Facebook's Oculus is finally shipping its first virtual reality headset to consumers who backed it on Kickstarter. Mark Zuckerberg has been touting the launch as a step "towards the future of computing." The founder of Oculus, Palmer Luckey, even delivered a headset to the first customer in Alaska.
So grateful to @PalmerLuckey and @oculus for coming all the way to Alaska to deliver the first Rift. You guys are super cool!
— Ross Martin (@RossDM) March 26, 2016
Virtual reality has been positioned as the next "big thing" and overall anticipation has been exploding in the tech industry. Who knows, maybe we're all destined to live in a dystopian future where everyone can interact and live in their virtual worlds. How does that sound? Can you imagine it? Maybe it would oddly look like the image below. Hmm.
In any case, we took a look at the press coverage and analyzed how well the media has reacted the new Oculus Rift VR product launch. Our interactive report found some interesting metrics and below are three big takeaways.
1). Oculus Has Big Competitive Advantage
When compared to other VR competitors, Oculus has a clear lead when it comes to share of voice. Since announcing pricing and preorders in January, Oculus has kept a steady lead above the competition and partners such as Samsung. Since the announcement of the Galaxy S7 and Gear 360, Samsung has only helped amplify the emerging virtual reality technology that has been built with the support of Oculus.
2). VR Is All About Video & Games. Not Porn.
As virtual reality becomes more of a reality, everyone is debating on how most people will engage with the product. The press key messages seem to think the majority of us will be consuming large quantities of videos and plunging ourselves into new interactive games.
3). It's Incredibly Popular Tech
If 2015 was the year of wearables, then 2016 seems to be all about virtual reality. The amount of social media shares appears to prove it. Any articles that talk about Oculus across the vast media landscape have been shared over 5 million times!
Check out our full PR interactive report here to dive deeper into the media coverage of the Oculus Rift VR product launch.
