I disagree. I started playing VRChat during the pandemic and it made me find a VR 'underground' EDM rave type group that I've spent thousands of hours with. Events in a AAA game studio level map are held every other weekend. Now I do side work with that same group that runs a 350+ person in real life VRChat rave in multiple cities every few months where tens of dozens of my VRChat friends show up and we spend a weekend together. VR has done the opposite of make me antisocial.
As a natural introvert, it is one of the best things to happen to me, and the most social I have ever been in my life.
I agree about work, but they are definitely for communication. VRChat is very successful. I play thousands of hours of VR social apps every year and you couldn't get me to do remote work in one. It's my escape and out from the negatives and stresses of reality.
I own a valve index and spend probably 2000hr/year in it playing social 'games' like VRChat. There is no way you could get me to do remote work in it. VR to me is for escaping reality and the negatives that come with real life.
I also am not optimistic hearing the $3,000+ price tag when most consumer headsets are below $1500 and an environment with games, activities, social apps etc. has already been created for them.
Those are the most popular outspoken right wing identity politic beliefs that the government absolutely does not care about. They're plastered on 'news' networks and 'news' radio every single day and the FCC does not care.
>They're investing massive amounts of money, and they seem to be miles ahead of everyone else (well, it doesn't seem like there is anyone else).
Who are they ahead of? They have a standalone headset which has fairly limited performance, and FB Horizons which looks like something you could make in Unity in a few days. With things like VRChat, Neos, Cluster, and others available, they definitely aren't ahead and are lagging very far behind in my opinion. Their increasingly poor reputation will even limit what they can do in a VR/AR space.
> They have a standalone headset which has fairly limited performance, and FB Horizons which looks like something you could make in Unity in a few days.
I think judging their long term plan by looking at the limitations with the current hardware (and therefore software), is extremely (and literally) short sighted. Horizons has been "out" for three whole months, and needs to run on that limited hardware. I'm assuming there's real value /learnings for getting the architecture figured out, regardless of the clients GFLOPS.
For some positives, besides having the only viable standalone headset right now, their camera based tracking (position, hands, controller) is far better than anyone else's. There's nothing remotely comparable for their hand tracking. I think it would be hard to argue that camera/lidar based inside out tracking is not necessarily the future for small form factor devices.
Hybrid standalone/PCVR, wireless and beaconless, with superior resolution and enough performance, for only $300. That does put them ahead of everyone else.
Meetings are smooth for me on Teams now after months of struggling but I still get near 100% CPU usage and my Macboook can't stay in a call for more than around an hour on battery. The UI is a confusing mess with too many things integrated into it. "Keep It Simple Stupid" needs to be more ingrained into Microsoft software. I do like the ability to raise hands and also the "meeting is ending in x minutes" notification however.
I would also consider joining a company in the future that doesn't use teams as a form of communication.
What's the difference between that and say, changing your brake rotors and brake pads? There's a level of danger there if it's not a professional doing it.
In either case the person doing the modification would be found at fault by police / insurance, but with software it isn't so clear cut - how do you know whether or not the car is hacked? Often, the collision will become a national news story, prompting Tesla to perform a multi-week investigation to see if anything in the car was modified, all while they've already lost because news media had already blamed Tesla.
I play a concerning amount of VR Chat because it helped me greatly during COVID while I was single. It is an amazing experience, but I find it very dangerous for society in some ways. It has improved my mental health I think, but it's limiting my real world socialization so I don't know if it's that healthy.
You can very easily replace your real life with it outside of work and bills, and get all of your social needs from it. As someone with crippling social anxiety, it removes something that triggers my social anxiety and I'm able to easily make friends. People are more open, identity just isn't a thing because everyone is anything they want to be, people are more open to being 'close' to other people and forming relationships with them. I've been comparing it to the early internet in the 90's and 2000's, especially since the entire game outside of the base code is something like 99% community created by artists with great creativity.
I dance a lot in VR in EDM clubs which I have never done in real life. The other night I went to a real world concert and I danced for the first time in my life. I felt confident and knew other people didn't care, finally. People started talking to me, they were interested in me. I honestly didn't even know how to process it until the show was over, but it was definitely because of my gained confidence in VR.
You say it's limiting your real world socialization but given you're now comfortable dancing at concerts and making friends it sounds like overall it's been positive socially in a way that could have been harder to achieve without it
It's interesting how much your experience echo's mine (I just jumped out of a VRC dance meet a moment ago)
I can definitely see social VR eating more of the world in the long run however. I can't say for sure this is a bad thing, just different. I think it's something the next generations won't feel negative about in the same way, for them it'll just be the nature of the world
The hacker news base and similar forum & social media 'nerd' spaces are no longer their largest customers. They've moved away from power users. Most people now using Windows, Android 12, iOS, don't care and only want a working machine that goes to the internet, plays netflix/disney+, and works with their social media websites/apps. It's about convenience instead of possibilities and tinkering.
As a natural introvert, it is one of the best things to happen to me, and the most social I have ever been in my life.