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Comment by spcebar | Hacker News Reader

I like this article. It expands on the big question for VR. We have this technology, it's here, it's mostly good enough (with the caveats the article lays out) for a variety of purposes. But what is the purpose consumers will want to use it for?

Apple has been the king of telling consumers what they want for years. If they can't sell VR, I don't think anyone can sell VR. This feels like the make or break moment for VR, where we'll know what people want to use it for/if it's capable of living in the mainstream, or if it's forever going to live as a niche product, as it has been since the VR renaissance started when the Occulus Rift came onto the scene.

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They want it for pr0n! Just like they wanted VCRs for pr0n.

Super tangential but this documentary is about pr0n going mainstream

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0418753/

In it they point out in the 70s how the movie the documentary is about was a huge public topic of discussion. They show Phil Donahue actually telling people to go see it (or at least I remember that in my memory. If it wasn't him it was some other household name). Eventually the prudes push back and effectively get it banned from lots of places but the VCR comes out and the prudes lose.

VR pr0n is pretty amazing. It's not perfect because there's only so many things that make sense first person. But, when someone gets up close and breaths on you your brain tells you you felt something even though you know that's impossible. If you saw it and didn't find it compelling I'd suggest you ask around for some better examples.

Then there's apps like Virt-A-Mate that take to the next level by being real 3D (Game tech) instead of recorded video. They're not perfect. They have bugs. They run too slow sometimes. But, unlike video, you can change any character to anything you want. That's only going to get better. Apple might ban it but eventually it will be a reason lots of people want VR/AR

Friends at Meta already tell me their metrics say the #1 use of VR is pr0n. (no different than the internet itself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most-visited_websites

VR pr0n is nasty because one can see all imperfections that Photoshop/Portaiture would instantly remove on 2D imagery/movies, breaking the spell. I would rather watch travel documentaries to choose my next vacation or interesting places I'd never see otherwise, like climbing something in Himalayas, visiting Galapagos, Antarctica etc. Visualizing my next house before it's built with all the views to/from the outside would be great as well.

Like I said in my comment, if you saw one that didn't appeal do you then you need to watch others. There are plenty with imperfections and there are plenty without. Apparently you watched ones with and made the mistaken assumption that that was a problem with the medium itself and not with the quality of the content you saw

A thread on the future of VR demands that:

> because one can see all imperfections

be qualified "for now".

Once upon a time 2D digital porn d/loaded scan line by scan line over several minutes in low resolution and reduced colour maps.

This is different. If you ever worked with models as a photographer, you'd have noticed that many models that look great in "2D camera projection" look weirdly distorted in the real life. VR basically showcases this weirdness and what tended to be attractive in 2D is suddenly repulsive in 3D.

This may or may not change - if you're talking about real life (some) fleash and (some) blood X-Ray models with profiles that can cut glass then yes, they can look weird IRL actual 3d.

However that may (or may not) push the use of models that live IRL and look pretty decent from most angles being used as the foundation for VR modelling.

The point being, one way or another, 3D VR will likely lose the weirdness, through viewer acclimation or product delivery advancement.

why are you saying pr0n instead of porn? lol

Maybe he's typing on a work computer and he doesn't want to trigger some kind of nsfw censoring system. Or he's a prude.

Tiktok and other social media sites allegedly derank posts with controversial words (suicide, porn, murder) so people butcher the words to talk about things without triggering the debooster. There isn't really evidence that this helps or hurts post discovery, so people mostly do it out of an abundance of caution, which is what seems to have happened here.

True but I feel I should mention that the term pr0n specifically is much older than TikTok and modern social media censorship, more of a "leet speak" slang than a tool to avoid censors.

Nowadays the youth call it corn or p*rn or just (insert corn emoji here).

I think that's why the initial version is the "Pro" and why it's so so expensive. Laptops/Computers have "text/spreadsheets" as their fundamental unit of usage, phones and tablets have images/videos. So right now we have all this awesome hardware, but we still really haven't found our VisiCalc/Instagram for VR just yet.

The spreadsheets of VR (well, AR) is spreadsheets. The marketing of Vision Pro is literally that you can have a lot of spreadsheets open in the room around you, without being limited by the size of displays you can carry with you.

I think this is a better approach than trying to get people to do spreadsheets in the metaverse.

Or to put it another way, the Vision Pro is only a VR device because the AR capabilities they want also allow for VR functionality.

How is anyone concluding VR is "mostly good enough"?

FOV is still bad. Weight is still too high. Resolution I'd say is adequate for gaming (but see FOV above).

Apple are selling the same problems in a very expensive package that they're desperately trying to pretend isn't a VR platform.

The article gives a variety of industries and use cases where VR has been prevalent/useful for years.

How is that applicable to the consumer market, in your eyes?

The fact that industry and special use cases like NASA are using it means that some consumer version will probably always exist, and if industry is finding uses for it, consumers might also find uses for it. VR could also fail catastrophically as a consumer product and just be something that's exclusively used by industry, but I don't see VR going away for good. I think it's carved out a healthy enough niche for itself at this point that some version of a VR/HMD industry is going to exist for a while.

TL;DR: People want useful or fun, not "VR"

> If they can't sell VR, I don't think anyone can sell VR

Imagine having as many monitors as you need. Anywhere. Rearrange them whenever and however, even on airplanes! It all weighs under 1 pound (0.45 kg).

How much would you pay? I'd pay at least $600.

> where we'll know what people want to use it for/if it's capable of living in the mainstream

A cheaper, better multi-monitor replacement would be very useful. It might even be fun in some cases, but it's still mostly a productivity tool.

Unfortunately, short-term incentives seem to limit funding to projects with potential for:

1. Platform lock-in (Apple Vision, Oculus)

2. Ecosystem extension (Apple Vision, Valve Index)

> or if it's forever going to live as a niche product

Is having 2+ monitors an obscure niche? An overwhelming number of offices and other workspaces disagree.

if VR is about having virtual monitors then thats not a Very enticing proposition

It's about being able to display information anywhere. Many work tasks consist of using reference material to do something else. This isn't limited to the office.

> thats not a Very enticing proposition

Consider the following use cases:

* A surgical team consulting a 3D CT scan as they remove the tumor threatening to kill you or someone you love

* A firefighter who can overlay a building's plans over thick smoke

* A rescue helicopter pilot who can see LIDAR and IR data as needed

All of these are literally life-saving. However, office uses such as replacing multi-monitor desks are far more pleasant to encounter.

I feel like these examples, and most examples of what AR is good for, are largely based on what looks cool in movies rather than what is actually more effective than looking at a screen or having someone speaking in your ear.

AR definitely has real industrial uses but 90% of the examples people can think of are not better or are worse than current methods.

Monitors anywhere though is useful, the issue is that the technology to it isn't there. The 4K monitor I have sitting about 45cm from my face needs a 16K monitor sitting 5cm from my eyeballs to be adequately emulated.

The problem is "virtual" monitors in VR aren't high enough FOV or resolution to be as useful as real monitors.

TL;DR: I agree and favor the "boring" uses, but chose emotional examples since GP sounded disappointed by those

I intentionally chose heroic examples because GP's viewpoint is understandable. Not everyone is as excited by window management and good UI as I am.

OP's article touched on attention management through UI a little bit, but I think that concern isn't given enough attention. Using the most heroic scenarios possible helps drive the point home without getting grim, but I will now. To be blunt, it's a historical fact that bad UI kills people [1][2].

> AR definitely has real industrial uses but 90% of the examples people can think of are not better or are worse than current methods.

I agree completely. My main concern is pinning manuals or reference sheets next to my work, even if paper fallback is still crucial. That's pretty much the use case for multi-monitor anyway.

The surgical example is the same thing: CT scans are used to tell the surgeons where it's ok to cut. However, there's an extra benefit here: reducing the need for a physical 3D print of the skull reduces infection risk. It's one less thing to moved into and out of the OR.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25

2. https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/11/uss-m...

If you could do any of these scenarios in real time, I'd rather trust robots to take any action in this kind of situation than any human whose attention is split between 3 different kind of screens or visuals. they already can't handle the few pieces of information that they have, adding more is asking for more confusion, like pilots in a plane not hearing the stall warning even though it's screaming in their ears.

With the added benefit of neck strain!

We already have neck strain with multi-monitor setups and bad office ergonomics. I know it's not likely in the nearest future, but I'm still hopeful we might be less sore if headsets become both light and common enough.

> We already have neck strain with multi-monitor setups and bad office ergonomics.

And this would make it even worse.

Why? Wouldn't you be able to position virtual displays however you like, and view them from many more body positions than is possible with physical displays?

> Why?

because putting weight on your head does that. Your muscles and joints are not going to like it no matter how you try to be comfortable.

I think GP's taking the pessimistic view that the VR headset will be forced on the user for cost-cutting reasons. It's a real worry, but I was taking the optimistic view where I can choose where and how I set up my workspace enough to be comfortable.

What's GP?

Grandparent, as in the grandparent post.

But why would you do that? Why would you go through the effort to move around?

The problem with physical displays isn't that you can't move them around, it's that there's no reason to.

It's like a chair, sitting for too long is terrible for your body. Chairs don't literally limit you from getting up, but there's just no immediate reason to get up, do some stretching.

It would be the same except you're adding annoying glass and plastic attached to your face.

> Why would you go through the effort to move around?

If a headset can be light enough, it can be a tool for AR documentation overlays. It's like taping a manual up next to the thing you're working on.

For example, engine components. I've seen airline mechanics consulting laptops as they work on engines. I didn't get a close enough look to be sure, but it seemed like it was a combination of manuals and running diagnostics.

> it's that there's no reason to.

Some monitors come with swivel mounts to support both horizontal and vertical modes. It's common enough that I think it's worth exploring.

> except you're adding annoying glass and plastic attached to your face.

This is absolutely true. Getting headsets down toward the same weight range as regular glasses is probably a major hurdle for use outside industrial or piloting applications and into the office.

Surely if you're walking around a plane and looking at it physically while holding a laptop, you're moving around, not sitting still on a chair for 8 hours, so I don't see how it would benefit that particular case. You were talking about monitors fixed on a desk.

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