We had some Friday fun snarking about Gartner's latest Hype Cycle report which puts VR on the Slope of Enlightenment, but as it happens, longtime SL blogger Eddi Haskell is a former researcher with the esteemed analyst firm, and posted some context to the forecast:
"This is my comment as a former Gartner Research Director - with a different real life name of course. Something is missing from the chart. It should say 'Hype Cycle' on top." [Editor: True, I cropped that label from the image for sizing reasons.]
"This is a chart of a classic Gartner Hype Cycle, not actual technology deployment. Gartner believes that technologies become overhyped prematurely, and reach the first point of the curve -- The Peak of Inflated Expectations and become overhyped... The Gartner Hype Cycle then continues to predict that technologies fail to deliver on initial promise and then fall rapidly into their nadir -- the low point on the Trough of Disillusionment and are given up as essentially dead or way too premature.
"Technologies, even when given up as dead, can continue to enter a Plateau of Productivity when they, slowly at times, begin to reach potential-- frequently being renamed and repositioned in the process. Once can argue that Virtual Reality Consumer Applications, of which Virtual Worlds are a subset, are starting to see this happen right now -- with the Facebook acquisition of Oculus Rift serving as a trigger.
"All this Hype Cycle is saying visa vis Virtual Reality (which really needs to be tightened as a term -- VR is not monolithic) is that Virtual Reality consumer applications were prematurely written off, and will start to slowly see some real adoption over time, even if their initial 'hype' is not realized."
I'm grateful to Eddi for helping us understand Gartner's reasoning for its new chart, but I'm still skeptical. VR as it's generally understood was last hyped and then written off in the 90s, but back when the larger technology market was totally different. At the same time, the current wave of VR is being freshly hyped yet again, with breathless prominent media profiles on the cover of Time and other major publications, and "It's going to change the world!" pronouncements frequently made by all kinds of people. Seems to me it makes more sense to place the current wave of VR on the Peak of Inflated Expectations.
Speaking of which, Eddi had this to say about the 2007 Gartner forecast mentioned, when Gartner said “80 percent of active Internet users (and Fortune 500 companies) will have a ‘second life’, but not necessarily in Second Life” by 2011":
"This is exactly what happened to Second Life and other virtual worlds in 2006 - 2007 when Business Week with its cover story, other media sources, and Gartner itself (which should have known better) bought the Kool-Aid about virtual worlds and issued incredible projections." Time will tell if Time and others are drinking a new flavor of Kool-Aid.
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Thanks for running my view on VR Hamlet. Let me offer another perspective. One of the best indications confirming a Hype Cycle is Venture Capital (VC) money. If you looks at "Virtual Reality" on the Hype Cycle, and if we make the assumption that Virtual Worlds are part of Virtual Reality (some would say they are more a part of MMO's than VR), this is another way of viewing what it happening with industry hype. There was little VC money to be had in the VR area after the rapid fall of Second Life and other Virtual Worlds after a peak of inflated expectations was reached, say, around 2008 - when Second Life stopped growing. The collapse of Blue Mars in 2010, was because of one reason -- VC money for additional growth became non-existent. This has all changed now, as VR is becoming hyped once again -- the Facebook acquisition of Oculus serving as a trigger. Witness what is happening with Project Sansar right now -- additional VC funding for its launch-- note I am calling funding from original investors in Linden Lab as new VC funding, I have no idea who is ponying up new cash for Linden Lab right now -- would not have happened without the "warm glow" given by Facebook -- and media "hype" falling in line. Let me offer one more perspective to this. Could it be that headset-based consumer Virtual Reality is beginning a journey on an entire new hype cycle -- and will ultimately fall into a trough of disillusionment once consumers fail to buy millions of these things for the 2016 Christmas Holiday season? It could happen. This is why I think the term "Virtual Reality" is too monolithic to be places on one spot on the Hype Cycle - and why anyone rightfully should view Gartner's current positioning with skepticism.
Posted by: Eddi Haskell | Monday, August 24, 2015 at 07:09 PM
" when Gartner said “80 percent of active Internet users (and Fortune 500 companies) will have a ‘second life’, but not necessarily in Second Life” by 2011" "
the prediction is correct, about there being a second life for people. Just not on 3D as it turned out. People have a virtual/online life. in 2D. on FB
Posted by: irihapeti | Tuesday, August 25, 2015 at 04:04 AM