At the Mobile World Congress today, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a new tie-in promotion for Samsung's Gear VR headset and the newly announced Galaxy S7 smartphones. The first 300,000 people to pre-order a Galaxy S7, or S7 Edge, will receive a $99 Gear VR headset for free.
It's a smart cross-promotion for Facebook, as the Gear VR is powered by Facebook-owned Oculus Tech. The device's entry-level VR capabilities are a perfect breeding ground for Zuckerberg's vision of VR as a new social platform. By increasing the install base, Facebook is raising interest in its own plans for the medium, as well as potential interest in the company's higher end headsets in the form of the Oculus Rift.
Zuckerberg also demonstrated a new "dynamic streaming" option for 360-degree video, whereby the area of the video being viewed streams at a higher resolution than the rest, reducing overall bandwidth consumption and allowing for an overall increase in resolution of the focus area. Meanwhile, Epic's Tim Sweeney appeared on stage to announce that the S7 series would utilise Kronos' Vulkan API, improving 3D rendering and, assumedly, what's possible for mobile VR experiences.
Great way to get people into VR!
Indeed. However I still feel the average consumers are a bit far off in adapting- but there is progress!