Will Virtual Reality Go the Way of Videophones: Cheap & Widely Available, But Still Rarely Used?

A lot of VR fans are excitedly passing around a new report from renowned analyst Piper Jaffray, as it's super bullish on the future of VR:

The market for VR and augmented reality headsets could be worth $62 billion in 2025, Piper Jaffray said. It estimates 500 million headsets sold at an average selling price of $125 that year... "Our optimism around the theme is based on consumers' insatiable appetite for new tech experiences: Virtual and augmented reality are radically new tech experiences," Piper Jaffray said.

Sure, all the major tech companies are driving to make VR mass market, and this boom may indeed continue booming. But the thing is, Piper Jaffray's last statement is not universally true, and not even true to VR in particular. 3D movies are a related technology, but market interest in 3D movies is already declining. And from a broader perspective, author Warren Ellis reminds us when major tech companies in the 60's and 70's thought everyone would be using videophones:

We were told again and again that videophones were not only imminent, but that they made so much sense that they might as well already be here, they fit so well into our lives... [but] when video calls finally arrived, they were mostly relegated to business usage and long-distance relationship maintenance by appointment. The basic unit of communication has become, not video calls or even voice calls, but text messages. Who saw that coming? The return of the telegram? Pretty much nobody.

Because yes, texting is pretty much like how people communicated over long distances in the 19th century. Yet we do that more now than we did then, and certainly more than we make videophone calls. Even when we have the option of doing either from the same device (i.e. our smartphones).

In retrospect, of course we should have seen the relative dearth of videophone calls coming -- they're time-consuming and attention-demanding, and because you need to comb your hair and look presentable to make them, we only use them on special occasions. Which brings up a related point around VR:

Wearing a VR headset is bulky, constrictive, and over long periods of use, itchy/sweaty/etc. Everyone knows this. VR fans readily admit this. They also cut you off from the rest of the world, including your immediate surroundings, which is disruptive to everything else you're doing. VR fans also readily admit this, or even promote that as a feature. Their basic response to these concerns is, "Well yes, VR headsets are bulky now, but soon they'll shrink to the size of eyeglasses." Which is definitely true, but here's the thing: People generally don't even like wearing glasses.

So if you run with the videophone analogy, these stumbling blocks suggest a similar future for VR: Widely available, but for most people, only used on special occasions. Which would still mean virtual reality is an important technology, but like videophones, not exactly a thing that fundamentally changes all of our lives.

Ellis via Kottke; image via PaleoFuture.

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Comments

[Cube Republic]

Video phone = skype, millions of people use it every day.

[Wagner James Au]

I use Skype everyday -- but 95% of the time, audio or IM only.

[Ciaran Laval]

There was a good article about this in The Guardian a few days back :

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/28/jonathan-waldern-return-virtual-reality-as-big-an-opportunity-as-internet

Professor Bob Stone's comments on the use of headsets is particularly relevant and the video about Virtuality, which was going to be big in the 90's is well worth a viewing.

They've been trying 3D in cinemas since the 1920's, peripherals have always been a barrier,

One of the issues this time around, which many feel will lead to greater engagement, is that costs are considerably lower.

[phantom republic]

I think virtual reality is still relevant - as long as it remains engaging with low barriers for entry. 3D VR might not be the preferred way people ever approach it - I still love the 2D variety as long as the graphics are great and the effort at reality improves.

Sadly, VR 2.0 seems to be hinting at failure, even though they're necessarily not wrapping themselves in the proliferation of Oculus Rift. LL is already talking about user-created content for Sansar as if it's the crazy aunt in the attic, while High Fidelity is hoping future users will trade realism for cartoonish avatars ... because recent advances allow one to throw a ball back and forth!

VR is still viable, but the VR graveyard is growing. I don't know how to close the divide between DIY worlds and high-quality graphics, but re-creating passive museums where the most creative thing a person can do is walk around and text (Blue Mars) ... these are sure-fire recipes for failure.

[irihapeti]

hamlet wrote: "I use Skype everyday -- but 95% of the time, audio or IM only."

^^ yeah that ^^

same my phone. It has a vidcam on it. Never use it, except to vid something not me

[Nathan Adored]

Heck, most of the time that I communicate on Skype, I do text only. I avoid voice even when I'm occasionally in a voice-chat conference call.

I've been saying for a good while to some people on HyFy who keep saying everyone's going to go to headset only, voice only, that I fully expect there to be lots of people using text chat. And in fact, I suspect a good number won't be using the VR goggles other than maybe occasionally. And yet there are lots of people there saying "Hey, why are we trying to keep text chat in the system? That's SO old fashioned! We need to pull it OUT!"

**FACEDESKS**

That said, I do figure I'll probably pick up a set of VR goggles at SOME point... once they come down a bunch in price, likely. But even then, I doubt in my VR time that I'll will be using them exclusively, or even often.

[RoblemVR]

Video Phones failed because it was an attempt to extend the old telephone paradigm. You and the other person you wanted to call had to purchase the same phone to sit down and have a conversation. Now we have Skype and “face time” type apps that run on our computers and the cell phones in our pockets. The investment to use these technologies is minimum and in most cases our computers and smartphones already have a video camera built in so the investment is zero, get the software and you are done. Now if you don’t personally feel comfortable making a video call that’s fine, but that’s you, millions of people use the technology every day. Now before you drop a new tired article about how VR is going to fail because 3D televisions and 3D in the movies are a failure understand that again these were attempts to extend old technologies that are on the way out. Cheap cardboard turns the smartphone in your pocket in to a serviceable VR device today, and prices are going to come down with high end headsets as fast the prices of the computers that are needed to support them. It may be “Hazy” to you, but it’s still coming.

[irihapeti]

the advantage that txt has over voice is that txt is not immediate. Can take your time replying

voice advantage over vid is that you don't have to care what your appearance is, or what else you might be doing at same time. This is quite important really and is I think one of the main reasons people don't do it, even if the cost was ok

vr negates the appearance and doing whatelse. It doesnt negate the non-immediacy of txt tho

+

the other reason why I don't use vid much at all on my phone is that it costs heaps. I only got a small data cap on my phone. Small compared to my fixed line broadband

if I could get the same cap on my phone for same price then I probably use it more. Same a wireless vid headset that works anywhere like my phone does, for same broadband cost

[Metacam Oh]

Tell my mother video is rarely used, maybe she'll stop trying to facetime me.

[Lagomorph7]

I think this article absolutely nails it. Right now I am sitting in my living room with my family. So I can't Skype, or immerse myself in VR isolation. These are things that I can only do when I am alone and unlikely to be disturbed. Neither of these technologies are never going to be the default way I interact with either other people or with the computer.