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The real definition of Mainstream!

kevinw729
Honored Visionary
Many commentators have been asking the question of what is "mainstream" and when would we be able to known when VR gets close to achieving this.

Well a recent announcement from Samsung kind of gives a good grounding on what that entails:

Samsung had sold 1 million foldable Galaxy Fold smartphones in just three months.....

https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/12/samsung-has-sold-1-million-galaxy-fold-smarthphones/?fbclid=IwAR2N...

So that kinda places the situation in perspective. As has been speculated from recent coverage:

k803718k1474.png

In over six months from the launch of the Oculus Quest a estimates 400,000 have been sold - and while the OculusVR internally had hoped for 1m sales before the end of the year that seems to be a target they may miss, even with the popularity generated by the Index - and reflecting on in this news (if these searches can be turned into sales):

 Quest dominated other VR headsets in search interest in the US. Worldwide.....

https://www.roadtovr.com/oculus-quest-dominated-black-friday-search-volume-us-tied-psvr-worldwide/
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
30 REPLIES 30

kevinw729
Honored Visionary

nalex66 said:
.....
I’m not sure what the point of the comparison was in the first place—as you say, phones and VR are not comparable markets. But, 
.....
Now, obviously VR is a long way from the mainstream ubiquity of smart phones, but if Quest can match the sales numbers of the latest fad phone, that’s a pretty good sign for VR overall. 



I think you can see the point of the compassion, being seeing how you quickly used it to make a point about the ubiquity of the different markets. Also I still stand by the sales number of the $2,000 priced phone:
...Samsung Electronic’s President Young Sohn revealed the company had sold 1 million foldable Galaxy Fold smartphones.....
Rather than the estimated 400,000 sales (at the point in October) of the Quest. I am not happy with the Superdata numbers, but as this is all we have as the manufacturer will not share sales, even to game developers - we are left with this situation.

I agree that the mobile phone business is not like VR - one is established mainstream, the other is attempting to establish itself in the consumer conscientiousness. But it allowed a much more focused  thread discussion. 


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

nalex66
MVP
MVP
There are several articles out where Samsung has corrected that statement.
After the original publication of this artlce, Samsung has since clarified to Korea’s Yonhap News Agency that it hasn’t actually sold one million Galaxy Fold devices, despite what executive Young Sohn said on stage earlier this week. Yonhap says a company spokesperson “said Sohn may have confused the figure with the company’s initial sales target for the year, emphasizing that sales of the tech firm’s first foldable handset have not reached 1 million units.” The company did not clarify how many Galaxy Fold devices have been sold, but it earlier said that it targeted 500,000 units for this year.

So, I stand by my point that Quest, in a market struggling to establish itself in the consumer consciousness, has managed to sell similar numbers as the Galaxy Fold, the latest fad device in a massive well-established mainstream market. As much as you would like to spin that as a failure for Oculus, I don’t know how this can be seen as anything other than a massive success.

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


Try my game: Cyclops Island Demo

kevinw729
Honored Visionary

nalex66 said:

There are several articles out where Samsung has corrected that statement.
After the original publication of this artlce, Samsung has since clarified to Korea’s Yonhap News Agency that it hasn’t actually sold one million Galaxy Fold devices, despite what executive Young Sohn said on stage earlier this week. Yonhap says a company spokesperson “said Sohn may have confused the figure with the company’s initial sales target for the year, emphasizing that sales of the tech firm’s first foldable handset have not reached 1 million units.” The company did not clarify how many Galaxy Fold devices have been sold, but it earlier said that it targeted 500,000 units for this year.

So, I stand by my point that Quest, in a market struggling to establish itself in the consumer consciousness, has managed to sell similar numbers as the Galaxy Fold, the latest fad device in a massive well-established mainstream market. As much as you would like to spin that as a failure for Oculus, I don’t know how this can be seen as anything other than a massive success.




Thanks for sharing that nalex66 - I also ready a article that stated that their target for the end of the year was 1m which they felt they were about to reach. I also know that the Quest has sold much more than 500,000 units at this point, though will be impacted by the restricted shipping conditions. 

I am not "spinning" that Quest is a failure, I think it will rank as their biggest success to date since the partnership with Samsung on the GearVR - please do not put words in my mouth - I get you dont like my positing, but I am not as negative as you try and imply. What I did say was that a definition of mainstream was possible to see from the situation of this $2,000 "fad" devise in the mainstream market and the sales process of the $399 VR headset.

It will be great to see how the two success stories of the end of the year for VR - the Quest and HLA will impact the penetration of this technology into the market - that can only be seen as a success for this sector. 
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

Nekto2
Superstar

That £399 price of entry is why the adoption rate is low.  It really needs to be half that price or less if it's to bring in the punters.


I will not agree that is a reason.
Ok I will agree that price drop will bring up sales. But that will not lead VR to mainstream.

Reason is: VR is not solving real world tasks yet.
You could not connect to real world with it :smile:

Just compare to smartphones. First years a smartphone (no camera, no GPS, no chats) was not a mainstream.
But now you could use it to communicate, to call 911, to make photo and video etc....
You can't do this with VR yet.
You can't play game and switch to chat (skype/messamger/discord/watsup/.....) to quick answer.
You can't take a party photo with great 10px camera.
You can't get a video.
You can't solve any task you could do with a smartphone! You are not posting to this forum from VR even!
😄

Smartphone can solve almost any task you could do with a PC and much more. But VR device can't.

Would be great to be able to do 3D world scan with a Quest. But we need at least 1 full color >10Mpx camera in it.
Or at least be able to make a simple 2D color photo and share it.

Aekero
Heroic Explorer
Came on to actually mention that it feels a little more mainstream only today. Quest is sold out everywhere, both models, that's impressive.
On top of that, I had 3 non-technical friends ask about buying a quest in the last week. (Vr recommendations, really) and coming from non technical friends that's 3 more times than I've -ever- been asked.

Go quest go! (I don't own a quest but if that's what drags the mainstream into vr, then I'm its number 1 fan!)

kojack
MVP
MVP

Nekto2 said:
You are not posting to this forum from VR even!



I'm posting this from vr.


Author: Oculus Monitor,  Auto Oculus Touch,  Forum Dark Mode, Phantom Touch Remover,  X-Plane Fixer
Hardware: Threadripper 1950x, MSI Gaming Trio 2080TI, Asrock X399 Taich
Headsets: Wrap 1200VR, DK1, DK2, CV1, Rift-S, GearVR, Go, Quest, Quest 2, Reverb G2

Nekto2
Superstar

kojack said:


I'm posting this from vr.


Cool! 🙂

kevinw729
Honored Visionary

kojack said:


Nekto2 said:
You are not posting to this forum from VR even!



I'm posting this from vr.





Wow Kojack that's bad ass - how much time do you spend doing this?
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

kojack
MVP
MVP

kevinw729 said:


kojack said:


Nekto2 said:
You are not posting to this forum from VR even!



I'm posting this from vr.





Wow Kojack that bad ass - how much time do you spend doing this?


About 30 sec to be a smart ass. 🙂
I even typed it all using a Touch controller.


Author: Oculus Monitor,  Auto Oculus Touch,  Forum Dark Mode, Phantom Touch Remover,  X-Plane Fixer
Hardware: Threadripper 1950x, MSI Gaming Trio 2080TI, Asrock X399 Taich
Headsets: Wrap 1200VR, DK1, DK2, CV1, Rift-S, GearVR, Go, Quest, Quest 2, Reverb G2

kevinw729
Honored Visionary


kojack said:
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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