the other technologies you mentioned.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  Yeah people are very image conscious, as long as you look like robocop nobody is going to wear that stuff. It's fun to goof with, and maybe gamers will be okay with it in their basements and dens but it's not going to be "Ubiquitous until it's Inconspicuous"™.
  - sangnoir 5y ago
    > It's fun to goof with, and maybe gamers will be okay with it in their basements and dens but it's not going to be "Ubiquitous until it's Inconspicuous"™. Or - hear me out - you could market the shit out of it until it's no longer goofy. Take Bluetooth headsets as an example - they used to be tacky and the users would appear obnoxious by default, until Apple made them white and expensive, and marketed them as aspirational products.
theshrike79 5y ago
$200 is cheap enough, but it's still not sharp enough to replace a half-decent monitor.
- ahelwer 5y ago
  It's plenty sharp. I'm typing this on the quest 2 right now. Hard to tell exactly but the virtual monitor seems to have resolution better than 1080p at least. I use 23" 4k monitors IRL so it's a downgrade in that respect, but the flexibility is interesting. I'm also looking forward to UI innovations moving beyond the desktop screen paradigm. Like each window floating in 3D space, stuff like that.

Those are not glasses.

I think this speaks more to their decline and gimmicky quality than their ubiquity. People try it out VR, have fun, and are over it quickly. If we look on Steam, less than 5% of users have a VR headset. And Steam users are outliers already. There are probably more CRT monitors in use than VR headsets.

ahelwer 5y ago
I don't know, I really think we're at an inflection point with VR. People have realized nobody will buy a tethered headset, so things are either streamed over wifi from your computer or compute is on board; both work really well. Screens are getting extremely high-res and high-refresh for not that much money. You don't need a very powerful computer to drive them unless you're gaming, and the real killer app is replacing your work setup. I think of that photo of the dude from 1980 with all the electronics equipment - microphone, camcorder, disc player, mobile TV, boombox, etc. - things that are all replaced by a smartphone everyone carries in their pocket. I think it'll be the same with my home office: desk, chair, monitors, monitor stand, microphone, webcam, computer - all will be replaced by a VR headset. The only thing it doesn't replace are input devices like keyboard & mouse, and pointing devices might get replaced by eye tracking. A common prediction is that the majority of knowledge workers will be in VR full time by the end of the decade, which honestly seems reasonable to me.
- withinboredom 5y ago
  I think before anyone will be spending a day in VR, they’ll need to solve the motion sickness problem. I know people who puke within 30s of being in VR, violently.
- vehemenz 5y ago
  You could be right. It's just a little less obvious to me what problem VR solves, as opposed to the other technologies you mentioned.
stjohnswarts 5y ago
Yeah people are very image conscious, as long as you look like robocop nobody is going to wear that stuff. It's fun to goof with, and maybe gamers will be okay with it in their basements and dens but it's not going to be "Ubiquitous until it's Inconspicuous"™.
- sangnoir 5y ago
  > It's fun to goof with, and maybe gamers will be okay with it in their basements and dens but it's not going to be "Ubiquitous until it's Inconspicuous"™. Or - hear me out - you could market the shit out of it until it's no longer goofy. Take Bluetooth headsets as an example - they used to be tacky and the users would appear obnoxious by default, until Apple made them white and expensive, and marketed them as aspirational products.

theshrike79 5y ago

$200 is cheap enough, but it's still not sharp enough to replace a half-decent monitor.

ahelwer 5y ago
It's plenty sharp. I'm typing this on the quest 2 right now. Hard to tell exactly but the virtual monitor seems to have resolution better than 1080p at least. I use 23" 4k monitors IRL so it's a downgrade in that respect, but the flexibility is interesting. I'm also looking forward to UI innovations moving beyond the desktop screen paradigm. Like each window floating in 3D space, stuff like that.