Facebook's on your PC, your phone and your tablet: now it really wants to get in your face. A year after it acquired virtual reality headset maker Oculs VR, the company has outlined plans to bring its social network to wraparound headsets.
Speaking at the Code/Media conference in California, Facebook's chief product officer Chris Cox revealed the company is working on an immersive version of the social network. "Virtual reality is pretty cool," said Cox, according to a report on Re/code. "We’re working on apps for VR."
Cox told attendees how he'd been testing virtual reality demos that placed the user in the seat of a fighter jet, and another that puts you in a yurt travelling through Mongolia. "You realise, when you're in it, that you're looking at the future, and it's going to be awesome," said Cox. "When you're in Facebook, you're just sending around these bits of experience - a photo, a video, a thought," whereas virtual reality would allow social networkers to "send a fuller picture."
When asked whether users would be able to create their own virtual reality content using the Facebook apps, Cox replied: "Totally. You’ll do it, Beyoncé will do it."
Cox admitted that VR apps for Facebook were still "a while" away, and admitted it would be a long time before most people are wearing VR headsets. However, Facebook has more options than most in this field. Aside from owning the company that makes the Oculus Rift headsets, one of Facebook's notable shareholders is Microsoft, which last month announced it would be building "holographic" virtual reality into Windows 10.
A future of crashing around in VR headsets is looking ominously likely...