Future Of Virtual Reality In The New Decade And Beyond
What’s the future of virtual reality? I mean many believed we’d have flying cars and robot chefs by now.
Society hasn’t technologically advanced as rapidly to that degree, yet. Though exciting technological advances are primed for a breakout decade.
Everyone can see how smart devices dominated the recent past.
Now, a new type of technology is prepared to disrupt the industry and dominate the next few decades: virtual reality.
The future of virtual reality is breathtaking and will likely soon become an integral part of our lives and businesses.
As a cunning business owner and individual, it’s best to be prepared.
What Is Virtual Reality?
Virtual reality (VR) isn’t as new as it’s cracked up to be.
Evidence of VR can be traced back to the 1960s when Ivan Sutherland created the first VR headset.
People have been creating virtual environments and realities for years—you’ve seen the Matrix, an entire movie about VR.
The way we know VR now (a headset that completely covers your eyes and immerses you in a new universe) has recently become more popular is big companies like Facebook are investing $2 billion in VR acquisitions. And Facebook must have data showing that’s a smart bet.
Now you should know that not everything that digitizes an environment is VR. There are three different types of artificial realities to distinguish:
- Virtual reality (VR)
- Augmented reality (AR)
- Mixed reality (MR)
Virtual Reality (VR)
VR forces people to accept the artificial environment as their own. It’s an optical trick on the brain that works.
The most common practice that you will see with VR is a headset that completely covers your eyes and projects images on a screen inside the headset.
VR has really taken off in the gaming industry—allowing players to take on a character and enter their world as if they were actually in the game.
With 78% of Americans now familiar using VR, the odds increase that a business can take advantage of this to push their products. We’ll talk more in depth about VR’s future business uses later on.
Augmented Reality (AR)
Augmented reality differs from virtual reality in the environments that they create.
AR doesn’t create an entirely new environment that the user completely immerses themselves in.
Instead, AR takes an existing environment and integrates digital information on top of it.
This is done a few different ways.
AR headsets tend to be more open because the user still needs to be grounded in their existing environment.
Another, more common, way of using augmented reality is through a smartphone.
Pokemon Go hit the app stores back in 2016 and immediately blew up. This app was a version of AR. The creators took a users real environment and showed them Pokemon through their smartphone lens existing in their reality.
AR is already disrupting the business world— 88% of mid-sized businesses are now experimenting with use in their daily operations.
Mixed Reality (MR)
Mixed reality might be a newer concept to you than the first two.
MR places virtual objects in your existing universe that you can then interact with. It is almost like a hologram you’d see in Star Wars.
Since MR is relatively new compared to VR and AR, it is not accessible to the public quite yet.
Mixed reality is still in its developing stages and is incredibly expensive for the public to try.
In fact, MR is so new that there isn’t even a product available for purchase on the market.
The rate at which these technologies are advancing is exponential, however. MR will likely begin to make an entrance into the market within this decade.
And who knows, eventually it could be a free service? (For example, you can get a free domain name.)
Virtual Reality And The Business World
Like any disruptive tech, VR is going to change the business world during this decade.
Really think about it. Most businesses today are utilizing cloud computing, integration and other technologies to change the way they do business. Isolated departments now operate as one cohesive unit.
VR is starting to emerge for practical business uses.
It’s cost effective and relatively risk-free so there really is no reason to not start experimenting with VR if cost isn’t holding your organization back.
As they say, the only certainty about the future is it will look different than the present.
Entertainment
No industry loves VR more than the entertainment industry.
Besides the obvious reasons in the gaming industry, the sports industry has big plans for VR.
Being able to display any virtual environment that a user may want is extremely advantageous.
The sports industry could potentially use this feature to allow fans to “attend” games without ever leaving their house. Recently the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens debuted a mixed reality raven flying over the stadium and picked up media attention.
We debuted a new mixed-reality feature tonight as part of the gameday fan experience. 😈 pic.twitter.com/26SzvWIOEx
— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) December 13, 2019
Sports teams will be able to make up ticket sales they’ve lost from people preferring to stay home and watch the game on TV by offering deals to watch the game with VR.
Medical Industry
The healthcare industry also has many VR plays.
VR can be used for training to simulate real-world scenarios for healthcare professionals and other industries that have high-risk jobs.
Medical school students can train with full immersion in stressful, high-risk scenarios that fully prepare them for what they may experience in their profession.
Firefighters can use VR to simulate fire situations that seem completely real yet won’t actually harm the person in the simulation.
Police officers can benefit from VR training by simulating potentially dangerous situations that they will likely encounter during their time in their position.
The environments will seem completely real. Yet the person going through the training will experience no harm, allowing them to make errors now and practice scenarios as much as they want without experiencing any consequences.
Manufacturing
Creating full, physical prototypes can cost a lot of money and resources for manufacturers.
With VR, manufacturers can create full, artificial prototypes and alter them without wasting any resources.
Prototyping is an essential part of the process for anyone that creates things. Virtual reality can allow these people to create as many prototypes they need in less time and without wasting any space.
VR also allows those in this industry to make as many mistakes as they need until they get every detail right. It is much easier to alter something that doesn’t actually exist than have to start from scratch by building an actual prototype.
The Home Industry
Architects, interior designers, and realtors can benefit greatly from using VR.
Headsets can show a potential buyer exactly what their home can look like with their stuff in it.
Interior designers can use VR to allow clients to place items where they want them to be. They can pick every detail of what their home will look like from the brand of couch to the color of the throw pillows in their living room.
Architects can model entire buildings using VR. Blueprints are going to quickly become a thing of the past. Artificial environments create entire buildings molded in real time.
VR should cut down on mistakes that are made during production which in the end will save each of these industries billions of dollars.
Ethical Concerns
Naysayers of VR point to its flaws.
The immersion of big data and progressive technology have raised many ethical concerns in the business and political world.
Virtual reality will be no exception to this idea.
Social Isolation
Many people fear that the increase of VR will lead to a world of social isolation.
People will prefer to live in an artificial environment than to experience life in our reality.
VR could lead to a lack of face-to-face interactions which can have serious implications on mental health and overall well-being.
This is not a likely scenario but is still a serious concern when it comes to the increasing presence of VR.
Manipulation
As a PPC agency owner, I’ve seen first hand how advertisements can manipulate the public. So with VR, there are naturally many ethical concerns that arise with a completely immersive experience and advertising.
As the world is now, people have external distractions that stop them from being completely attentive to whatever they’re reading or what they see on TV.
In the world of VR, there are no distractions. The experience immerses all of your senses.
Because of this feature of VR, advertisers have to be extremely careful with the way they share their brand. Otherwise, they may risk tarnishing an organization’s reputation. (Speaking of, when’s the last time you measured brand equity?)
The reality is businesses will be able to completely control every aspect of the environment in which they’re advertising.
Concerns of manipulation arise with the ability to control every aspect of what someone is seeing. Rightfully so.
As long as businesses are aware of this concern and take it into account when they start to advertise in these environments, this should not be a concern.
Privacy and Data
Most people are aware of ethical concerns that come with privacy because of the rise of big data in the past couple decades.
VR tracks every movement of users. Imagine a gang or terrorist group having this ability.
Many people won’t know when VR is tracking them. Retailers can use VR to see where people look when in their store and what displays they go to first. They can then use this data to decide where they want to place items in the store.
What retailers and other industries that use VR for tracking purposes do with this data, is where ethical concerns can arise.
VR needs clear distinctions for using data.
Privacy concerns are serious in the current society we are living in.
Conclusion
It’s not a matter of will VR completely disrupt the business world, it’s a matter of when.
The future of virtual reality will cause historical changes in the way we live our lives.
The global VR market is expected to reach $22.9 billion by the end of 2020.
It’s time to figure out how you can incorporate VR into your business.
What do you think the future of VR looks like?