In today’s edition of news pieces I never expected to write but am Facebook has announced that it is buying Oculus VR, aka the company behind Oculus Rift, for the sum of $2 billion. This deal won’t affect Oculus Rift’s push into gaming and Facebook are keen to support the move, while allowing the virtual reality company to continue independently in this regard. But, according to Mark Zuckerberg, this is just the beginning of what Oculus means for the future.
“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. This is really a new communication platform. By feeling truly present, you can share unbounded spaces and experiences with the people in your life. Imagine sharing not just moments with your friends online, but entire experiences and adventures.”
So a few years from now we may have Facebook Reality or something where you can put on your Facebook Rift to join your friends at a virtual show, or some other scenario. In a way it’s quite an innovative way to push VR in. On the other hand Facebook stalking will just become that bit more creepier.
Source: FacebookÂ
Jumping Monks
I can only see this as being a good thing.
The guys at Oculus (who will continue to operate independently) just received a £2,000,000,000 cash injection, on top of the hundred million or so already thrown at the project. VR is definitely happening, the guys at Oculus just received a huge boost than enables them to chase the dream without compromise, they can seriously bargain with the large manufacturers in a way they couldn’t before. Having Facebook at their back adds to their credibility as a firm massively and they will be able to secure the contracts they need.
What does this mean for you and I, the consumer at the end? Better products (you know, Samsung may take them seriously and allow them to use their nice screens) and it means, as they’ve said, they can fund more made for VR content. Facebook do games, and now want to fund VR games, and other content, I don’t see that as bad, quite the opposite.
My initial thoughts anyhow…
TSBonyman
If they have received that cash then that is wonderful. And if Facebook then steps back after handing over that cash and let’s them get on with it themselves then that’s equally wonderful. But i feel with that sort of investment they might want to exert some influence over the Rift project. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
Jumping Monks
From what I can tell it was $400,000 up front, cash, and the rest will either come later or will go into stocks. Facebook claim they’re taking a hands-off approach, but you just know someone in Facebook at some point will want to pull some levers in Oculus. For now though, they have a lot more cash and the freedom to achieve their own goals, free from influence, so it would seem.
NotSmartEnough
Disagree.
As far as I know, the consumer version of OR had no date for mass production or launch. That wasn’t due to lack of funds; gifting billions to the geeks at OR isn’t going to accelerate anything. The only thing that’s going to get product out of the door is the corporate drones from FaceBook coming in and enforcing it. When they do they are not going to be targeting the sub-1% of the market with premium GPUs, they’re going for the mass-market, and they’re going to want as many cross-sales with other FB products as possible.
Enjoy!
TSBonyman
Whether the games team are allowed to continue developing their own tech without any support/meddling from their Facebook overlords will be interesting to see. I expect the Oculus game team will want to make a statement soon what with all the negative reaction.
DJ Judas
If Morpheus wasn’t coming, and Valves VR wasn’t coming, Facebook wouldn’t be buying Oculus.
They’ve spotted a good investment, with guaranteed support from devs who will be making games and experiences for VR devices.
Don’t expect this to become a Facebook branded device, expect it to be a seed device to prepare the mainstream mindshare for what succeeds it in years to come.
blarty
Valves VR isn’t coming, they’ve fallen in with OR, although that may well change over the next few weeks – I think the honeymoon period with the gaming public is over now for Oculus, a lot of what they do know will be viewed with skepticism.
yiddo
Valve aren’t doing VR.
They showed off a possible demo, but they stated that THEY will never ever bring it to market as a product. They instead decided to opt in to Oculus Rift (as the other poster said).
It was a purely Oculus and Morpheus. The PC VR (Oculus) can now be assumed as ‘dead’ to alot of hardcore gamers (just look at reactions to this announcement for one). The only hardcore VR device left is Sonys, and that is restricted to console only. But, at least that will be a hardcore gaming VR device without intrusive action from a social media company. People who buy into Oculus now can enjoy ‘liking’ things in a 3D virtual space, scrolling past various ads and having their data tracked.
The Von Braun
Dear BBC….
I don’t use Facebook, nor own a PC and i think VR has a lot to prove no matter who makes it.Should i be concerned, or just post a comment about how many hospital beds you could save with 2 Billion being spent?.
Have the daily mail been informed?.
Seriousily though, i’ve honest to god lost track of which consumer corp is supposed to be the target of my rabid hatred these days.E.A? Facebook? Apple? sony…err they were, then they were’nt, now they are laying off staff, but wait they are bringing home VR and (as of yet) have’nt been ‘bought’….so answer must be MS..still spying on us? Amazon/starbucks etc for not paying tax…
It’s all too confusing….
Sinclair! the bas*ard..he married a lap dancer or something..and was ginger (was’nt he?) and the keys fell off the QL….what a git!
colmshan1990
John Carmack now works for Facebook.
Who saw that coming?
gazzagb
I think it’s way too early to pass judgement on if this is good or bad.
On the upside, this now means Oculus has secured more than enough money and backing to assure it’s continued development. Also, this massively increases the market potential – clearly Facebook don’t see VR as just a gimmick.
On the downside, this could reduce Oculus to being too ‘casual’ for it to catch on with mainstream developers and gamers, although I doubt many people will pay £300 for an Oculus just to play FarmVille!
gazzagb
Just saw this, not the most encouraging thing to see:
https://twitter.com/notch/status/448586381565390848
yiddo
Notch is such a little bitch about things.
He says this yet he snuggles tightly up to Microsoft and Google, who are most certainly worse and more ‘creepy’ than Facebook.
He needs to get off his damn high horse and stop thinking he is so important. This is just a lame ass excuse so he can cop out of spending time officially integrating it into Minecraft.
Andrewww
Fully agree with the Minecraft guy, Facebook is creepy and I don’t trust them at all. Of course, Google screws their customers just as much, not selling products to them, but selling them and their data instead. But in my view, Google has learnt some lessons and knows the limits, while this Zuck teen is still completely unprofessional and unpredictable, therefore creepy.
Andrewww
Probably, Zuck woke up one day and thought ‘those Google guys get so much attention for glass, I have to do something about headmounted stuff too…’. So why not throw some billions that way, doesn’t really hurt after wasting all the overpayed billions on WhatsApp…
ron_mcphatty
Yep, then if it fails because the Facebook board members are too controlling and cock things up for Oculus they close the project down and we all lose out. This is wonderful news for the Oculus guys, big investment and huge opportunities, and Zuckerberg does seem to have truly innocent intentions for his social monopoly. The problem these days are his scary, evil, cut throat, ball-breaking shareholders and their advertising saturation and personal information hoarding ways, that’s what we all need to worry about.
minerwilly
Terrible news ,a couple of weeks ago Whatsapp and now this too. Facebook is just so annoying , I left a couple of years ago but it seems like it stalks you down. Next week they’ll probably buy LFC .
lambchop
Candy Crush Saga – Oculus Rift Edition…….You heard it here first!…..and maybe last…..
hazelam
well, it cost them one big title already, Notch/Mojang have now cancelled any plans for an Oculus enabled version of Minecraft.
http://kotaku.com/notch-says-hes-canceled-oculus-rift-minecraft-because-1551568311
there’s still mods that allow you to play Minecraft with the Oculus, but official support is now out the window.
and Notch was a big supporter of the device, being a big backer in the kickstarter
and it’s possible, he wont be the last to jump ship.
my opinion on this deal is not gonna have an impact, though for the record i don’t think this is a good thing.
but when game creators are abandoning the Oculus because of it, then it’s a concern for the people behind the device, or it should be.