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Oculus social features now require a linked Facebook account

nalex66
MVP
MVP
Apparently, starting today, Oculus social features (friends list, parties, visiting people's Oculus Homes) will now require a linked Facebook account. This was already the case for some apps like Venues, and some features, like accessing your phone's camera roll in the Quest gallery. Going forward, new social features will demand a Facebook account, and now existing features will too.

Starting today, when you choose to log into
Facebook from the Oculus Platform, you’ll be able to access new social
features that make it easier for you to connect with other people,
including:

  • Chats, so you can message your Oculus friends in or out of the headset with quick responses to hop into games together
  • Join your friends
    in VR directly from any device with links that open to where your
    friends are within an app, and see the most popular destinations where
    people are playing in VR
  • User-created Events, so you can organize meetups or multiplayer games with friends
  • Share photos, videos, and livestreaming to Facebook, allowing you to share your favorite moments to Facebook Groups from VR
  • Parties that any of your Oculus friends can join (previously parties were only invite-only)
  • Messenger friends can easily join you in VR when you send them links to join you where you’re playing

As
these changes roll out and we make it easier for people to connect and
build communities in VR, we’ll ask people to log into Facebook from the
Oculus Platform to use both the new social features above, as well as
existing social features like joining parties, adding friends, and
visiting other people’s Homes. These features are already powered by
Facebook, since Oculus is part of the Facebook family of apps. And now
first-party social interactions on the Oculus Platform will be backed by
Facebook identity, allowing us to help keep people safer in VR as we
grow the social VR ecosystem.


Personally, I'm not excited to see this, but I guess it's not surprising. I've never had a FB account, and haven't been interested in creating one, but we'll see how it goes--the obvious answer is to create one just for Oculus-related activity and not populate it with a lot of personally identifying information.

DK2, CV1, Go, Quest, Quest 2, Quest 3.


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ShowbizDonkey
Retired Support
Just jumping in quickly to note the following, as it seems to be a bit of a sticking point here:

"Q: Will you show my real name from Facebook to my friends on Oculus without my permission?

People on Oculus will only be able to find your Facebook real name if you enable this option in your privacy settings."

This is towards the bottom of our big FAQ doc on this.

kevinw729
Honored Visionary
This level of intrusion seems to go against what was promised at the time of the acquisition - do we take it that because those executives have left the stage, the previous concerns can now be validated?
https://vrawards.aixr.org/ "The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities" https://www.amazon.co.uk/Out-Home-Immersive-Entertainment-Frontier/dp/1472426959


kevinw729 said:

This level of intrusion seems to go against what was promised at the time of the acquisition - do we take it that because those executives have left the stage, the previous concerns can now be validated?



Probably.
Big PC, all the headsets, now using Quest 3

kevinw729
Honored Visionary

Probably.



Seems some others feel the same way!

0mm5z53a1h75.png


https://vrawards.aixr.org/ "The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities" https://www.amazon.co.uk/Out-Home-Immersive-Entertainment-Frontier/dp/1472426959

Anonymous
Not applicable
It really isn't a problem tbh. Just create a dummy Facebook account. Job done.

I've always had my Facebook account linked with my Oculus account so it's not going to make any difference to me personally, but if you have a problem with it just create a dummy account and don't go near the thing ever again.

And anyone stressing out about the data that Facebook have access to is about 25 years too late. Google has probably known your inside leg measurement and what sort of porn you like to watch since the 90s.

Anonymous
Not applicable

snowdog said:

It really isn't a problem tbh. Just create a dummy Facebook account. Job done.

I've always had my Facebook account linked with my Oculus account so it's not going to make any difference to me personally, but if you have a problem with it just create a dummy account and don't go near the thing ever again.

And anyone stressing out about the data that Facebook have access to is about 25 years too late. Google has probably known your inside leg measurement and what sort of porn you like to watch since the 90s.



I'm already using a fake last name on my last account, that's now dormant, because they don't actually let you delete your account anymore. So, with a 'new' fake account, what happens to all your previously purchased games, that are under your original 'authentic' Oculus account? That's what worries me. Or, if you can simply sign into Venues, without changing your Oculus account...alrighty then. Or if they let me make my original Facebook account invisible, then I'd be ok. But right now, if I reopen my account, I'd pop up on my friend's feeds, therefore, telling any stalkers I'm back online. Just imagine a battered woman, trying to stay hidden from an ex...should she be forced to open a Facebook account just to use an Oculus Quest? This is absolute bullshit.

RedRizla
Honored Visionary

kojack said:



maybe I'm getting too paranoid... just wondering what list Horizon will use

Considering they are making adding friends to the oculus list require a facebook account anyway, I'm guessing eventually they will just make it use one system.

We've had a good run over the last 5 years since the buyout, but I guess the push is on to change from "VR owned by a social network" to "VR for a social network".




I'm a little confused. Are you saying we will have to have a facebook account if we already have a friends list created in Oculus Home for PC -VR? Even if we don't what to join these social apps in future? Does this mean that your Oculus account automatically becomes a facebook account or is this just for Oculus Quest and Oculus Rift S social apps?


kojack
MVP
MVP

RedRizla said:


kojack said:



maybe I'm getting too paranoid... just wondering what list Horizon will use

Considering they are making adding friends to the oculus list require a facebook account anyway, I'm guessing eventually they will just make it use one system.

We've had a good run over the last 5 years since the buyout, but I guess the push is on to change from "VR owned by a social network" to "VR for a social network".




I'm a little confused. Are you saying we will have to have a facebook account if we already have a friends list that exists now on PC -VR? Even if we don't what to join these social apps in future? Does this mean that your Oculus PC -VR account automatically becomes a facebook account or is this just for Oculus Quest social apps?



From the Oculus blog: "we’ll ask people to log into Facebook from the

Oculus Platform to use both the new social features above, as well as

existing social features like joining parties, adding friends, and

visiting other people’s Homes.
"

They also say that the existing friends list will remain separate from the facebook friends list, but the above sounds like to add new friends you'll need facebook.

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kevinw729
Honored Visionary

snowdog said:

It really isn't a problem tbh. Just create a dummy Facebook account. Job done.

I've always had my Facebook account linked with my Oculus account so it's not going to make any difference to me personally, but if you have a problem with it just create a dummy account and don't go near the thing ever again.

And anyone stressing out about the data that Facebook have access to is about 25 years too late. Google has probably known your inside leg measurement and what sort of porn you like to watch since the 90s.



Well this is a turn-up for the books - the "this isn't a problem" comment!

We have now seen the full gambit, it started with "this will never happen", "they will not do this", then the famous "what would be the benefit", and "they will make sure this wont happen" and finally we reach the "well this isn't a problem". As always thanks for sharing your opinion, but on this one, I think the comments we had at the beginning have been proven correct.

phklq77ehi2i.png
https://vrawards.aixr.org/ "The Out-of-Home Immersive Entertainment Frontier: Expanding Interactive Boundaries in Leisure Facilities" https://www.amazon.co.uk/Out-Home-Immersive-Entertainment-Frontier/dp/1472426959

Shadowmask72
Honored Visionary
Always stirring the pot Kevin or in this case boiled frog.   😄


System Specs: MSI NVIDIA RTX 4090 , i5 13700K CPU, 32GB DDR 4 RAM, Win 11 64 Bit OS.