What is real? Not only is this an existential question, but a source of creation, innovation, and curiosity. We explore the answers to this question by delving into the virtual realm, and our tool has, since the 60’s, been VR-technology. Although, recently it has taken up an increasingly larger part of the videogame community. Starting with several failed attempts in the mid-90’s and continued by Palmer Luckey’s highly successful Oculus Rift, This new headset sparked new life into the VR- community, including VR-research and development.
In this text, I will use the theories of McQuivey, Rogers, Simon and Winston in the fields of design and innovation to explain the VR-headsets, more specifically the Oculus Rifts innovative effect.
VR/AR-technology can come in different formats, although the most recognizable to the average consumer is the Head-Mounted Display (HMD). In the beginning, an HMD was heavy, mechanical and had little application other than scientific research. However, over time, the HMD became more electronic with features like motion tracking, 3D stereoscopic imaging, built-in stereo headphones and peripheral controllers.
Virtual Reality (VR) is an artificially created simulation of any reality, altered or otherwise. The hardware can vary from a simple mask with optics that manipulates your vision; to an HMD giving the experience of a fully computer-generated world which can simulate any 3D-environment. Currently, VR is mainly used for entertainment, art design or scientific research. Although, the application can also be extended to remote control of robots, training simulations and psychological treatment.
Augmented Reality (AR), however, differs from VR in that while it does not simulate a reality, it alters our perception of the actual reality. AR-technology can either alter our perception of physical reality; or give us new mechanisms in physical reality to manipulate artificial objects projected from the digital world into the physical world. A great example of this is the VIDEOPLACE technology developed by Myron Krueger. (Virtual Reality Society, n.d)
The first ever occurrence of VR/AR-technology is the Wheatstone mirror stereoscope , invented by Sir Charles Wheatstone in the 1840’s. It was simply a board with two pictures on either side of it. In the middle, there was a pair of mirrors at 45 degree angles to the user’s eyes, each reflecting the picture located off to each side of the board. More than a hundred years later, the Sensorama was invented by Morton Heilig in 1962, and introduced to the public. This was a stationary booth, reminiscent of an arcade machine from the 80’s and could fit up to 4 people at once. One could experience up to six different films in all 5 senses. It featured scent producers, a vibrating chair, stereo speakers and a stereoscopic 3D screen.
Heilig also patented the first HMD called the Telesphere mask. This provided the user with stereoscopic 3D images and stereo sound. This inspired Comeau and Bryan to create the Until Headsight for the US military, the first HMD with motion tracking. in 1966, the Sayre Gloves were created by Sandin and Defanti, and were the first wired glove peripherals. These gloves used light emitters and photocells in the hands’ fingers to monitor movement. In other words, the movement of the fingers disrupted the light emitting into the photocell, which was converted into electrical signals.
In 1984 , VPL Research, Inc. was founded. They were contracted by NASA in 1986 to make a range of VR-hardware. During their contract, they went on to develop the DataGlove (glove peripheral), the EyePhone (HMD), the AudioSphere (3D sound software) and the DataSuit (bodysuit). (Virtual Reality Society, n.d) In 1989, Mattel, Inc. launched the PowerGlove , inspired by the DataGlove. The PowerGlove was developed as a controller accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), but never caught on as a product because of its difficulty in use.
2 years later, in 1991, a company called The Virtuality Group launched a VR arcade game called Virtuality. This was the first mass-produced VR entertainment system. It featured real-time stereoscopic 3D images through an HMD with built-in stereo headphones, joysticks, a microphone and multi-player capability. In 1995, three commercial VR-headsets were produced for mass-production. This is the year the VFX1 Headgear was released by Forte Technologies, as well as Victormaxx’s Cybermaxx and the Virtual IO’s I-Glasses (Delaney, 1996). They all failed within a short time. At this point, VR had lost its appeal to the general public. But 16 years later, Palmer Luckey created the first prototype of the Oculus Rift. Starting a new chapter in the history of VR-technology. But how did this come to be?
While Luckey was working in a mobile phone repair shop, he had a hobby of buying and testing old VR-headsets. He found them inadequate, none of them living up the expectations of immersing him in a different virtual world. Later as he attended a local community college, he started tinkering on his own prototype for a new VR-headset, combining parts of old VR-headsets and screens from mobile phones. He regularly updated a 3D-gaming forum online of his progress. Eventually after he had produced several prototypes, John Carmack, co-founder of id Software, stumbled upon his posts on the forum. Carmack contacted Luckey and was promptly given the offer of receiving one of the prototypes for free. The prototype blew Carmack away and he immediately saw the potential of this technology. Carmack repurposed a copy of “Doom 3” to work with the prototype, adjusting his own 3D software to accommodate for the prototypes shortcomings. Later that same year, he showed the prototype to a plethora of journalists on the E3 gaming convention.
Over the next 21 months, Luckey partnered up with Brendan Iribe, Nate Mitchell and Michael Antoinov to found Oculus VR. John Carmack also joined their company a little later as CTO. They continued development and launched a Kickstarter project to fund the production of a DIY kit, called the Development Kit 1. In a month, they raised 2.4 million dollars, and because of this massive success, it drew the attention of Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook. After some negotiations, the company was sold to Facebook with a price tag of 2 billion dollars (Kumparak, 2014). This was a massive success for Oculus VR, since it now had a virtually endless amount of funding for further development and production. Since then, 3 more versions of the Oculus Rift was developed and sold, with it’s latest being the Oculus Rift S. But how come the Oculus Rift was this successful? We might find answer in researchers of innovation dynamics.
Simon ( 1996 ) separates the artificial from the natural and claims that an artificial system has 3 important elements vital to its survival.
- The inner environment
- The outer environment
- The task environment
The inner environment must be designed such that it responds to the criteria of the outer environment, however they can only interact through the task environment. In the case of VR-HMDs, it looks a little bit different. This is the task environment of the Oculus Rift.
- The inner environment (VR-HMD)
- The 1st outer environment (the computer)
- The 2nd outer environment (the person/operator)
- The task environment (Giving the operator a means of experiencing and manipulating a simulated environment)
The Oculus Rift’s inner environment consists of 2 small screens, stereo headphones and an ergonomic, low-weight helmet to carry the screens and headphones. In addition, it also has a “motion tracking”-module to register the helmets orientation in space. The screens are maintained by the helmet, such that each screen goes to each eye. And of course, the headphones are also separated such that each speaker goes to each ear. There is also a protective visor around the screens, such that no discernible light can enter the operator’s line of sight (Desai, P.R., Desai, P.N., Ajmera, & Mehta, 2014 ).
The inner environment therefore has the means of receiving visual and audio information from the 1st outer environment. It also has the means to feed this information to the 2nd outer environment, through the screens and speakers. In turn, this makes the 2nd outer environment stimulate the inner environment’s gyroscope. This, through the inner environment, feeds the 1st outer environment with orientation data, which it uses to alter the visual information received by the inner environment. The computer, with its hardware, runs the software necessary for the 3D-environment to exist, while the HMD serves as the interface between the operator and the simulated environment.
The Oculus Rift is a collection of subsystems that each has its different function, using its own mechanism, which adds to the performance of the entire inner system’s function. Reducing each subsystems function to perform, reduces the quality of the whole inner systems function.
There have been several iterations of the Rift , with DK1 , the Crystal Cove , DK2 , Crescent Bay , the CV and finally the Rift S. The CV1 , or Consumer Version 1 , was the first marketable version produced by Oculus VR. However, both the DK1 and DK2 were sold to the people backing Luckey’s Kickstarter project. This is Luckey’s way of simulating the task environment, improving the function of the inner environment for every iteration (Winston, 1998). For every version, the resolution, latency, Degrees of Freedom, processing power, software compatibility and ergonomics have been improved. This has not only improved the task environment, but also given us new knowledge about what is needed to effectively simulate a reality.
The main reason for the Oculus Rift’s inner environment serving its intended purpose when previous attempts by other companies have not, is cybersickness. Cybersickness is an affliction induced by VR- technology, mainly HMDs, causing symptoms similar to motion sickness, but also headaches and eyestrain (LaViola, 2000). Because of the Rift’s ability to not induce cybersickness in its operators, people can use it through extended periods of time. The main proponent of this ability is its low latency (2ms – 30ms), its wide field of view (100 ֯- 110 ֯ ) and its superior orientation tracking (accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer). This feeds the operator with real-time changes in visuals that eliminates conflicting vestibular and spatial perception.
One of the design constraints have been not to induce cybersickness in its users. This is a hard constraint. This is because inducing cybersickness renders the 2nd outer environment incapable of interacting with the 1st outer environment through the the inner environment. In addition, it also had to be of low weight, have an affordable price and not limit the operator in its degrees of freedom. However, these were only soft constraints.
The first iteration of the Oculus Rift , however, was not the optimal solution to these design constraints, but it was a satisficing one. Operators of the first iteration, the DK1 , reported the image afflicted by a “Screen Door”-effect. In short, this means that the operator could notice holes between each pixel, making the entire image look like a screen door. This was a hinderance for total immersability. It also only had 3 degrees of freedom, which is the rotational motion of pitch (x-axis), yaw (y-axis) and roll (z-axis) in a 3D space. All later iterations also included translational motion such as turning, tilting and pivoting on all axes, resulting in a total of 6 degrees of freedom. Later iterations also have a reduced “Screen Door”-effect.
The Rift has been adapted to human limitations, such as a human’s perception of vestibular and spatial orientation. Had it not accounted for these limitations, the HMD would have induced cybersickness and failed in serving its intended purpose. VR-HMDs is a peculiar instance of the artificial. Since, if the limitations and expectations are not accommodated for, the inner environment is rendered unusable.
According to Winston (Media Technology and Society, Winston. S.3), technology is the explicit utterances in the language of science. Meaning that we social creatures, humans, use the development of technology, of mechanical or electrical devices, to express the scientifically established. The process of eventually arriving at the production of an invention, starts with “ideation”, which simply means coming up with an idea, on the basis of science. And since science inspired it, technology becomes the expression of the idea.
The first mention of the VR-HMD as we know it today, was by Stanley G. Weinbaum in his science fiction story, Pygmalion’s Spectacles, published in 1935. This “ideation” inspired Morton Heilig, and later Ivan Sutherland, to create their prototypes; Sword of Damocles and The Ultimate Display, respectively, during the 1960s (Virtual Reality Society, n.d). Both prototypes can be classified as rejected, since no supervening social necessity had operated yet, and no possible application was apparent.
However, research continued for the US Airforce, and later NASA, which accumulated further the competence of scientific knowledge. This reinforces Winston’s affirmation that this process is governed by an accelerator-brake dynamic (Winston, p.11). As science further expanded its competence in computer science, several more prototypes were built. Such as VPL Research’s EyePhone , SEGA’s SEGA VR and Oculus VR’s Oculus Rift.
The EyePhone is an example of a parallel prototype, since it was developed by VPL for NASA’s Space Flight Simulations. Meanwhile, SEGA VR was an example of a partial prototype, since it was designed to perform effectively as a VR-HMD, but did not perform as well as intended, and ultimately rejected. The Oculus Rift , however, was an accepted prototype. This is because of the “accelerator-brake” dynamic was in its “brake”-period up until now, thus creating a supervening social necessity for a new prototype. I consider the response to the Oculus Rift’s Kickstarter project as evidence of this (Oculus VR, 2016).
However, the first version of the Rift, called PR1, was not carried on tripartite phase of Winston’s technological performance (Winston, 1998). There were several versions after, such as the DK1, Crystal Cove, DK2, Crescent Bay, CV1 and Rift S. In accordance with Winston’s classifications, I can further distinguish each iteration of the Rift as follows:
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PR1 – accepted prototype, but did not go on as a production, and did not become an invention.
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DK1 – accepted prototype, went on production and became an invention. However, it became redundant after later versions were released.
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Crystal Cove – accepted prototype, but did not go on as a production and therefore did not become an invention.
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DK2 – accepted prototype, went on to production and became an invention. However, it became redundant after later versions were released.
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Crescent Bay – accepted prototype, but did not go on as a production and therefore did not become an invention.
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CV 1 – accepted prototype, went on as a production and is an invention. However, it is not redundant yet.
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Rift S – is a continuation of CV1, therefore accepted. It has gone to production, become an invention and is not redundant as of today.
According to Winston, all technological advancements is subject to the “law” of the suppression of radical potential (Winston, p. 11 ). Is this the case of the Oculus Rift?
I would argue that it has not reached it yet, but perhaps in a few years. The reason for this is the vast range of parallel prototypes, in form of software, being developed for a plethora of VR-HMDs. The invention of the Oculus Rift has created a new supervening social necessity. The Oculus Rift is just one of several VR-headsets acting as tools for software developers in their creative ventures. Examples of this are the increasing amount of VR-games available, as well as graphic design tools supporting VR, such as Blender, Gravity Sketch, Facebook Quill and Oculus Medium.
The subject of the Oculus Rift creating a new supervening social necessity, can arguably make it a disruptive innovation, and a digital one at that. Palmer Luckey has truly acted as a digital disruptor up until his company’s acquisition by Facebook. Using only himself as labour for development of the first prototype, using spare parts from older VR- technology and new mobile phones, while consulting internet forums for advice. Thereby, he kept manufacturing and research costs low, and eventually introducing it to viable investors through the internet.
After the company was founded, he looked for further funding through Kickstarter.com and acquired 2.4 million dollars for the production of Development Kit 1. After the production of Development Kit 1 , he also released the SDK for developers to engineer their own systems for the HMD. Thereby, giving any owner of the DK1 the ability to become a digital disruptor in the brand-new market of VR-software development. However, how has the innovation been adopted by society? Where are we now and what is the future for the diffusion of this innovation?
Rogers ( 2003 ) has categorized the different groups of innovation adopters. Based on statistical rules, he also splits them into percentages of the population.
- Innovators – 2.5%
- Early Adopters – 13.5%
- Early Majority – 34%
- Late Majority – 34%
- Laggards – 16%
In the case of the Oculus Rift, the “innovators” at this stage were Palmer Luckey, the co-founders of Oculus VR and several other employees of Oculus VR. I also estimate the percentage of “innovators” was a bit lower than Rogers estimates, in this case. Through internet forums and Kickstarter, he reached the “early adopters”, who was later sold the DK1 and DK2 versions. They were happily ready to adopt this innovation, mainly because of its technological abilities, but also its affordable price. The low price, and peer pressure from early adopters, enabled the “early majority” to actively adopt this new innovation. The people who are buying the Oculus Rift at this point in time, are acting deliberately to acquire this innovation. And by extension, influencing the “late majority” to do so as well.
However, even if the Rift S is reasonably priced, at around 600$, most people see it as a huge monetary setback. It is more expensive than a laptop, a gaming console or a new phone, and is still mainly functioning as an entertainment system. However, the applicability extends further. There exists a plethora of graphic design tools with support for the Oculus Rift , as previously mentioned. I would argue that the current pricetag is the greatest hindrance for this innovation to diffuse into the “late majority”. Had the price been lower, the “late majority”, being the skeptics as they are, would adopt this quite rapidly. (Rogers, 2003)
Furthermore, my prediction is that the evolution of VR-HMD as a PC-peripheral is synonymous with the evolution of the Personal Computer becoming a household necessity. The sooner this comparison becomes apparent for the “late majority”, the sooner they will adopt this new innovation. They will see it a necessary tool to perform their work, to enjoy their entertainment or for regular communication with their peers. This, in turn, will affect the “laggards” as the price of the HMD will become increasingly lower, making it a safer innovation for them to adopt.
In conclusion, the Oculus Rift has been an enormous innovative success and a breath of fresh air in the videogame industry. It is an amazing technological venture, which has succeeded as an innovation mainly because of its ability to sustain the task environment. As an innovation it has yet to diffuse into the “late majority adopters”, however someday it will become a household PC-peripheral. Maybe even a standalone device. Which removes some of the physical boundaries set upon us by the currently normalized, soon to be redundant, human computer interface.
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