Programmer Humor

While Metaverse is rightfully a laughing stock, I'm kind of looking forward to where will they take the Workrooms idea. I was dismissing it at first, because "meta, lol", but out of curiosity I've once booted my quest and convinced the other people working on a hobby project with me that we should do the meeting in there, since we all have quests.

The experience was way better than a soulless meeting of staring at a profile picture. Just the basic tracking of quest and the lower resolution was enough to make the meeting more engaging, and the virtual blackboard idea where you use the other end of your controller as a writing pen is amazing and fun to use. I would take VR meeting anytime over a simple Teams call now.

I've also tried a few times to take my quest with me when traveling, and using it as a virtual 3 monitors when working on a laptop at a hotel - even with the limited resolution of the quest, it was great. You can focus since it shuts down all of the distractions, you can work in a really small space and still have your assortment of large displays, and ever since they implemented the passthrough - meaning you have a square right above your keyboard/desk, so you see your hands when typing - using the computer in VR was smooth experience. Although still limited by the headset being uncomfortable to wear for long. I didn't have issues with the resolution, though, assuming you don't have the monitors too close and aren't working in 4K.

I'm looking forward to the Quest 3 for this reason, since the pricetag of Quest Pro is way above what I'm willing to pay (or the Apple headset - which I assume would be even better for this kind of use-case). But I do realize that it's still too early for that, and that we're nowhere near the comfort required to be able to wear the headset for a whole day. But once that issue is solved, I can imagine it being amazing for remote working or WFH in a virtual office. Being in an office boosts my productivity, mostly because I can just quickly bounce ideas or vent frustration with other on coffee breaks, and meetings where you get at least some semblence and illusion of gestures are more engaging than staring to an empty screen, or seeing people whose eyes are randomly darting on the screen in front of them though a camera, never being able to make eye contant.

So, a portable VR office is something I can imagine being amazing, especially if you travel a lot or have a limited space. I mean, come on, being able to pack 3+ large displays with me in a small bag? That's amazing! But I wouldn't want to use it for socializing outside of that - for that there is VRChat, or I can just go outside or something.