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I personally believe that VR headsets will become increasingly popular in the future due to their many different use cases. However, looking from an outsider's

I personally believe that VR headsets will become increasingly popular in the future due to their many different use cases. However, looking from an outsider's perspective, it doesn't seem like Meta has used their $30 billion investment efficiently. While their research demos are impressive, it's hard to justify such a massive investment for what we've seen so far. Furthermore, Meta may have reason to worry about Apple's upcoming VR headset, which is rumored to have significantly better specs and enable users to perform tasks that the current Quest headset can't. For example, the rumored 4k screens could potentially serve as a viable replacement for monitors, the M1 silicon could deliver much better graphics, etc. Additionally, Apple's ecosystem is likely to attract a larger number of developers to create more applications. Because the rumored price of Apple's headset is so high ($3000), Meta may still have some time to cement themselves as the VR company. I can't help but wonder if the situation will end up playing out similarly to the release of smartwatches for Android vs the Apple Watch. Android smartwatches hit the market first, but Apple ultimately took over the industry after releasing their product.

shubb 3y ago
Kind of agree kind of don't. Stuff like 4k screens is a case of buying the slightly more expensive off the shelf components. Although I'm sure apple has its special sauce, it's just a case of engineering to a different cost. 8k headsets have been out for years. What the research should be yielding is deep technological innovation in lense and rendering design, gesture recognition and ideally a developer tools ecosystem. This is what we are seeing in the demos but it has not translated into the current product. To give an apple vs Samsung example, either company can choose to buy a larger battery from LG and have longer artery life, but only by replicating the billions Apple poured into developing a custom chip design can you match the iPhone performance at cost and size. Something Samsung recently accepted it has to do. So I think that, if the product category works out the investment is fine. The problem is that at the moment we have a Google situation. You know, inventing LLMs and then watching microsoft productize them. Over the next couple years, FB either uses its research to produce a product apple can't match, or bust on the whole thing.

shubb 3y ago

Kind of agree kind of don't. Stuff like 4k screens is a case of buying the slightly more expensive off the shelf components. Although I'm sure apple has its special sauce, it's just a case of engineering to a different cost. 8k headsets have been out for years. What the research should be yielding is deep technological innovation in lense and rendering design, gesture recognition and ideally a developer tools ecosystem. This is what we are seeing in the demos but it has not translated into the current product. To give an apple vs Samsung example, either company can choose to buy a larger battery from LG and have longer artery life, but only by replicating the billions Apple poured into developing a custom chip design can you match the iPhone performance at cost and size. Something Samsung recently accepted it has to do. So I think that, if the product category works out the investment is fine. The problem is that at the moment we have a Google situation. You know, inventing LLMs and then watching microsoft productize them. Over the next couple years, FB either uses its research to produce a product apple can't match, or bust on the whole thing.