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Damn! I don't like this. I had hoped they jump in bed with valve. Yes, I just really dislike facebook, so I hate to see them aquiring something i was really e
by lawl 13y ago
Damn! I don't like this.
I had hoped they jump in bed with valve.
Yes, I just really dislike facebook, so I hate to see them aquiring something i was really excited about.
Also from the article:
> After games, we're going to make Oculus a platform for many other experiences. Imagine enjoying a court side seat at a game, studying in a classroom of students and teachers all over the world or consulting with a doctor face-to-face -- just by putting on goggles in your home.
Nah, I'd rather not, thank you. I prefer to actually visit my doctor where facebook doesn't get all the data about it.
- hueving 13y agoBut how else will you automate the update to your Facebook page about your herpes treatment?
- sudont 13y agoIndeed. I preordered the DK2, but I'm not sure if I should try to get a refund. I'm not on Facebook, and I don't want to develop for their platform. Although, one of the ideas was to replicate DFW's "samizdat" as an art project. Something tells me Facebook wouldn't look kindly on it pulling all your friend data to entertain you to death.
- 1qaz2wsx3edc 13y agoI'm in the same boat, I'm going to wait a couple days, but I'm very tempted to cancel my preorder.
- serge2k 13y agoI already sent an emailing asking how to cancel. If it turns out to be good I'll get one. Not bothering to preorder though. No need to risk money supporting the company now.
- thisisrobv 13y agoI think this is what makes me hate this purchase. The most interesting part of Oculus to me was the "open-ness" of the platform. They were seemingly doing an amazing job of getting developers interested in the platform. I'd argue that Facebook does a pretty terrible job on both fronts.
- venomsnake 13y agoI have tried to develop app for facebook. Just terrible experience.
- 72deluxe 13y agoI wrote one for allowing an external site to automatically post info to a wall. It wasn't too bad, with oauth and all that. But that's the only reason I have a Facebook account.
- olouv 13y agoSame here, I've already sent an email regarding a refund. I had big dreams for this company, it just feels wrong. I'm not happy to see theses conglomerates grow uncontrolled, sucking up the spirit of innovation and openness that are so critical to our future.
- 72deluxe 13y agoNot trying to be argumentative, but is a VR helmet really critical to our future? Is it on the same level as food and poverty and peace?
- thenomad 13y agoTechnological advancements have a funny way of producing important side-benefits. A change as massive as VR - we simply don't know how big a deal it is. For example, as one of the smaller potential side-effects, imagine VR became good enough that there was no practical reason to have people travel for face-to-face meetings. That would have a significant knock-on effect (closing on single-digit percentile worldwide) on carbon emissions, global warming, and potentially catastrophic climate change.
- 72deluxe 13y agoTeleconferencing is currently very possible, including video to video or voice to voice, but this hasn't stopped people travelling around. I am not so sure that VR will suddenly be the thing to take off in this regard; if people aren't happy sat in front of a camera for a meeting, will they be happy wearing a headset?
- nailer 13y agoCan you explain Shamzidat more? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_Jest http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_Jest doesn't have much. Thanks!
- necubi 13y agoThe samizdat refers to a film (after which Infinite Jest is named). This film is so entertaining that, once seen, a viewer will want to do nothing but continue watching it, endlessly. (Also, IJ is a great novel.)
- sudont 13y ago"The Entertainment" was a video tape in the book that "so entertaining to its viewers that they lose all interest in anything other than viewing it and thus eventually die." Depending on your scholarly beliefs, it's either just a metaphor for addiction, or in addition, a critique on media and media consumption. I chose to believe the latter, in that it could stand to be a critique on how our pastimes are intentionally becoming more engaging and addicting. I'm not sure on the visual representation, but the thing would have been a Rauchenberg-ian collage of video, text and audio, layered together and becoming more "recommended" for the user, based on physical cues from the physical input devices, as well as choices. The actual recommendation algorithm would have been relatively primitive, most likely a decision tree, or if I could figure it out, an ensemble algorithm that would have created better media recommendations in real time to show to the viewer from trending topics, imgur, youtube, that type of junk.
- jobigoud 13y agoDitto. I just preordered the DK2 yesterday and don't have a facebook account. Don't want to have to do anything with them. Shit.
- hjnilsson 13y agoIt's in one way sad how the stupendous amount of money available to the giants in this business makes them able to acquire any potential competitors. The only ones not being acquired are those who have the ambition to be giants themselves (Dropbox, Snapchat), it seems this was not the goal of Oculus. So now it'll just become another tentacle of the Facebook Empire. Although I guess this is how most other businesses operate too. Finding a hit product allows you to become a multi-millionaire, but if you want to become a billionaire you have to have conviction as well. (Which has considerable risk as you might be killed. I can certainly imagine myself selling out when a billion-dollar deal is on the table, so I'm not saying it's a bad move to sell out, it's just sort of sad)
- pjmlp 13y ago> Yes, I just really dislike facebook, so I hate to see them aquiring something i was really excited about. What about Oculus VR ? They could have said no.
- socceroos 13y agoAre you sure? What did you know of their situation (financial, etc)?
- pjmlp 13y agoIt doesn't matter. OP was putting the blame on Facebook, where a deal has always a signature from all involved parties. Regardless of their situation, one can always say no. It is a matter of convictions and being able to live with the consequences. Apparently, getting money was more important.
- WalterSear 13y agoThere's no way they could be wanting for investors. There's likely to be more to this deal than meets the eye.
- andruby 13y agoI just checked my calendar to see if it was April 1st. What a low amount of money for the purposed future of gaming. I wonder how John Carmack will like his new freedom under Zuck's reign.
- selmnoo 13y agoI am shattered right now. I was so happy for Oculus VR, I wanted it to become big, I wanted it to become something truly special. And now this happens. I'm horrified and speechless. This is the day I stop cheering for Oculus VR and get behind Sony's Morpheus: http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/19/tech/gaming-gadgets/sony-morpheus-virtual-reality/ http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/19/tech/gaming-gadgets/sony-morph... Notch on this deal: "We were in talks about maybe bringing a version of Minecraft to Oculus. I just cancelled that deal. Facebook creeps me out." (https://twitter.com/notch/status/448586381565390848 https://twitter.com/notch/status/448586381565390848). Oh God why did this have to happen
- s3r3nity 13y ago>I am shattered right now. Oh come on -- this is just ridiculous. They (Oculus) now have many many more times the resources at their disposal than before to make countless imaginative projects. I know i'll get down votes for saying this, but if Google was the buyer, there would be much more positive comments here. Use some rational analysis here, folks.
- pyrocat 13y agoYeah... because Google has experience with this sort of project. It's in Google's wheelhouse, so to speak.
- sehr 13y agoIt's in Google's wheelhouse now, it wouldn't have been six or seven years ago. Give it a chance, the overreactions in this thread and in general are ridiculous.
- socceroos 13y agoNice use of words. Define overreaction. How about I be specific: most of the comments in this thread seem entirely justified to me.
- s3r3nity 13y agoEh, this is the type of sensationalist comment that disappoints me when it makes it to the top of the comments list, because you offer no real commentary outside of "I just really dislike facebook" -- proving there is a circle-jerk of hate on FB in the HN community. >I prefer to actually visit my doctor where facebook doesn't get all the data about it. Until you use a self-hosted email client, self-hosted calendar server, a dumb phone (i.e. not a smartphone like android) , etc. -- Google and/or some other company already is "getting" the data about your doctor and you. The way I interpreted this, I think about all the cases where open communication is increasingly fostered. Imagine someone like Snowden being able to communicate with his girlfriend again; imagine traveling across the world, and having your mom/pop see what you are seeing. THAT's the cool stuff/ideas we should be upvoting.
- incision 13y agoSame. My initial reaction is to hate this. After thinking it over briefly I still hate it. I think I'm going to look to Carmack as my proxy. If he jumps ship, the whole thing is surely tainted.
- axylone 13y agoI'm very interested to see what Carmack does. I hope the whole team moves to Valve or something, and this doesn't set back VR another 10 years.
- nosequel 13y agoI expect Carmack got some pretty shiny golden handcuffs in the deal, I wouldn't expect him to jump ship anytime soon.
- WalterSear 13y agoHe doesn't seem like the type who would be wanting for money.
- aeberbach 13y agoI expect Carmack is the sort of guy to say "fuck your golden handcuffs, I'd rather work on interesting problems". If it turns bad he'd go.
- briantakita 13y agoI expect he will have a similar situation that Ray Kurzweil has at Google.
- mkull 13y agoWhat does that mean?
- zacharypinter 13y agoPresumably that having the resources (servers and infrastructure, devs, designers, researchers, business connections, data, etc) available at the parent company is a bigger incentive than running things yourself (even if you have the financial means to do so).
- marvin 13y agoLook on the bright side - now you can actually buy a stake in Oculus! Albeit at a ridiculous premium.
- DEinspanjer 13y agoWow.. I came to the comments page wanting to express my disappointment. I really wasn't expecting to see so many other people sharing the sentiment. I thought I was one of the last people in existence who deleted their Facebook account years ago and left it deleted. :)
- phusion 13y agoNo, it's terrible for everyone. I'm quite sad for the same reasons. The openness, the possibilities... (sigh) maybe someone else will take the torch.
- vhost- 13y agoSame boat here. I can't escape Facebook and Google. I use something, it get acquired by one of them. I'm glad I'm not alone.
- gtremper 13y agoNope, you have the cool/hip/popular opinion. Like hating country music or Nickleback.
- xbadxapple 13y agoI haven't deleted it, but for me the problem lies somewhere else: The tech-sector is slowly growing into an oligopoly or at least that's my impression. I expect it to be diversified but deals like this leave me questioning and yes, they make me a bit sad. Perhaps the Oculus guys can use the resources Facebook will flow into them but...I have a bad feeling about this. Really.
- rodgerd 13y agoSlowly? The waves of patent and copyright attacks unleashed on Google are basically the giants who were born in the 70s and early 80s (Microsoft, Apple, and Oracle) trying their damndest to make sure no-one will ever grow in the shadows they cast.
- jfoster 13y agoI think it's going the other way. Remember that circa 2000, consumer tech was a monopoly. Now there are quite a few big players. Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, etc.
- greyskull 13y agoI can also see them creating a commerce platform. Companies create some sort of VR marketplace where customers can log in and view products. For example, you're shopping for a car. Instead of going to a dealer you put on the goggles and see models and options. Nvidia would love to get in on that; offload 3D model generation to one of their GPU compute clusters. Facebook gets either a bulk payment up front or some percentage of sales; basically like advertising space. Just a thought.
- bashcoder 13y agoTo make matters worse, people who get this news while wearing an Oculus Rift headset can't even do a proper facepalm.
- anigbrowl 13y agoSounds like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Palms http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Palms waiting to happen.
- TrainedMonkey 13y agoThis was my first reaction as well, however we have to remember Carmack is there. I am confident that he will not let original spirit of Rift die. I am sure you will be able to use Rift without Facebook account and device will be quite hackable. In any case, I think we should wait and see what Facebook does before crying foul.
- Perseids 13y agoWhat has "too long, didn't read" come to mean nowadays? Your dl:dr version is not significantly shorter than the 2 lines above and it is also not a summary.
- TrainedMonkey 13y agoGood point, edited the post.
- wildermuthn 13y agoI'm thrilled. This is a brilliant move designed to bring world-shattering high-quality VR to the entire planet. Consider: Facebook has one of the largest user bases on the planet. Facebook has vast amounts of capital. Facebook has just demonstrated how important they believe VR to be. With Facebook's users, money, and engineering talent, VR is about to arrive earlier, faster, and better than anyone could imagine. I plan on buying Facebook stock immediately.
- jobigoud 13y agoConsidering almost everyone hates on Facebook and is sort of forced into it due to the network effect, I wouldn't call this move brilliant.
- AUmrysh 13y agoIt is brilliant on Facebook's part. They know they are widely loathed among internet users. They can use this Oculus acquisition to show the world that they aren't just some evil creepy web site with no regard for anything but their own profits.
- MrZongle2 13y agoMaybe this will push Valve to reconsider turning their internal VR headset into a consumer product.
- techwatching 13y agoOk, so the hardware landgrab is in full effect. But... Facebook? Facebook is going to be competing with Sony? How does this line up with their competencies? With the track record they have with phones, I'm not holding my breath here. On the other hand, would you rather Google had bought them and siphoned off their team and energy into the Googleplex as they have done with other startups? Or - could Oculus have joined the Xbox team as a foil to Morpheus (http://techwatching.com/tag/morpheus http://techwatching.com/tag/morpheus)?
- jobigoud 13y agoWhy do they have to sell to anyone? Can't a company live on its own these days? They had everyone cheering up behind them.
- techwatching 13y agoFor sure; maybe the saw the writing on the wall though - i.e.: its hard for an independent to compete with Sony / MSFT / whatever other MegaCos enter the fray in terms of development resources, manufacturing scale, leverage with studios etc. If you think about it, how would Oculus have been able to finance a major production push (millions of units)? On the flip side, competing like that might have been difficult --- but not impossible. The world needs more organizations willing to stand on their own two feet and try
- dcre 13y agoIt's not as though the doctor and classroom ideas weren't already in Oculus's plans. I too am wary of Facebook handling all of this data, but they also have an nearly unparalleled ability to make it happen.
- marcamillion 13y agoI would say that at the very least, we should give Carmack the benefit of the doubt. He has proven to be a visionary and able to execute on all manner of awesome tech for many years. If he leaves shortly after this acquisition, then we know something is amiss. If he stays, then it should be for a very valid reason - i.e. that they can probably do much more inside of FB than outside. Keep in mind he was independently wealthy before, so it's likely that he wasn't as tempted by money as say the founders were (assuming that they weren't independently wealthy - which I don't know if they are).
- deletes 13y agoI think for Carmack the situation is the same as when Id was acquired by Zenimax. So for anyone curious just look what happened then. He doesn't care, as long he can work on the stuff he wants to and he left Id because he couldn't do that( work on VR ). If he leaves Facebook, the reasons will be similar.
- morbius 13y agoI'm pretty sure this sums up what Facebook is going to do with Oculus: "Imagine sharing not just moments with your friends online, but entire experiences and adventures." Yep, it's farked for good now. I'm heartbroken beyond words right now. I was so excited for the future of VR by an indie, open company. But no... I suppose we'll have to settle with Morpheus. I am, in one word: upset.
- 31reasons 13y agoDamn I just bought DK2 2 days ago, what do I do now?
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- qq66 13y agoThere could be interesting applications of this. What if the doctors were all linked in a group through Facebook (this sounds unlikely, they have their own professional networking tools, but suspend disbelief for a moment). The patient is a mother experiencing pregnancy complications, stuck a remote area of Alaska, in an Oculus conference with a doctor in Seattle. Her doctor diagnoses her and uses the network to find a specialist in the specific condition. Turns out there's one in Portugal, and at an appropriate time the Portuguese doctor joins the Oculus conference. The two doctors work together to make a recommendation for the patient. Like a videoconference that actually feels like a meeting (a holy grail for decades) This is the kind of application that would be best pursued by an independent company, but is certainly more likely from Facebook than from Valve.
- toufka 13y ago>What if the doctors were all linked in a group through Facebook Fortunately, other professions hold privacy in high enough regard not to sell their clients' information to the highest bidder. And this is precisely why this announcement is so disappointin; this scenario explicitly will not happen via the Oculus product. It will require yet another round of innovation in the VR space because no doctor worth their salt would use a facebook product with their patients' privacy at stake.
- ilovecookies 13y agoCouldnt agree more! I'd I'm kind of fed up with the constant exposure... Really looked forward to oculus vr not anymore though.
- igl 13y agoAnd next week Facebook buys Valve. Computers are ruined forever.
- GreaterFool 13y agoI'm pretty sure Valve can make their own VR headset if they want to -- didn't Sony do just that with Project Morpheus? There's also Avegant; their focus is different but the tech seems awesome.
- SixSigma 13y agoAlso : Imagine - me and my doctor can talk face to face while both wearing goggles. Sounds great! I'd rather use Skype thanks.
- 72deluxe 13y agoSkype haha contention land "It definitely looks like your pixel has been infected with another pixel! I'll prescribe you some cream" (perhaps that's just the Android experience with Skype) Everyone at Microsoft would enjoy snooping on horrible illnesses.
- SixSigma 13y ago:) I was ignoring the privacy aspect, it was more the goggles-to-goggles, someone hasn't thought that through.
- nooneelse 13y agoThe first thing I usually think when I start a video call with someone is "is there some way I can automatically block the view of that person's eyes and half of their facial expression, that would make this communication experience go much smoother".
- ashwinp92 13y agoThe major line of thought here is what Facebook will do with Occulus to integrate with its current core offering. However the point that may be missed is that this can be its foray into virtual reality gaming. Hardcore gamers still maintain their distance from facebook however with an offering such as occult they can attract gamers as well and tap on to the advertising revenues. And not to mention, as far as social networking is concerned, the more the merrier.
- dingdingdang 13y agoFor me this is a game-breaker - I was wanting to be early (as in 3DFX early) adopter of the tech but it'll have to wait until I can buy this gear off someone NOT faceborg.
- SuddsMcDuff 13y ago"I prefer to actually visit my doctor where facebook doesn't get all the data about it." Unless of course the NHS sells it to them (http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-02/04/care-data-nhs-healthcare http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-02/04/care-data-nhs...)
- pacmon 13y agoI share your sentiment about facebook. They might know how to program, but their business is shady as hell. I had such high hopes for the Oculus and now I could care less. Maybe Sony's product will be better.
- alirazaq 13y agoThis is great news for Sony's VR product. They could use this acquisition as a strategic attack towards Oculus as they did with Microsoft's XBOX One blunder. Opening the hardware up to PC development would be one of the best moves Sony could make. Besides Portal 2 not much seemed to materialize from Sony's partnership with Valve last gen, this could be a game changer if functionality translates well between PC/PS4. I'm very interested in seeing how all companies involved deal with this.