It’s a rhetorical question, but LeBeau’s statement in our interview at Workrooms a few weeks ago suggested that he objected to that premise. For one thing, people don’t spend their entire lives in VR—typically sessions last 15 minutes to an hour, rarely more than two minutes, he said. The average cost is lower than many smartphones, and has dropped significantly since the first-generation Oculus Rift debuted at $600 in 2016.
Although LeBeau declined to disclose specific numbers, he said it helps retain remote teams who want to discuss issues together, seemingly face-to-face. Updates planned for 2023 will make Workrooms more attractive to mixed teams, he said. These include the option to view 3D models and a mixed reality experience called Magic Room, which will allow on-site and remote workers to collaborate in the same shared space. Integrations with Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Windows are also coming in 2023.
Early testers have mixed opinions on whether the product is ready for prime time. Trevor Ainge, media and content specialist at s2s, said Workrooms’ first-person view — the feeling of occupying the same space as a colleague and having to turn your body to meet someone’s gaze — is a marked improvement over Zoom or WebEX.
“One of the things I struggled with in particular was the performance aspect of communication when you look at the screen and see yourself, and Workrooms absolutely flattened that for me,” says Ainge. “I find it more natural to connect.”
Others are less convinced. “What you’re missing is the emotional part, because no one recognizes your face,” said Sergey Toporov, a London-based partner at investment firm LETA Capital, which piloted the software last summer. “They have a really good lip-sync that looks natural when you’re talking, but when you stop talking, you start smiling, which is weird.”
The virtual blackboard also drew complaints from early testers. While s2s planned to continue using the software, LETA Capital abandoned it after discovering that users were unable to interact with financial models in Google Sheets while in front of a virtual blackboard. The digital rendering pad, which must be set up before entering the studio, can be written on by turning one of the two Quest controllers upside down and using it like a pen. But anything you write on the whiteboard, or sticky notes you can stick on it, are just overlays; they don’t change the native file being displayed.
“Your first action is to pick up your finger, or pick up your Oculus controller, and put something in the cell,” Toporov said. “But, in fact, even if you see the picture, you have to go back to the laptop and use the keyboard to change the value.”
Typing in Workrooms is also a bit of a risk, said Ari Lightman, a professor of digital media and marketing at Carnegie Mellon University who pilots Workrooms with graduate students in his Measuring Society course.
“I don’t remember what the text string was, but imagine the worst autocorrect ever. It’s all crazy and vague,” he said. As a workaround, Letterman ended up taking off his headset and using his physical keyboard to type notes on the Meta remote desktop application.
Before anything can get done, there’s a fairly laborious process: charging the headset (the battery takes about two and a half hours to charge, which is about as long as it takes), connecting the headset to the Meta Quest smartphone app, creating an account, and going through A lengthy sequence of authentications. To avoid bumping into nearby walls or armchairs, users also set up a laser-like 3D point cloud, called a Guardian, that appears as they approach pre-set room boundaries. All of this begs the question of whether the investment is worth it for a 30-minute or hour-long meeting that other video conferencing platforms allow users to click into without an account.
