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Comment by bane | Hacker News Reader

> put on a headset and get teleported to a room in a virtual world where you can talk to your friends' avatars.

Uhm...No thanks. Second life has already been tried.

Why does this idea keep coming up? It sucks every.single.time.

Either you're misunderstanding me or you're equating an anthill with the pyramids of Giza. In Second Life, your avatar is a sprite on a screen. With Oculus Rift + Virtuix Omni, your avatar is you. It's like the Matrix. Or Avatar. Or a [lower resolution] lucid dream where you can interact with people from the real world in video game maps. For me, that's truly awesome in the literal sense of the word.

No, I understand you exactly. But I'm also paying attention to the last 30 years where this keeps getting tried and either it doesn't work or it degenerates into a 2nd life analog.

There's nothing magical about 2nd life, but in a first person POV and in 3d.

Would you find it magical if it were truly immersive 3d where eye movements would scroll and an Omni-like 3D treadmill actually worked?

No it's even worse. Now I have to work even harder to have the marginal experience I can have from my desk.

Have you tried a Crystal Cove Oculus? Have you seen the demos from HD cameras that capture video in almost 360 degrees?

Explain how sitting in front of my desk, with this gear on, looking at avatars of my friends, no matter the fidelity of the gear, is a better communication medium than group chat or video hangouts or the million other more efficient communication mediums that exist is worth anything more than a passing novelty?

Or are you proposing that I look at a high bandwidth, 3d video stream of somebody with a black rrectangle strapped to their face while they look at my complimentary version?

Wait.

It's not that it's a better communication medium any more than a 4K monitor is a better medium for learning what's being broadcast on your television. But it's certainly more enjoyable.

Imagine if you had an actual supernatural button that you could press to teleport yourself to an alternate dimension in which you could chat with friends. It wouldn't be a more effective tool for communication than a phone or video chat, but I'm sure you'd often use it since magic is, well, magical. VR is the closest you're gonna get to that experience.

Edit: And hopefully there would be a workaround for the issue of goggles obstructing the face.

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