Oh there is definitely a niche for high end HMD's aimed at higher price brackets, but that isn't their audience since they serve entertainment focused niche aimed at consumers, most of whom want low cost. The likes of big business from high end car dealerships, interior design and architecture and other niche business use will go with the likes of Varjo XR-3. Especially since the latter have support built into the subscription package their HMD's require to work. They're outside of most consumers budget even before the annual sub fees, and I don't think private individuals can buy them generally as it tends to be business only customers model last I checked. The several thousand per device is a drop in the ocean to such companies and it saves them in other areas the AR/VR replaces the function of. Certainly not an entertainment niche device though and more tool than toy and meta/fb aren't serving that market.

Although I'd be inclined to agree shorter flange distance isn't the cause of better IQ, it isn't irrelevant and can be the case. OP just got the cause wrong, it's not the flange distance per se but what that shorter distance allows you to do in lens design and certain physics limitations easier to overcome. Also things like having deeply protruding rear elements like some RF cine mount and canons RF extenders which would cause mirror strike problems on dslr equivalents. I use Canons RF system where smaller sadly isn't a benefit as most the rf glass is hideously heavy and bulky, but the performance vs EF mount is much better IQ because of what lens designers can do with that short flange distance. I'm a hybrid shooter and also opens up a lot of cine options that just wouldn't be doable in such a size/weight package otherwise which matters when I'm on a gimbal even if it is still bulky vs the small mirrorless stuff, still prefer BMCC pocket series with likes of small sirui crop ana's for that kind of thing though which are good enough for me and much much smaller.

it isn't the resolution so much as things like bit rate and compression type I have issues with. Especially noticeable in dark scenes even more so with motion the compression artifacts etc are problematic vs dvd. Below average quality even for the moderate to higher bit rates used vs properly encoded video files. The way they produce those delivery formats prioritises speed/low power over quality is my guess which is understandable if it is the reason, doesn't mean I like it. I notice it on all browsers I've tried, and my monitors are decent and all profiled/calibrated. Granted it may not bother everyone but I know I'm far from the only one who struggles with it.

You joke but I saw someone censored and almost banned from a community for using that in normal context. It escalated when he [poster] tried diffusing the person who claimed it was racist explaining meaning which others backed but apparently it is bad because "it sounds racist", how can you argue with someone like that. An attempt at humour made it worse when he missed the python reference of being told "go away or I shall taunt you a second time". It was rather amusing but for the fact these people often get their way and keep pushing it as far as they can debasing language, eliminating real discourse and so on.

Few flaws in the reasoning there, autistic people are NOT necessarily logical. Some of our processing may be based on logic reasoning in areas most NT's base on emotive "reasoning" but that doesn't mean the same as this "we're logical" creatures. I hear that myth a lot but quite often we are VERY far from that. Coming from someone with officially recognised savant traits, diagnosed officially and so on the always logical thing is complete myth just as much as the "they have no feelings" thing.

I respect a lot of RMS' accomplishments but admit he can be fanatical and have deeply rigid ideation and many other flaws that we just simply should accept under the spectrum excuse. Just because someone demonstrates brilliance in a field doesn't mean you tolerate behaviour or mistakes they make others would not be allowed to make. That is how you end up with rockstars. I think anyone who has had dealings with him knows he can't admit when he is wrong, and when he may have a point that is correct doesn't seem able to separate out a lack of skilful expression or method from the correct point. I constantly have to keep myself in check when things get flagged as wrong and misunderstood, even when I know my point is right I need to check to see if my behaviour is also "right", I'm responsible for my behaviour and if it harms my point or is misunderstood I am the one responsible for fixing that no matter how "correct" I am. Being strongly toward the AQ end of the spectrum doesn't mean you're excused from acting like any other mature adult and expected to keep your ego in check.

They make the chips not necessarily the cards which aside from the small number of FE cards are usually 3rd party vendors using nvidias chips and design specs Nvidia enforces partners adhere to. On that note some of those aforementioned card manufacturers have been doing exactly that, zotac for instance. Not smart long term because you'll lose customers and the whole bad pr isn't great for business and many things factor into why it is a bad idea. You only break even after a given amount of time and if the market collapses before then and you've screwed your main revenue stream it is a silly gamble and they'd likely make more money selling hardware, especially at inflated prices and vendors have significantly jacked up the price overnight as started with asus and other vendors followed their example, not just retail and resellers who are gouging the price of cards.

Been that way for a while and goes back much further than this woke trend, although from a linguistic PoV it isn't a bad word in and of itself some folks are up in arms about it because it came to have negative connotations due to the attitudes of the white Europeans who used it as the catch all term it is for a multitude of peoples. Not saying I agree with banning the word (I don't) but it is complicated issue because there is some truth behind the claims of offensiveness. It isn't the word that is offensive though and more association with attitudes of the groups who most commonly used it. Every group has broad encompassing generic not technically incorrect terms in and of themselves, and in some situations where the speakers intent, attitude and knowledge of culture and race etc is clear they can use such terms without anyone batting an eye. However more commonly those terms would generally to be avoided because of how more commonly heard when used by ignorant people with an attitude of folks encompassed by the term are all alike and speaker regards them as somehow lesser. The deemed "correct" word depends on who you ask and who is speaking and why but Eskimo could be more than tolerated and viewed as fine depending on your use. Most prefer to avoid misunderstanding and demonstrate knowledge of potential issue by avoiding it which I'm not sure how I feel about because it debases language if not careful taking that route, and historically censoring language is a tool used more often than not by those with less than noble agendas for reasons of control and in most/all cases to no good end.

Broad encompassing terms for instance for Alaskan natives folks are more likely to refer to First Nation peoples or similar terms depending on the circumstance or other "safe" terms not co-opted by derogatory speakers, yet (therein lies the problem). Again less about the word and more about what is being said and how, it isn't really about the word. Alternately many trend toward specifying the actual group they're referencing such as Inupiat, Yupik and so on. Again silly on the surface but deeper into it holds truth, yet those less ignorant of the diversity within the catch all term would likely not get flagged by people with a valid right to take issue. As with most these things most the media drama is mostly by virtue signaller types who don't have any association with the groups they are offended on behalf of, nor do they represent the groups interests general either.. TLDR The problem lies more with association of use from those with a "they're all the same" attitude who don't know any other term or care than with such words themselves thus sensible people oft wont try banning the words but more educate speakers on "you know that can be misunderstood phrasing it that way right?".

Some of the newer HMDs are better but I don't think that is what holds VR back personally and think some things just are not suited to VR. I use a valve index which is far less noticeable regarding sde, which used to bother me on the earlier HMD's. Still not perfect but that and the wider FoV helps. I think the thing stopping VR being mainstream is less the optical artifacts and more it takes a particular niche of games suited to it to work well or designed around VR from the ground up. I mostly play DCS world which is a good match, and tailored for vr from ground up experiences like Alyx are also well matched but most the ported from things designed without VR in mind just doesn't translate so well.

As for movies apart from gaining 3d you miss a lot of what makes movies a good medium in VR, the importance of set angles as part of visual storytelling and setting tone and so on, guiding exactly where the viewer looks, focus pulls and so on are as important as dialog and other elements if not more so at times. For instance a director may see it is more fitting to the narrative in a scene with two characters talking that a viewer is looking at a listeners reaction rather than looking at the person talking, in VR folks are likely to look at the person talking and it can break so many elements that should be under the control of the DP, director and so on.

For the stuff that does translate exceptionally well like DCS the extra res you mention would be nice but then performance becomes constraint and wider FoV needs to come with it really (why I switched to an index, a lot I dislike about it but the FoV is a godsend). We really need proper eye tracking coupled with fully implemented foveated rendering to go with the res and fov bump tbh. I've seen the latter done in some titles were the centre of the view per eye is higher detail than periphery but it isn't like having super high fov and res with very low accuity and only high frequency details rendered on the visual spot you're looking at thus eye tracking. I have seen research and demos of it but it is a long way of commercial off the shelf solution and price would likely be a problem. Then there is the keeping the weight down and addressing comfort along with making sure tracking is good and so on as HMDs have many aspects needed to be successful, index has trash controllers for instance and I feel they hold it back a lot although most of my use I use hotas so isn't an issue the controllers have major issues especially at the price point.

Although you shouldn't use water a lot of metal hydrides and other similar water reactive and pyrophoric stuff will extinguish if you drown them with enough water. Although the official method for dealing with it is likely not water it will often still work. For small scale it probably makes more sense to deal with it with water and seen things like that dumped in lab sinks before now. Whether it will meet emissions laws of what you can put in drains that don't go through additional scrubbing etc is another story as plenty of things are illegal to just simple dump in a drain, even if it isn't a risk at that point it is problematic further down the environmental line, thus cradle to grave and emissions laws exist. Even larger scale I personally know of a case with someone drenching a bag of water reactive catalyst that someone left exposed that spontaneously ignited under one of the safety showers that were dotted around plant and lab floor ; some kind of metal hydride, forget which as was decades ago. Not saying it is ideal course of action but just isn't as bad as sounds since depending on situation it will extinguish with enough volume.

I was only at the place in question for short period when I was an undergrad but family member worked on plant side of operations for almost 30 years before retiring (most in that sector retire early) and some of the other stuff that happened made stuff like that sound safe. Some of the stories were scary and nearly lost family member to a few. Favourite was few fellas on large scale side of things seen bashing small tubs of reagent with a crowbar because it had tendency to clump and affected process if added in chunks and I guess a proper unwrap and declump was slow and tedious and not taken into account on the official procedure as can be common at times with on paper method not always translating from lab/small scale (who wrote the process guide) to going to large scale side of things. Not everything is the same but bigger because reagent packaging, grades, prep and so on can differ a lot in practise that looks identical on paper. Plant safety officer and supervisor complained to manager who dismissed it as "yeah it is fine it clumps up and sticks in the tub so they need to do that" only to be told it is a contact explosive. What made it worse is it is clearly marked and in shock resistant double walled tubs and witness to it was horrified because he could see the sparks through the tub at point of impact when they were hitting it! Thankfully things like purity for large scale is lesser than lab grades and the fact it was clumped up and likely not high purity in a fine powder probably helped save someones fingers as well as causing the initial problem perhaps.

and bigger sensors cost significantly more. Not like doubling sensor size simply doubles cost as it doesn't scale linear and often cost a lot more and can be 4 times the price for twice the surface area. Then comes all the other factors related to increasing the sensor such as increase in optics so glass isn't your significantly weak link. For webcams it is simply good enough for their main purpose and this whole thing is a none issue. One of the roles of webcams utilised in the correct way is low cost, ie. not pros trying to use a webcam for the wrong thing where vid IQ matters more and income is directly related to video image quality. Significantly more expensive webcams would not equal better IMHO, since low cost plastic optics with tiny crap sensor is good enough for purpose.

Possibly depends on camera as my R outputs at 720p (@ 30p 10MBs) via the canon webcam software and agree there is a point to do that still as it looks fine for webcam style use vs the webcam I have around somewhere and the better noise and low light performance, out the camera colour, control over exposure etc, better DR and so on means it is still not bad idea for just the odd call to family where video is needed (oft just audio is good enough for me and I do have significantly better than average setup for that so I usually wont bother with video). I don't need amazing IQ and a proper vid streaming setup would be stupid. I mean I can get better using likes of elgato camlink and so on but for most that is surplus to requirements and good enough as is.

I think this is a none issue as anyone who NEEDS significantly higher streaming video quality is better served with a proper setup which isn't a dslr/mirrorless stills orientated camera including hybrids aimed more at stills than video exception being likes of BPCC. Thus the use of such cameras as crappy res webcam alternatives is pretty much fine and compared to pro's it isn't apples to apples as two totally different needs and roles. For instance my cousin when he is on set uses real camera, on a rig with full cage and all kinds of stuff bolted on yet on his comp to speak to family he'll use either the webcam built into his laptop or a cheap logitech c920 hooked to a desktop because his work setup is simply not the tool for that job, they are two totally different needs regardless of if folks have access to the gear.

As far as streaming video folks who actually need the video IQ most I know personally don't even use the videocentric hybrid ILC's with clean HDMI out or adapted options like camlink but rather they use lower end cine cams such as C100 and C200 at minimum. Although I know two using higher end they own them for other work related reasons and didn't buy for that setup and simply use for streaming since kit is doing nothing during current restrictions and lockdowns and they relegated their streaming A cams to running as a secondary B cam such as for overhead that they previously used hybrids in that role. Again for those who need that they are after features that would be a disadvantage to regular consumers for use as "normal" webcam role since they oft output in clog (or equivalent for none Canon folk) and apply their own lut and using separate audio solution thus need the xlr interface and so on thus that isn't what most who need a simple webcam are looking for and conversely those "features" are cons not pros.

The parent is missing the point you made of good enough for purpose imho. They are totally different needs. One of my pet hates is the low resolution "pros" use arguments I see in a lot of areas when oft it isn't apples to apples to the none pro use for such tech. The usual car analogy would be it seems akin to saying "F1 drivers don't drive regular 4 door family cars, real pro's use race cars" when sure not if they are at work setting times on the track. Doesn't mean that applies to the best car for taking the kids to the beach nor going grocery shopping for the family and such pros oft use the same "none pro" car for those roles.

Ah that makes total sense for pixel precise stuff. I spend much more time daily dodge/burn and editing masks and adjustment layers mostly for print but last year been mostly all for web but I don't need pixel perfect in either case. That and the tilt function for some vector brushes etc makes it a no brainer for my my use but obviously ymmv and depends what folks are doing and how much. Thought worth mentioning on the off chance you'd not considered it.

A mouse for photo touch up work, what kind of sadist are you? Joking aside if not considered it may want to look at one of the cheap gfx tablets. Apologies if considered it and have reasons not to but for that kind of work they are much much more suited and after the initial weird feeling period I couldn't go back to mouse. Not like it used to be either with only really higher end wacom being worth it 15 years ago when I first made the switch. A couple of cheaper options exist now with pros and cons to each. I use a cheap Huion Q11K v2 these days which I like more than my old model wacom. Got a second one for another work rig as well as gifting family members H610's who tried my tablet and decided they hated mouse for light retouching they do on seldom occasion. There are other alternatives that have different pros and cons but all are pretty much better than mouse not just for coordination reasons but the pressure control (for size or opacity control depending on what you're doing).

I did take the comment that way and tried typing a response to clarify my point but struggled how to say it differently thus didn't post as assumed wouldn't help the discussion any as wrongly read it as that rather than genuine misunderstanding or debate of disagreement. Two things though are firstly that is likely on me as have habit of explaining my point poorly especially in concise (for me) text format and generally people need to know me to take what I mean correctly. That being a flaw of myself rather than of others. Secondly no need to apologise since life is complex and nothing is black and white thus there is often no absolute correct/incorrect view that fits every person or case each person can think of (kinda my point above albeit explained poor)) as it depends on individual circumstance, as well as wider culture and so on. Room in the world for folks to disagree for that very reason. It seems civility between those who strongly disagree is missing from the world and would fix a lot.

I should make it clear although I say I disagree with absolute statements like violence begets violence, I find as a general rule it is definitely true more often than not. My point is more life is not black and white, though I may often incorrectly see it that way at times. Things are complicated thus I dislike soundbite like answers and simplistic rules applied to everything yet admit they have a function in conveying general sentiments yet us humans seem to have problem with taking them as hard principles over the oversimplified low resolution generally the case statements they are at times. I think aggression is part of human makeup and needs to be accepted so it can be controlled, and methods for restraint pushed over the trend I see toward "just don't feel that way". Not saying you are pushing the latter point of course but I do see it come up and cause problems. Fwiw I feel we are probably on the same page in this case on that part at least though and can agree majority of the time aggressive responses are seen it is the wrong one, and in the case where it is the rare correct response of being correct the person acting in that way shouldn't take pleasure in it and it is almost never the impulse or emotional fuelled times you often see that resorted to. Every case I can think of where it is/was correct requires a somewhat objective and disciplined professional like execution of such actions. I was going to give examples of when I saw it was appropriate but the details are long and a little dark for here.

On the coddling kids note I have personally seen a lot of it with school and related kids activity club staff with my family as well as in culture in general. A move to cast any masculine trait expression or thing perceived as aggressive into negative light of toxic masculinity and demand for boys to not act like boys which never seems productive long term causing a lot of problems. Again maybe you're not agreeing with that at all and I just said it poorly (likely), and even if you do I can accept we disagree but stand by my point. Apologise for any confusion from my part as I don't help things at times.

and some of the more thorough studies that found aggression links found it dissipated quickly after the game exposure. Although the desensitized to aggression provoking stressors effects lasted longer, however that is a positive in many cases such as less likely to act out and fail to control impulsive urges in school time or playground quarrels etc outside of gaming sessions and handled conflict better than the groups not exposed to anything but wrapping them in cotton wool and shielding them from aggression provoking stressors. Protecting kids from the world and expecting them not to struggle when life gets in the way vs teaching them to be resilient and handle challenges doesn't work, who'd have thought it. I'd read of some medical professionals drew comparisons with becoming desensitized to blood and gruesome injuries etc in their residency.

Aggression intervention in boys I agree if you mean learn to control it and not be impulsive and emotional but if you mean make them act not like boys then no you're incorrect there. Aggressive behaviour in boys is biology and male androgens gear us toward this. Feminising boys is something I see a lot and I've personally saw a lot of issues from this. The demonization of maleness and aggression is bullshit imho. Aggression in part of maleness, what we need is for control and restraint over it and that starts with acceptance and learnign to fight so you don't have to. I raised my kids with the same hardline don't start it but don't be a victim or weak attitude I had albeit without a lot of the harshness I had as a kid. I grew up with aggression and fighting but was taught control that, held to high accountability and expected to take ownership of my failings regardless of whether others were, don't start anything but as a last resort when all proper channels fail or life depends on it finish it physically and finish it hard. I agree that violence will not solve most problems and most the time it is resorted to it is the wrong solution 99% of the time BUT sometimes it is the answer. If you've ever dealt with extremely manipulative people such as those with NPD or psychopathy traits or certain criminal types you'd know sometimes being all hugs and rainbows won't work, a capability to destroy someone if pushed despite being clear you don't want that but more than willing to if have to does work. It also allows you to not act out of fear, or cowardly make yourself a victim. Some folks are just looking for weak prey and some insecure folks will response aggressively if cornered so if you don't go looking for trouble, walk away when possible but when it is called for and unavoidable physically solve a situation where nothing else works it is generally the most beneficial way for all involved.