A Brief History Of Oculus

[Turk.]

By Greg Kumparak 9 hours ago
Less than two years ago, Oculus raised 2.5 million dollars on Kickstarter.

Yesterday, they were acquired by Facebook for $2 billion.

To write the words ?A Brief History Of Oculus? is a bit funny ? because really, the company?s very existence has been brief. From the launch of their Kickstarter campaign to their massive acquisition, just 601 days had passed.

The company has definitely generated its fair share of buzz in its short lifespan ? and yet, many, many people are hearing about the team for the very first time this week.

For those people, and for everyone who might?ve missed some details along the way, here?s their story so far.

Early Days:

Around the age of 15, Palmer Luckey started to fall in love with the concept of virtual reality.

By day, he attended classes at the local community college. By night, he was the founder and admin of ModRetro, a community dedicated to modifying vintage gaming consoles. Taking a N64 and making it portable; contorting an Xbox into a package half its original size ? that sort of thing.

If there?s anything that videogames have taught gamers to love, it?s collecting things ? the rarer, the better. Palmer?s favorite thing to pick up? Early attempts at virtual reality headsets.

Throughout the late 80s and 90s, dozens of companies tried to turn VR headsets into commercial success. All of them failed ? hard. Some were too expensive; most just didn?t work worth a damn. All of them were far too ahead of their time (with components being far too expensive to source, and most home computers being far too weak to power anything worth playing.)

Sourcing his collection everywhere from industry liquidation sales to government auctions and carting himself out to the seller to avoid paying for shipping, he?d get his hands on headsets that once cost nearly $100,000 for less than $100. By his own estimates, Palmer has the largest private collection of virtual reality headsets in the world.
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