3 weeks ago
Meta,
You need to make the Oculus/Link PC app software available in a full "offline installer" form. Make it happen.
Your most long-time customers spent a LOT of money for their various Oculus/Quest headsets and Oculus PC game libraries for use with their PCs, and you need to be careful to not hang those customers out to dry when you finally decide to stop supporting native PC VR entirely.
Yes, we all know your obvious plan is to entirely phase out this Oculus/Link PC app and the PC connectivity option, because the PC is an open platform that you don't get to strictly gatekeep and charge developers royalty fees to participate in. We know you don't like the existence of alternate app stores, sideloading, or PC streaming for the Quest headsets because it totally side-steps your systems of control and profits. We all know that you inherited the Oculus PC game store/library from Oculus and only begrudgingly support it because it already existed... and we know you're itching to kill off as quickly as humanly possible so you can force consumers to have to buy all their games and apps through the Quest app store inside the Quest headsets.
But fair warning to you: it is UTTERLY UNACCEPTABLE to your long-time customers with large investments in PC VR for all your headsets to suddenly become useless paperweights when the day comes that you decide to stop hosting the files needed by the online installer. Unless you want to royally piss off the most tech-savvy, vocal, and longest-time customers you've got and see that splattered all over social media and YouTube and the tech news, you NEED to provide an offline installer that people like me can keep a permanent backup of alongside the permanent backups we already keep of our Oculus PC game library, so we can continue to use the PC VR games and headsets we already bought.
Aside from this simply being the right thing to do from PR, business, and moral standpoints, it's also the right thing to do from the standpoint of historical preservation. Fifty years from now when everyone just gets cortical VR implants at birth and technological historians want to know how it all got started, they should still be able to fire up a virtual 2025 PC with Windows 11, still install Meta Quest Link on it, still restore a backup of purchased PC games on it, still connect a painstakingly restored Oculus Rift CV1 headset via a mess of USB-A to USB-Z adapters, and have it mostly just work. Historical preservation MATTERS, but it can't happen when proprietary software is only made available via stupid "online" installers that require all kinds of secretive online dependencies.
Please have your business people and engineering team get your act together and prioritize doing the right thing.
Thanks,
- Previously thrilled Oculus Rift CV1 owner (and currently very concerned Meta Quest 3 owner)
Did this answer your question? If it didn’t, use our search to find other topics or create your own and other members of the community will help out.
If you need an agent to help with your Meta device, please contact our store support team here.
Having trouble with a Facebook or Instagram account? The best place to go for help with those accounts is the Facebook Help Center or the Instagram Help Center. This community can't help with those accounts.
Check out some popular posts here:
Getting Help from the Meta Quest Community
Tips and Tricks: Charging your Meta Quest Headset