Facebook isn’t going anywhere. It’s over a decade old and yet people are still on it. Maybe not as frequent as before but the world depends on this social network to communicate. Browsing behaviors and usage may have changed but truth is, Mark Zuckerberg knows how to innovate. From being a simple online community, it has since grown into becoming a portal to many things. Brands and celebrities alike take advantage of the platform to market products and services or campaign for different causes.
The past few years, the Facebook devs have been working on new features to make the experience more interesting and so as not to drive people away. We’ve seen new stuff introduced like the Facebook Messenger, Facebook Live, Instant Articles, more games, and Reactions among others. There’s also the Facebook 360 videos that give us a glimpse of the future.
Facebook has also partnered and acquired other big companies like Instagram, WhatsApp, and Oculus. The latter is focused on virtual reality. We can all agree that the brand is one of those important groups that have ushered us to the “virtual age”. The VR era has just begun. The possibilities are endless but it may take a while before those VR concepts turn into reality.
For now, Facebook and Oculus are working on the idea of social VR interaction. Remember that time when a father was able to see the birth of his child virtually via a Samsung Gear VR? That’s one example of a social VR experience but Facebook and Oculus want to make it easier and more fun.
There is the possibility of visiting virtual realms together with another person who are far away from you. Facebook Product Manager Michael Booth and CTO Mike Schroepfer recently tried sharing a virtual space even if they were miles away from each other. It was some sort of a VR conference call with the two demonstrating going on a tour in different sights and stepping in 360 photos. They even showed the possibility of drawing objects and writing on their virtual avatars or taking VR selfies.
The project is still under development but we can see the future where social VR experiences will be more common. Instead of just liking or commenting on a person’s Facebook post, people can now “meet” and “see” in the VR world. VR Facebook? That’s a possibility.
VIA: Chris Burns, SlashGear
SOURCE: Michael Booth, Mike Schroepfer
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