Face-wearables - will any survive or thrive (Rift / Glass / HoloLens / Vive / Apple Vision etc)?

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neye_eve

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  • #1
    The current batch of wearables and their associated software / usability all have their own problems.

    Microsoft HoloLens's issues have to do with the hardware, and it is the least tested of them all Microsoft's HoloLens is new, improved, and still has big problems - HoloLens can deliver amazing illusions, but only on a small scale. Also, the to-be-shipped version is apparently not as capable or magical as the initially-presented version.

    Facebook Oculus Rift was hot stuff and could do no wrong for a while, as it was decent VR for the masses, and delivered on its Kickstarter promise. Things started looking less rosy to some people when Facebook purchased them, and delays have been the norm, to the point where competitors will probably beat them to market with decent hardware.

    Google Glass has a storied history of bluders which are well-known enough that links probably aren't necessary. Sufficed to say, the initial rollout was problematic due to privacy, social, capabilites, battery life, and fashion concerns, among others. However, Google is getting back on the saddle soon, and sounds like they might be releasing version 2 (and probably marketing message version 2) fairly soon.

    These are the big three, but with Oculus delays, the both the HTC Vive (http://www.techradar.com/us/reviews/wea ... 775/review) and Sony Morpheus (http://www.techradar.com/us/reviews/gam ... 379/review) have a non-negligible chance of muddying the waters before the previously-presumptive shoe-in (Oculus) gets into market.

    The main categories seem to be:
    AR: HoloLens
    VR: Oculus / Vive / Morpheus
    All-day Wearable/partial-AR: Glass

    That having been said, will people be unwilling to buy 3 separate face-wearables, even if they're all individually fantastic? Or are these segments all so different that there will be plenty of space in the market so that all three categories could thrive? And are any of these going to deliver on the hype of really introducing a new interaction paradigm to the masses?

    In a testable question - in 5 years, and in 10 years, will all of them survive (same-project or direct-descendent), where the product is still actively funded and developed? Will all of them thrive, with most people encountering them directly or indirectly on a daily basis like we do with PCs, Tablets, and Phones currently?
     
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    KallDrexx

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  • #2
    I'm still stoked for HoloLens, even after all the disappointed reviews. The prototype in January shows that it truly is possible to do full view AR, it's just a matter of getting the power and heat dissipation to work well for it in a portable form (I think it's safe to bet that these are the cause for the FOV). Until then I think the smaller FOV isn't as big of a deal and it would be interesting to find some reviews from someone who didn't play with the full FOV version.
     
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    ant1pathy

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  • #3
    I can see some huge uses for AR in industry and education. VR seems more of an entertainment (or education) setup, but you won't wear them outside of a particular environment. What I can't see is everyone wearing them casually all day, at least not with what anyone has shown us. If they looked just like a pair of regular glasses, maybe, but I think we're farther away from that technology.
     
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    wrylachlan

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  • #5
    As someone who has had LASIK surgery after wearing glasses for the better part of twenty years... I'm never going back to wearing shit on my face daily. I don't think I'm alone in this. Each year over 600K people in he US have LASIK and it's a growing market. With a little less than 4 million births per year and roughly 33% myopia prevalence, the long term trend is towards universal LASIK and glasses and contacts are heading towards niche status over the next ten years.

    All of which is to say that the population at large has increasingly shown that they'll let someone cut their eye with a fucking laser to avoid having to wear shit on their face. The idea of daily use consumer AR a la Google Glass is dead on arrival.

    That said, something like Hololens will probably have important applications in industry, but that's still 10 years off. And it's not clear how big first mover advantage is going to be for a tool that will require industry specific software to unlock its potential.
     
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    solomonrex

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  • #6
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=28986223#p28986223:27v8x8h6 said:
    wrylachlan[/url]":27v8x8h6]As someone who has had LASIK surgery after wearing glasses for the better part of twenty years... I'm never going back to wearing shit on my face daily. I don't think I'm alone in this. Each year over 600K people in he US have LASIK and it's a growing market. With a little less than 4 million births per year and roughly 33% myopia prevalence, the long term trend is towards universal LASIK and glasses and contacts are heading towards niche status over the next ten years.

    All of which is to say that the population at large has increasingly shown that they'll let someone cut their eye with a fucking laser to avoid having to wear shit on their face. The idea of daily use consumer AR a la Google Glass is dead on arrival.

    That said, something like Hololens will probably have important applications in industry, but that's still 10 years off. And it's not clear how big first mover advantage is going to be for a tool that will require industry specific software to unlock its potential.
    Click to expand...

    It's not really the same as eyeglasses, because you still have choice. Plenty of people choose to wear sunglasses, and eventually those chunky sunglasses will have PCs inside them for one reason or another. That's already here, I'm sure. Which reminds me, now that I'm in DC I need to go to the spy museum.

    I think VR will be limited to the sort of fps/simulator fans that have huge gaming rigs, and that feels right to me.

    MS's AR will take some time but should gain traction in niche industries - but I really think their last demo was too limited to do much of anything. I think the software will come along fairly quickly once they fix the hardware. They should follow the old Apple on this one - make the device that works best even if it costs thousands of dollars.

    Google Glass will be useful in security and military situations, I imagine. Possibly self-driving cars, not for the controls but for entertainment, shouldn't go full VR if you're the driver and MS's AR would have little use in a tiny cabin.

    For the military, HUD tech has been in fighter jets for decades and there's a big push both for intel and for data on the ground. Data is advancing to the point that military/police could have targets mapped like figher pilots through the glasses in real time. It's not quite there yet, but I see it happening, whether it's google that does it or not. After all, Google, Facebook and MS have mostly nailed facial recognition in the digital world. This is one of those things, like Star Trek's tablet, that you can see happening miles away, as well as some of the obvious problems.
     
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    irenic

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  • #10
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=28967367#p28967367:3vrcghud said:
    KallDrexx[/url]":3vrcghud]I'm still stoked for HoloLens, even after all the disappointed reviews. The prototype in January shows that it truly is possible to do full view AR, it's just a matter of getting the power and heat dissipation to work well for it in a portable form (I think it's safe to bet that these are the cause for the FOV). Until then I think the smaller FOV isn't as big of a deal and it would be interesting to find some reviews from someone who didn't play with the full FOV version.
    Click to expand...

    From what I've experienced of HoloLens it does feel like the future; it understands object occlusion and such impressively enough that virtual objects for intents & purposes appear real. The power/heat seems a secondary issue since it's just whatever atom platform they have running the display atm. The main problem, imo not unlike kinect, is the huge gap in talent generally displayed in the industry vs. what's necessary to develop compelling apps for this level of interface sophistication.

    > Why no mention of Magic Leap? They have tech that totally blows away HoloLens.

    Magic Leap is supposedly attempting silicon photonics or whatever, yet have no provenance of working hard problems and only stages handwaving PR. More likely IMO they're working on an IP portfolio for sale to people who can make things a reality.
     
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    MutualCore

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  • #11
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30340211#p30340211:qu30szwo said:
    irenic[/url]":qu30szwo]
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=28967367#p28967367:qu30szwo said:
    KallDrexx[/url]":qu30szwo]I'm still stoked for HoloLens, even after all the disappointed reviews. The prototype in January shows that it truly is possible to do full view AR, it's just a matter of getting the power and heat dissipation to work well for it in a portable form (I think it's safe to bet that these are the cause for the FOV). Until then I think the smaller FOV isn't as big of a deal and it would be interesting to find some reviews from someone who didn't play with the full FOV version.
    Click to expand...

    From what I've experienced of HoloLens it does feel like the future; it understands object occlusion and such impressively enough that virtual objects for intents & purposes appear real. The power/heat seems a secondary issue since it's just whatever atom platform they have running the display atm. The main problem, imo not unlike kinect, is the huge gap in talent generally displayed in the industry vs. what's necessary to develop compelling apps for this level of interface sophistication.

    > Why no mention of Magic Leap? They have tech that totally blows away HoloLens.

    Magic Leap is supposedly attempting silicon photonics or whatever, yet have no provenance of working hard problems and only stages handwaving PR. More likely IMO they're working on an IP portfolio for sale to people who can make things a reality.
    Click to expand...

    People were saying the same thing about the Apple phone c. 2005. We know what happened in the end. Magic Leap is the next iPhone.
     
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    ZnU

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  • #12
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30340211#p30340211:1553vhcd said:
    irenic[/url]":1553vhcd]
    Magic Leap is supposedly attempting silicon photonics or whatever, yet have no provenance of working hard problems and only stages handwaving PR. More likely IMO they're working on an IP portfolio for sale to people who can make things a reality.
    Click to expand...

    Google is already an investor.

    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30344603#p30344603:1553vhcd said:
    MutualCore[/url]":1553vhcd]
    People were saying the same thing about the Apple phone c. 2005. We know what happened in the end. Magic Leap is the next iPhone.
    Click to expand...

    Display tech like theirs may be an important component of the product category that eventually eclipses iPhone-like smartphones, the way capacitative touch was for the iPhone. But you'll notice the iPhone was built by a company that was already in the computing platforms business, not a company from the touchscreen hardware business. I expect the first successful mass-market augmented reality products will also be built by a company already in the computing platforms business. Most likely Apple, Google, or Microsoft.
     
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    irenic

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  • #13
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30345137#p30345137:24jhkah9 said:
    ZnU[/url]":24jhkah9]
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30340211#p30340211:24jhkah9 said:
    irenic[/url]":24jhkah9]
    Magic Leap is supposedly attempting silicon photonics or whatever, yet have no provenance of working hard problems and only stages handwaving PR. More likely IMO they're working on an IP portfolio for sale to people who can make things a reality.
    Click to expand...

    Google is already an investor.
    Click to expand...
    That proves nothing other than their IP might be worth some money. Apple/MS also bought similar AR upstarts for stakes in the patent space.

    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30344603#p30344603:24jhkah9 said:
    MutualCore[/url]":24jhkah9]
    People were saying the same thing about the Apple phone c. 2005. We know what happened in the end. Magic Leap is the next iPhone.
    Click to expand...

    Display tech like theirs may be an important component of the product category that eventually eclipses iPhone-like smartphones, the way capacitative touch was for the iPhone. But you'll notice the iPhone was built by a company that was already in the computing platforms business, not a company from the touchscreen hardware business. I expect the first successful mass-market augmented reality products will also be built by a company already in the computing platforms business. Most likely Apple, Google, or Microsoft.
    Click to expand...

    Their background show nothing of the presumably advanced research/manufacturing required for meaningfully moving state of the art. I realize those not familiar with tech analyze these companies as black boxes & buzzwords anyway, but technology is actually built on physical mechanisms with realworld limitations. In this case, the Magic Leap CEO's last venture basically took a Media Lab robot arm and packaged it up as a surgical device, the whole of which sold for a handy sum. The kind of hiring/partnerships they're doing show signs of repeating the same thing.
     
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    wco81

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  • #14
    People may put on sunglasses but not goggles or anything bulkier and heavier.

    What are the applications of VR beyond games? OR needs a relatively high end rig so it's a niche product for a niche market.

    Of course lower prices and more content will drive adoption to a certain level but it's hard to conceive of VR causing more people to get into PC gaming, that is expanding the market or expanding beyond gaming.

    Let's say ps4, PC and Xbox One sell a combined 200 million by 2020. What portion of that 200 million gaming devices will be regularly used for VR games? Even 10% seems generous, especially if the HMDs remain several hundred dollars.

    As for AR, it seems more likely that AR would be used through mobile devices being held up rather than in conjunction with a heavy, awkward, expensive headset. But there seems to be no obvious business model which would stimulate the creation of a lot of AR content.
     
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    solomonrex

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  • #15
    I can't find the product now, but I saw a blurb about these goggles at CES that weren't VR, they were like glasses-mounted screens.

    And while that isn't so exciting, I bring it up because compared to Google glass, they didn't have a camera, unlike VR they work with mobile, they're more affordable (just a big looking screen in front of you) and more portable.

    I think VR's place is in the home for now and AR's place is in the workplace, perhaps. While the smartglasses thing doesn't look as promising, it's affordable, doesn't take you out of your surroundings - doesn't cover your face - and could work with normal glasses. Plus, the ones shown doubled as headphones. I don't know if that can catch on, but I can see how each form has different advantages and it's a wide open field.

    I think they'll all survive, we have enough screens in our lives, I bet, but we can't ever seem to get enough.
     
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    solomonrex

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  • #16
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30443775#p30443775:38fldiw5 said:
    wco81[/url]":38fldiw5]People may put on sunglasses but not goggles or anything bulkier and heavier.

    What are the applications of VR beyond games? OR needs a relatively high end rig so it's a niche product for a niche market.

    Of course lower prices and more content will drive adoption to a certain level but it's hard to conceive of VR causing more people to get into PC gaming, that is expanding the market or expanding beyond gaming.

    Let's say ps4, PC and Xbox One sell a combined 200 million by 2020. What portion of that 200 million gaming devices will be regularly used for VR games? Even 10% seems generous, especially if the HMDs remain several hundred dollars.

    As for AR, it seems more likely that AR would be used through mobile devices being held up rather than in conjunction with a heavy, awkward, expensive headset. But there seems to be no obvious business model which would stimulate the creation of a lot of AR content.
    Click to expand...

    I think the beauty of the original Hololens is that it was VR, too (the Mars demo). But the whole thing might take years to get portable enough for that to matter. It feels a bit like Tablet PC that way, way, way ahead of it's time.
     
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    Horatio

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  • #18
    What are the applications of VR beyond games?
    Click to expand...
    I've seen a few - non-interactive media (movies where you can move around), things like the Game of Thrones exhibit. Also, I've seen a virtual workspace in VR, where you have all your "monitors" in VR - the guy that did it was writing Oculus games inside the Rift, which was kinda neat.
     
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    ant1pathy

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  • #19
    Horatio said:
    What are the applications of VR beyond games?
    Click to expand...
    I've seen a few - non-interactive media (movies where you can move around), things like the Game of Thrones exhibit. Also, I've seen a virtual workspace in VR, where you have all your "monitors" in VR - the guy that did it was writing Oculus games inside the Rift, which was kinda neat.
    Click to expand...

    Entertainment and information. Imagine how much more impactful a grade school lesson about dinosaurs will be when they can "go back in time" and move around in a recreated space.
     
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    ZnU

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  • #20
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30446743#p30446743:3dcmx8sx said:
    Horatio[/url]":3dcmx8sx]Also, I've seen a virtual workspace in VR, where you have all your "monitors" in VR - the guy that did it was writing Oculus games inside the Rift, which was kinda neat.
    Click to expand...

    This is potentially a big deal (for both VR and AR), but nobody has yet done what the iPhone did for multitouch finger interaction, and developed a comprehensive UI vocabulary for it. What we've seen of HoloLens so far, for instance, seems to rely heavily on 2D planes that happen to be hovering in space. That's probably not the answer. Apple/Google/Microsoft likely all have teams quietly working on this.
     
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    Beautiful Ninja

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  • #22
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30444511#p30444511:34h9nwiq said:
    anonymous9000[/url]":34h9nwiq]My opinion that is VR needs to pull a Nintendo DS to become mainstream; not only the the vendor has to make the hardware but also the games and apps themselves. Relying on others to supply the software for your niche hardware is only courting disaster. I'm not sure who outside of Apple or MS can even do that these days.
    Click to expand...

    The answer here is Sony and it's a major reason why I think PSVR is ready to lead the charge in the early VR era. They've already announced 100 games in development for PSVR, they also have control of a large amount of non-gaming media content. I think people are really sleeping on Sony's ability to court development for their platform. PSVR also has the advantage of having an enormous userbase ready to use PSVR when it launches, there will be 40+ million PS4's out there by the time PSVR hits.
     
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    solomonrex

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  • #25
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30450577#p30450577:emimnj0y said:
    carlos_c[/url]":emimnj0y]
    I can't find the product now, but I saw a blurb about these goggles at CES that weren't VR, they were like glasses-mounted screens.
    Click to expand...

    I think you mean the zeiss smart lens

    http://www.wired.com/2016/01/zeiss-smart-glasses/
    Click to expand...

    No, it isn't, but that's actually nicer looking and more credible.

    http://www.gizmag.com/avegant-glyph-rev ... 016/41247/

    This preview had a price on it, but it isn't any cheaper, so except for portability it doesn't look so nice. It would certainly be enough for white collar workers to skip monitors, but then you're wearing something heavy on your head. Maybe this is what VR looks like eventually - more like headphones - or maybe it's a dead end.

    Part of the point is, the size and expense are key. AR will be the perfect solution one day, since it can do both or at least leave you immersed in the real world. But only if it's perfected and miniaturized and still usable. It looks like a taller order than just making VR work for videogames, which is already looking very good and soon to be mainstream.

    I expect Rift to win short term and sony/Valve long term. Platforms matter.
     
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  • #26
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30450577#p30450577:12to8ckr said:
    carlos_c[/url]":12to8ckr]
    I think you mean the zeiss smart lens

    http://www.wired.com/2016/01/zeiss-smart-glasses/
    Click to expand...

    These look like mass-market AR hardware will have to look, but it seems that like Google Glass, they only offer a small HUD off to one side. I doubt that capability is going to be the basis of a mass-market product. The promise of AR is freeing data from screens — permitting it to (appear to) exist out in real space. That means 100+ degrees of FoV coverage, motion tracking, gesture recognition, and some basic reimagining of UI. Not sticking a fixed display with lower resolution than a modern smartphone screen off to the side of your field of view. It confuses me that these things are even referred to with the same label.
     
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    solomonrex

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  • #27
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30452899#p30452899:1km87zdx said:
    ZnU[/url]":1km87zdx]
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30450577#p30450577:1km87zdx said:
    carlos_c[/url]":1km87zdx]
    I think you mean the zeiss smart lens

    http://www.wired.com/2016/01/zeiss-smart-glasses/
    Click to expand...

    These look like mass-market AR hardware will have to look, but it seems that like Google Glass, they only offer a small HUD off to one side. I doubt that capability is going to be the basis of a mass-market product. The promise of AR is freeing data from screens — permitting it to (appear to) exist out in real space. That means 100+ degrees of FoV coverage, motion tracking, gesture recognition, and some basic reimagining of UI. Not sticking a fixed display with lower resolution than a modern smartphone screen off to the side of your field of view. It confuses me that these things are even referred to with the same label.
    Click to expand...

    They aren't referred to as the same, imo, the thread title is just 'face wearables'.

    I think these could easily find a market at the right price - the ones integrated into, say, sunglasses someday. Or at certain workplaces. You know, like in DS9. I'd much rather police drive with these on their heads than look down at their PCs constantly while driving/idling.

    Whereas VR is such an all or nothing thing and then AR is just years away from getting out there, afaict. And the fact is the glasses people wear now don't cover their faces, while these things are close to helmets and probably will be for years.
     
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    MutualCore

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  • #28
    Honestly I think it has to be something like Google Glass but normal glasses that people would buy and have full FOV, 10 hours battery life and it's ok for it to be tethered to an iPhone since anyone who can buy this device for $599 already owns one. The Oculus Rift will be a niche product for hard-core PC gamers. Hololens is DOA. The real wild card is Magic Leap and what Apple has planned.
     
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    neye_eve

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  • #29
    I finally went to bestbuy and got a Google Cardboard pre-built holder. Worked fine - seemed better in some respects than my Oculus Devkit 1. But not having a separate input device really put a damper on things for me. Some apps had a "look up here for 2 seconds" methodology for selecting a button on my phone, which worked ok, but I can't see myself using it much because of the overall UX.

    At this point I think I'm looking forward to trying out the HoloLens the most because it's the novel one of the bunch.
     
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    ZnU

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  • #31
    Apple just hired Doug Bowman, considered a leading VR expert. He was director of Virginia Tech's Center for Human-Computer Interaction for the past five years and lead author of the book "3D User Interfaces: Theory and Practice." If the patents and acquisitions weren't enough evidence Apple was working on VR and/or AR, this pretty much settles it.
     
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  • #35
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30705003#p30705003:2yile6lp said:
    Horatio[/url]":2yile6lp]
    I'm not sure it really can - for VR especially, it has to completely cover your eyes. Excepting a true holodeck, which I think is still absolutely science fiction.
    Click to expand...

    Well, completely blocking out the physical world isn't really something you want to do while in public anyway. Or eventually, usually, in private. VR will likely be a specialty tech for entertainment and simulation tasks. Perhaps there are some productivity tasks where a VR headset hooked up to a powerful workstation is really useful, but in this world of increasingly mobile computing, display tech that cuts people off from the world is necessarily going to be niche.

    AR, on the other hand, fits a world of pervasive mobile computing better than the current model (a screen in your pocket), and I'm pretty confident it will eventually (might take 10 or 15 years) emerge as our primary means of interacting with computing devices.
     
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    Horatio

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  • #36
    VR will likely be a specialty tech for entertainment and simulation tasks. Perhaps there are some productivity tasks where a VR headset hooked up to a powerful workstation is really useful, but in this world of increasingly mobile computing, display tech that cuts people off from the world is necessarily going to be niche.
    Click to expand...
    Actually, one of the most interesting VR projects I've seen was one where you place regular virtual desktops in your view - I think that could be pretty cool for software development (the guy that did the project writes his own VR games inside his VR "office", so he doesn't have to take the goggles on and off to test stuff).

    VR could also allow workers to be crammed into smaller physical spaces, meaning you can spend less on rent, or even just have more telecommuting without the loss of person-to-person interaction.
     
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    ZnU

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  • #37
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30705161#p30705161:25fnegtj said:
    Horatio[/url]":25fnegtj]
    Actually, one of the most interesting VR projects I've seen was one where you place regular virtual desktops in your view - I think that could be pretty cool for software development (the guy that did the project writes his own VR games inside his VR "office", so he doesn't have to take the goggles on and off to test stuff).

    VR could also allow workers to be crammed into smaller physical spaces, meaning you can spend less on rent, or even just have more telecommuting without the loss of person-to-person interaction.
    Click to expand...

    But AR can do this too, and will be much more natural for these scenarios, because you can more seamlessly move between interacting with the real world and the virtual one (i.e. without having to take off or put on a headset). I saw that project as well, and it makes sense to use VR gear for this right now because AR hardware that's up to the task isn't really available yet, but I think this sort of use case will mostly tip to AR once it is.
     
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    Echohead2

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  • #38
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30283961#p30283961:37k934wa said:
    MutualCore[/url]":37k934wa]Why no mention of Magic Leap? They have tech that totally blows away HoloLens. Already funded up to $1.4 billion. Obviously venture capitalists have seen something that totally blows them away.
    Click to expand...

    From what I have seen, the Magic Leap is 2-3 years behind Hololens. Hololens has actual products...Magic leap is not even to tech demo from what I have seen. It is just mocked up videos and not real honest-to-goodness product.
     
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    ant1pathy

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  • #39
    [url=http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?p=30705107#p30705107:3djbm1gz said:
    ZnU[/url]":3djbm1gz]AR, on the other hand, fits a world of pervasive mobile computing better than the current model (a screen in your pocket), and I'm pretty confident it will eventually (might take 10 or 15 years) emerge as our primary means of interacting with computing devices.
    Click to expand...

    100% agree. VR and voice will be a huge paradigm in the short future.
     
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    wco81

    Ars Legatus Legionis
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  • #40
    I don't see VR or AR leading to more telecommuting.

    There is really no reason now that there isn't more telecommuting. Yet tech companies, which should be at the forefront of redefining workplace tech and process flows, would rather deploy fleets of buses to have workers bussed into the office rather than allowing them to telecommute.

    They put wifi in these busses so workers can be more productive, staring into the screen while they ride the bus. Of course, all the time they spend staring into the screen could be done at home.

    Why would VR make companies more inclined to allow workers to work remotely? Because they would be immersed in a video feed of a meeting as opposed to a regular video stream?


    As for entertainment purposes, maybe serious gamers will bother but what's the appeal for casual or non gamers? Did QuickTime VR and the like make the masses crave such wraparound content? I see virtual visits for real estate and tourism sites but that is still a small fraction of such content.

    Porn industry put out those POV videos. Some were interactive, made with Macromedia Director so you could click what sequence would play. Those bombed out too and the porn industry isn't in a position to invest a lot into VR content development. Nor will even VR enthusiasts pay for porn VR when there is so much free conventional content out there.
     
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