Netflix to Launch Virtual Reality App For Immersive 3D Experience
The VR Market is set to get some major support from the online streaming buffet Netflix.
Variety reports that the most popular streaming service is in the process of procuring a new app that will feature the VR technology and give its subscribers an immersive 3D experience when watching content on TVs and computers.
Although most of the details as to how this will work for the viewer are scarce, there are many routes Netflix can take to make the emerging technology a mainstay for its streaming service.
Facebook's recently acquired Oculus VR technology will also be one of the leaders in this area, working with Netflix to create the app on Samsung's Gear VR, which is set to go on sale in the fall for $99.
Basically, the app itself features a setting of a virtual Netflix living room and will allow users to interact with Netflix much in the same way they do with games.
Oculus CEO John Carmack made a statement explaining how the new technology will be applied to the Netflix streaming platform.
"Despite all the talk of hardcore gamers and abstract metaverses, a lot of people want to watch movies and shows in virtual reality. In fact, during the development of Gear VR, Samsung internally referred to it as the HMT, for 'Head Mounted Theater,'" Carmack said in a blog post on the Netflix website. "The plan of attack was to take the Netflix TV codebase and present it on a virtual TV screen in VR. Ideally, the Netflix code would be getting events and drawing surfaces, not even really aware that it wasn't showing up on a normal 2D screen."
Rival streaming company Hulu is also developing a VR app for the same purposes and the company is said to be producing content that is specifically designed for the technology.
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