(AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
Drew Guarini, Facebook Acquires Virtual Reality Company Oculus VR For $2 Billion, to gain access to their flagship product the Oculus Rift, a virtual reality headset that has received 75,000 orders for development kits.
"After games, we're going to make Oculus a platform for many other experiences," Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a Facebook post about the purchase. "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."
Over the past year, the Internet has been abuzz with each video that arises of the Rift's capabilities -- some serious, some fun. Developers have used the Rift to allow a man and a woman to "gender swap," simulate the feeling of decapitation by guillotine and play Pokemon through the eyes of a Pokemon trainer. ...
"Facebook understands the potential for VR," the Oculus team wrote in a blog post announcing the deal. "Mark and his team share our vision for virtual reality’s potential to transform the way we learn, share, play, and communicate. Facebook is a company that believes that anything is possible with the right group of people, and we couldn’t agree more."
Perhaps, I am missing something but shouldn't the user require some additional attachments to experience the kinds of experience "gender swaps," and "being decapitated guillotine?" Like some plug in body suit, or bicycle pants, and some kind of scarf?
Last month Facebook acquired the instant messaging service, WhatsApp, for $19 billion, after buying Eye Labs and Branch earlier in the year. Time will tell whether this acquisitions represent a brilliant strategic expansion into new directions of technology, or the desperate thrashings of an aging soon-to-be-extinct dinosaur trying to buy its way out of a dead end.
The market is picking up the later vibe with Facebook's stock falling 20 percent since going public last May. Business history is replete with failed acquisitions, and we see multiple ones here, with many different technologies. Perhaps Zuckerberg will pull a rabbit out of the hat.
P.S. Selected portions of Zuckerberg's original Facebook post below the squiggle.
Zuckerberg's Facebook post:
This is where Oculus comes in. They build virtual reality technology, like the Oculus Rift headset. When you put it on, you enter a completely immersive computer-generated environment, like a game or a movie scene or a place far away. The incredible thing about the technology is that you feel like you're actually present in another place with other people. People who try it say it's different from anything they've ever experienced in their lives.
Immersive gaming will be the first, and Oculus already has big plans here that won't be changing and we hope to accelerate. The Rift is highly anticipated by the gaming community, and there's a lot of interest from developers in building for this platform. We're going to focus on helping Oculus build out their product and develop partnerships to support more games. Oculus will continue operating independently within Facebook to achieve this.
But this is just the start. After games, we're going to make Oculus a platform for many other experiences. 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.
Virtual reality was once the dream of science fiction. But the internet was also once a dream, and so were computers and smartphones. The future is coming and we have a chance to build it together. I can't wait to start working with the whole team at Oculus to bring this future to the world, and to unlock new worlds for all of us.
about an hour ago
·
4:47 PM PT: These writing and marketing people have such limited imaginations. "Gender swapping, and being decapitated" with a guillitine" was the best their marketing people could come up with for tantalizing images?
Seriouslly, WTH. How about "Species Swapping?" Or actually, catching the Mailman, or taking down a Porche. I could come up with a better list than theirs without even getting up off the porch!