2017 — How Virtual Reality (VR) Can Inspire and Empower Actual Reality
Evolving Beyond Escapism and Entertainment
What’s the point?
A few weeks back I was sharing my thoughts on VR with an artist friend. He’s a classic oil painter/illustrator, the true artist kind of guy that goes up the canyon on weekend hikes to paint barns for a good challenge.
As any fan of VR, I did my best to describe Google’s Tilt Brush, Oculus Quill, and some other immersive design tools currently available, thinking he’d be over the moon about being able to step into his artwork. Nope. It was a lackluster response that I found really odd at first. He wasn’t even curious, or if he was, it was veiled in deep, artistic skepticism. Trying to pull some kind of enthusiasm out of him, I shared my recent efforts running UX/UI experiments geared towards educational VR/AR applications. “Educational VR,” he replied, “That’s great. It can’t all be about wizards and guns right?”
So can we do about that perception? Well, marketing plays a HUGE part in how VR is received by anyone not drinking the early adopter Kool-aid. Let’s look at some of the different ways VR is currently portrayed.
Escape Reality
Ready Player One is frequently referred to in VR circles, for good and for ill, and is an upcoming 2018 Spielberg film so it definitely deserves a look. The film has some major potential of helping or harming adoption behaviors.
The story takes place in a dystopian future, where the world is run by shady mega corporations, the economy is all sorts of messed up and most folks are jacked into the OASIS around the clock. The OASIS is described as an MMOSG (massively multiplayer online simulation game), essentially a VR based internet of simulated environments.
There’s a lot to like about the book, cool technology, a bit of nerd romance, lots of video games culture, tons of nostalgic 80’s pop-culture references and a final battle scene with all your favorite battle mech warriors dukin’ it out.
One major thing I don’t like about the story, (SPOILERS AHEAD!!), is how the in-game victories have so little impact on the outside world, on REAL LIFE. When all is said and done, the world doesn’t become less dystopian, the main baddie gets arrested but nothing happens to his mega evil super corporation, which happens to be the very ISP (internet service provider) powering the OASIS — think a much more powerful & evil version of Comcast, sounds like the worst possible future right? The status quo is basically maintained, and the characters continue along more or less the same path as they followed at the beginning of the book without much of an emotional transformation. But hey, at least they still have the OASIS, IRL AND virtual friendship, and tons of cash for winning the competition, who needs anything else right?!
It’s a fun read, and I’d love to see a massively adopted VR platform, but not at the expense of real world adventures, and not due to eroding economic or social dynamics. There’s got to be a better future than one where VR becomes our escape route.
Replace Reality
Somehow, dystopian science fiction has become a common go-to future when thinking about emerging technologies rather than thinking of them as positive and productive parts of our collective future (Star Trek utopia baby!) Short stories like “Uncanny Valley”, while definitely depressing and taking a negative, skeptical tone, serves as an excellent cautionary reminders of the dangers of replacing our reality.
So ya, let’s not go that route, that’s definitely the dark side of VR…no thanks!
Relive Reality
GoPro is well known for their action cameras and their brand perfectly captures the spirit of adventure. Where VR can often feel like another game console for avid gamers, GoPro sees VR & 360 capture as an amazing way to record, preserve and share your personal adventures. GoPro wants you to get outside, have fun doing some bat $h!t crazy things and record them using their new Fusion 360 camera.
Their take on VR/360 video is amazing, encouraging us to go big, explore the unknown and enjoy us some nature. These guys are the front-line of adventure and do a great job at rallying the troops towards an adrenaline filled future where technology doesn’t replace reality, but instead helps us share and relive reality.
Inspire & Empower Reality
There are a few essential questions the VR industry needs to do a better job at marketing: How can VR improve our lives? How can VR make us better people? How can VR make our challenges less challenging? We are constantly making purchasing decisions based on what products can offer us, how we want to be perceived by our peers, and how well different brands reflect social causes we also believe in.
Samsung struck gold with their #DoWhatYouCant GearVR video featuring…an Ostrich! Their campaign slogan “We make what can’t be made, so you can do what can’t be done” pulls at the heart strings of VR’s greatest promise — VR can truly empower our reality.
Samsung got the ball moving with that ad campaign and hopefully more brands throwing will join the ranks.
In their Google I/O 2017 event, Google shared plans for their new standalone VR headset, showcasing new ways VR can be used to empower & improve our reality. While the messaging isn’t as strong as Samsung’s, the example is clear, VR is something we can believe in, not because the tech is cool, but because it can help make me be successful at the things I care about, like dodgeball!
I can’t think of many VR ads featuring kids, VR ads are all too often geared toward the prototypical 25–34 year olds, but here Google has the foresight to understand that while I love games & technology, I want my kids to dominate the dodgeball court even more.
I agree wholeheartedly with Vincent Chen, CS student at Stanford and Y Combinator ambassador, from his excellent piece on Getting into VR when he said:
VR isn’t Just for Gamers
Yes, it’s fun to shoot robots in VR.
But VR will also enable immersive concerts, reinvented museums, and live, court-side sporting events. With VR, videoconferencing will improve, with better eye contact and the inclusion of nuanced, non-verbal cues. The cost of training will plummet without the need for human trainers in industries like construction or manufacturing. At the same time, the efficacy of repeatable, hands-on training will increase. Academics will conduct social psychology research with more reproducibility, diverse sample sizes, and day-to-day realism without the need for human confederates. VR will provide a scalable way to introduce true experiential learning into education.
Personally, I’m extremely excited about the impact of VR on healthcare and medicine. The benefits of VR in training/education will also apply to clinicians. In terms of patient care, VR can be used to manage pain, combat addiction, and treat mental health issues.
So what are you building in VR and why?
I encourage you to keep innovating and pushing the limits, but to be especially mindful of the power that you wield when literally hijacking people’s eyes, ears, and powers of perception. And remember that thing about great power?
