Former Microsoft CTO says VR/AR at least 'a decade' away from being mainstream

[Landguy]

Insidb said:

Normchacho said:

I'm not saying that the situations are necessarily comparable, I'm illustrating just how far tech moves in 10 years.

The actual tech behind VR is pretty much ready today. To expect it to take another 10 years for VR to become mainstream is failing to see how quickly these things happen.

I'm with you: in less than 10 years, the iPhone became the smart phone paragon. Prior to that, I was using an old school RAZR, like the rest of the world. Hell, I had a Rio player: the iPod revolution was just beginning. All this happened, in 10 years, with far less-developed builds out or releasing. Several VR platforms are products today, so I think a short term adoption would be unsurpising.

I still disagree with you both.  I get that technology can be adopted quicker than the 10yr timeframe.  BUT, you are talking about taking something that has a limited use and making it mainstream.  That was the point I was making with the iphone comparison.  In that it disproves the point that it can be adopted quickly.  THe iphone has a ton of benefits to a mass market user.  VR/AR has very few uses for 90% of the population outside of gaming.  Thats why the main theory is that "mainstream" adoption will take so long.  The tech existing doesn't give it a use by everyone.  It will take years of ever changing tech before it is really even feasible for easy use by mainstreamers, let alone practial uses being found for most users.