Meta Plots Ambitious VR Release Schedule of Four Headsets by 2024 (theinformation.com) 35
An anonymous reader shares a report: Meta Platforms is planning to release four virtual reality headsets between now and 2024, according to an internal road map viewed by The Information. The aggressive timeline reflects Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's desire to advance his vision of the metaverse by getting more people to use VR devices. Whether he can meet the timeline, however, is far from certain. Meta is planning to release Project Cambria, a high-end VR and mixed-reality headset it is billing as a device for the future of work, around September, according to a person familiar with the matter. Cambria was originally supposed to come out last year but its launch was delayed by supply chain and other pandemic-related issues, which could again push back the launch date, the person said. A second version of Cambria, code-named Funston, is slated to come out in 2024. Meanwhile, Meta plans two new versions of its less expensive Quest headset -- internally code-named Stinson and Cardiff -- for release in 2023 and 2024, the road map shows. All four code names for the devices on Meta's Cambria and Quest lines refer to locations in California, following the pattern of the earliest Quest prototypes, made under the name Project Santa Cruz.
There was a yawn. (Score:4, Insightful)
There was a yawn, as if million of people didn't care.
Funny aside, I really wonder who they think the target audience for all this is. Almost anyone I talk to either isn't interested, or consider Facebook to be an absolute no-go for this kind of thing.
The few people that want a headset like this seem to mostly want it for.. "Nature Films".
Re: There was a yawn. (Score:3)
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If "nature films" means pron, count me in.
Just kidding. No interest in any aspect of VR that I've been able to detect yet. Maybe I was poisoned by exposure to Second Life about 10 years ago?
Actually met a VR fan a few days ago. He wanted to talk about a VR game I'd never heard of. He said some stuff about the game, but nothing interesting detected. So I probed him on a few other topics. He didn't seem to know anything about economics or history or several other topics. Not interesting to him, but I count th
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google earth vr is one of the best vr apps/experiences you can find. it's free as in google free.
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I would love to "visit" historical sites in VR that I otherwise couldn't, for time, money, or availability to the public reasons.
You really want to see them through chicken-wire?
That's the resolution of these headsets.
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there is a small but lucrative market for very high end devices for professional applications.
there is a discrete market segment for vr gaming, i doubt meta makes any breakthrough there, plus that's people who does 1-2h sessions with the device on avg. (of course you can meet that one weirdo who can do 6 hours in one sitting. i was one of those).
the cheaper range obviously is mostly for porn, which last i checked wasn't really very good either.
what i don't see, not even remotely, is a significant audience w
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Millions of people probably haven't tried it yet, and can't imagine what the experience is like.
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Yep. I have some interest in VR, though not sure any of the current offerings are what I'm looking for (basically once something like the Valve Index can go wireless).
I use Facebook, but I won't use any of their other services or products. There's been too many stories of people getting banned or suspended from Facebook and it affecting their ability to login with the Oculus. No thanks.
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The Vive can go wireless, as well, the Quest 2 has a wireless stream ability to a PC to run heavier VR applications.
I don't know how the Quest compares to an Index, as I have never owned an Index.
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You fool, you've owned two indexes since the day you were born.
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multiple implementations (Score:2)
Doesn't having multiple implementations with different features somewhat undermine the builders of VR apps? VR already suffers from being fragmented off of the game market. The goal should be a common powerful platform, not a grab bag of capabilities.
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what multiple implementations?
(sorry if that is explained in tfa, it requires registration and that would have ruined my slashdot experience. editors these days ...)
Re: multiple implementations (Score:3)
I didn't read it either, but they're talking about releasing 4 devices over the next two years. That sounds like different price points, and thus features.
Re: multiple implementations (Score:5, Funny)
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And once you account for the fact that one of these four people is Mark Z. himself, you get a much more credible total of three persons interested in this.
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i thought so. that doesn't really imply platform fragmentation. the difference is mostly in build quality, performance and supported software, api supporting progressive enhancement (or graceful fallback) for different devices are not a new thing. actually, i expect all these headsets will run with the same old "oculus sdk" and will be "steam vr" and "windows ar" compatible. afaik they aren't actually inventing anything, it's all hype.
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Stupidity (Score:2)
In the old days we had Onlive Traveller which was basically the same thing but without headsets and with 1990s graphics. It was kinda fun to meet people there.
I don't really see what a headset adds apart from extra cost and bad eyes you do it too much.
Headsets have always seemed more like a barrier to entry to me rather than turning something into a killer app. Facebook (sorry, "Meta") would probably get way more people on board if they ditch the headset requirement.
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If referring to 'vr chat' like experience (PS Home, Second Life, I don't recall Onlive traveller but I assume it's like that), for me those are an awkward in-between. The 3D models were less straightforward than a flat UI for communication when dealing with screen, keyboard, and mouse paradigm. Meanwhile, they didn't really add much to the experience. Having the environment surround rather than be in a window helps with the perception limitations and perhaps more critically, the highly capable controls m
I'll believe it when I see it (Score:2)
The resolution increments that Oculus/Meta have been putting out have been pathetic. There is no way Meta will be at actual retina resolution (that is 8 or 12K per eye with no discernible space between pixels) by 2024.
It's possible.. (Score:2)
It can depend on the field of view. If each eye gets 90 degrees, the figure is under 6k. Many people may clamor for a wider fov, but in pracitce it seems about 100-110 is about as far as they feel compelled to go.
According to rumors, it may do a higher frequency interlacing to extend a smaller high refresh display effective resolution, in conjunction with a dynamic lense layer to alternately steer the display a touch up and down to have the alternating output not being superimposed on itself. Interlacing
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Among VR-related challenges, there is much more than resolution.
First, you need a lot of computing power to render at such a resolution. There is a thing called foveated rendering that use eye tracking to render details only where the eye can see them. I am not aware of a production-ready implementation of that. I think that on low-end headsets (embedded), they use a simpler version where only the center is rendered in detail, but it only works if you are looking straight ahead.
Of course, all that rendering
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With foveated rendering, the computing requirements are less than rendering even on an HD monitor, maybe even VGA .. I mean when you look at this screen you can only see a two or three degrees FOV at best. As long as it can render at 120 fps it will work fine.
Four Headsets by 2024? (Score:4, Funny)
Is that the projected number of units sold?
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Indeed. But they cheated a little on the numbers since one of those four units is for Mark Z. himself.
Not a fan, but... (Score:2)
I'm not a fan of Meta or Zuckerbook, but... I am glad they are investing heavily in VR/AR. That is, or could be, the next step for working remotely for many people. However, current hardware is bulky and unpleasant, and current software limited and fragile.
The metaverse, as Zuckerberg imagines it, will almost certainly fail. The tech spinoffs will be good for lots of other things...
This'll be the biggest thing... (Score:3)
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Bleh, nothing beats Frank's 2000" TV.
The VR blindspot (Score:5, Interesting)
Media scholars such as Jannet Murray (who wrote Hamlet on the Holodeck) have been pointing out that Silicon Valley has a big blind spot when it comes to understanding how new media evolve. The growt of a new medium isn't just about the evolution of the hardware, it's also about the evolution of culture and, specifically, a medium's language.
Take cinema. After the invention of the camera around 1900 it took decades for the "Hollywood film language" to grow into what we know today (see the work of David Bordwell). Pioneers like Vertov (of "Man with a movie camera" fame) but also Charlie Chaplin were experimenting with how to tell a story. Cuts, pans, dolly's, zoom, the 180 degree rule, etc.
And not only that, the audience had to learn how to 'read' this language. The content and the audience grew together.
So if there were prefect VR headsets tomorrow, that wouldn't solve this issue. Figuring out and disseminating the culture around VR will take decades. You need to build the the "Hollywood of VR" too.
I spoke with an organiser of a VR festival years ago, and asked him about this issue. He told me investors had little interest in financing content; they all wanted to finance headsets. Partly because of this there is so little valuable VR content. Companies like Valve (Half Life Alyx) are still the exception to the rule.
Hamlet on the Holodeck:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Vertov's famous film, Man with a Movie Camera:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
David Bordwell, a well known media scholar on film language:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Ford, is that you?
For it to catch on (Score:2)
sixers won (Score:2)
So in our universe the sixers won.