You either use Facebook readily and offer up your information to the company that has been battered with lawsuits regarding the selling of information to the highest bidder, or your Oculus VR system becomes a paperweight.
It’s been a nasty streak of news that has hit the VR community still very much in its infancy, and with that statement, Facebook and Oculus alike have cemented their stance on what gaming is: another point of entry to gain more information on the community that is attempting to dive deep into immersion.
A frustrated Oculus founder has appeared on social media multiple times since the announcement was made, apologizing to consumers after promising that this would never happen in the merger; it was a frankly brutal lesson for the entrepreneur regarding precisely how much power he had in his own company.
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Fans have been furious, Oculus’ have lost a heft of their functionality which turns them into small screens more than a VR system, and Facebook continues its charade of innocence.
Until now, apparently.
Germany’s Federal Cartel Office is now investigating Facebook with an anti-trust probe surrounding Facebook’s decidedly bold usage and mandate of tying Facebook with the VR system, including those purchased before the announcement. Imagine your cellphone turning into a brick because you aren’t using Google+ (when it existed) readily enough; that’s what Germany is taking a close look at.
For Oculus owners, this could be a saving grace; it could revert the controversial stance that Facebook has taken to secure their own platform by tying it in with another. More likely, this will be a sole benefit of Europe, once again, as the United States is apparently far further into the pocket of corporations than anyone seems to be ready to admit.
Much how the GDPR protected Europe, and the United States enjoyed a few benefits from some committee having their heads not fully within their fourth point of contact, it’s possible that we experience a few benefits as well. It’s likely, however, that whatever fruit this process bears will be localized.
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Germany has faced against Facebook before with their selling of information and building of profiles of users, but Facebook has recently been hit in the United States by a whopping 46 states accusing the social media juggernaut of monopolistic stances and using funds to undermine and ruin competitors.
There’s a world where Facebook has a monumental slap heading directly towards its face. Here’s hoping that we can dust off the Oculus systems in the near future, and once again dive back into gaming. You know, kind of the entire point of the platform.