Over the past few years, Apple CEO Tim Cook has stated several times that augmented reality is a promising technology. “I think the [AR] promise is even greater in the future. So it’s a critically important part of Apple’s future,” Cook told Kara Swisher back in 2021.
But it sounds like Apple’s upcoming product is going to offer a mixed-reality experience. Users will be able to experience both augmented and virtual reality. Details are still thin about the potential use cases and apps for the headset as it’s easier to control software leaks compared to product leaks.
The problem is, the Quest Pro isn’t very good. It’s a device seemingly launched without plan or purpose, highlighting VR’s persistent drawbacks without making good use of its strengths — and topped off with some irredeemably bad software. We might be seeing a roadmap for where Meta is going, but right now, it’s not a particularly fun place to be. And if Meta lingers there much longer, its metaverse is in trouble.
“The Holy Grail would be to create a virtual reality world that lets in only the controls and operator parts (the physical controls, in this case, a flight sim’s controls and the pilot) while creating an outside world, the airplane and the world outside, including airports and terrain and weather, so the pilot could fly using physical controls while seeing a world around them that’s rendered via virtual reality.
Image Credits: David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile / Getty Images
“To reflect who we are and what we hope to build, I am proud to announce that starting today, our company is now Meta. Our mission remains the same — it’s still about bringing people together. Our apps and our brands — they’re not changing either,” Zuckerberg said.
Well, it turns out that’s not so true. In a lengthy Facebook post, CTO-in-waiting Andrew Bosworth detailed about 15 minutes later following the completion of the keynote that as part of the new rebrand, they will be killing off the Oculus brand.
Facebook employees unveil a new logo and the name ‘Meta’ on the sign in front of Facebook headquarters on Oct. 28 in Menlo Park, Calif. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
“From now on, we’re going to be the metaverse first. Not Facebook first,” Zuckerberg said at Connect, the company’s annual event focused on virtual and augmented reality. “Facebook is one of the most-used products in the world. But increasingly, it doesn’t encompass everything that we do. Right now, our brand is so tightly linked to one product that it can’t possibly represent everything we are doing.”
The coming name change, which CEO Mark Zuckerberg plans to talk about at the company’s annual Connect conference on October 28th, but could unveil sooner, is meant to signal the tech giant’s ambition to be known for more than social media and all the ills that entail. The rebrand would likely position the blue Facebook app as one of many products under a parent company overseeing groups like Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus, and more. A spokesperson for Facebook declined to comment for this story.
Instead of being on a computer, in the metaverse you might use a headset to enter a virtual world connecting all sorts of digital environments.
Unlike current VR, which is mostly used for gaming, this virtual world could be used for practically anything – work, play, concerts, cinema trips – or just hanging out.
Most people envision that you would have a 3D avatar – a representation of yourself – as you use it.
But because it’s still just an idea, there’s no single agreed definition of the metaverse.
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