Category: App Store

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Oculus Clarifies VR App Return Policy, Allowing 5 Refunds Over 30 Days

Though high app prices have dissuaded some people from buying — or re-buying — titles for the new Oculus Quest headset, Oculus’ policy of allowing refunds for briefly tested apps gives users an incentive to test VR experiences they might otherwise have skipped. But the policy isn’t as straightforward as it seemed, a reader tells VentureBeat, as Oculus is now deeming multiple returns “potential abuse of our systems,” and rejecting them, a situation we contacted the company to clarify.

A quick read of Oculus’ official Quest/Rift content return policy suggests that there’s a simple standard for receiving “automated refunds” from the store: You can request a refund within 14 days of purchase for virtually any app used for fewer than two hours. Here’s the policy — emphasis ours:

You may return apps, games, and many experiencespurchased through Oculus for Oculus Rift, Rift S, and Quest for any reason, so long as you submit your request within fourteen days of purchase and you have engaged with the content for no more than two hours.

But as reader Doug Borses noted in an email from Oculus Support, an ambiguous clause at the bottom of the return policy page lets the company deny refunds if it spots “potential abuse” — specifically including “multiple attempts to return content over a period of time.” At best, that phrase is ambiguous; in the context of the rest of the return policy, it’s downright contradictory.

While no one could blame Oculus for wanting to prevent “abuse,” its policy invites multiple returns, using plurals: “apps” rather than “an app,” “games” rather than “a game,” and “many experiences” rather than “an experience.” You needn’t have or provide a reason. Just meet the timeline, and refunds should be automated.

Borses tells us that he received his Quest on a Friday, picked 10 games to test over the weekend, and decided to keep two of them, returning the rest. Oculus initially told him that they would only refund five of the games, as requesting eight refunds “definitely qualifies as ‘abuse of our systems’.” As a “one-time exception,” Oculus said it would refund a sixth game of his choice, but deny “any further refund requests.”

We reached out to Oculus for comment, and a Facebook spokesperson offered a clarification on the policy that will be useful for all future Oculus Store customers:

We have a generous refund policy, but that policy states that we may deny refund requests if we detect potential abuse of our refund system — for example by requesting bulk refunds over a short period of time. We begin to assume potential abuse when our system flags more than five refund requests in 30 days, but also consider every situation on a case-by-case basis.

In other words, users shouldn’t expect problems if they request five Oculus Store refunds within 30 days, but anything more than that may be automatically or manually rejected, requiring human intervention — and a “one-time exception.” For brand new Oculus Quest users such as Doug, the advice is therefore simple: Limit your initial sampling of apps to only a few titles if you suspect you’ll be returning some of them, and perhaps hold off on grabbing iffy ones until and unless free demos are released.

This post by Jeremy Horwitz originally appeared on VentureBeat. 

The post Oculus Clarifies VR App Return Policy, Allowing 5 Refunds Over 30 Days appeared first on UploadVR.

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AR’s Initial Growth On App Store Hits Landmark, Is Similar Rate To That Of The Store Itself – Cook

It has only been a mere six months since Apple’s Craig Federighi came out onto the stage at The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2017 and show cased Apple’s ARKit, it’s surprise announcement of an augmented reality (AR) development platform. It had announcements relating to virtual reality (VR) yes. Such as Steam VR for Mac, that Metal would be supporting VR in High Sierra and that Unity and Unreal Engine support would be joining it. Whilst a VR demonstration featuring Star Wars wowed those in attendance.

At the time many understood that it was a game changer for AR, Apple had beaten Google, who had been very publicly working on Project Tango, to the punch and AR was now going to be a part of the millions of iOS powered tablets and phones that make up the Apple’s ecosystem.  Even so, it is doubtful many would’ve seen what happened next, for all parts of the developer spectrum – from fully fledged studios to bedroom coders videogames, apps, experiences and experiments began appearing. Each capturing the imagination of what AR could do to some sort of degree.  By the end of the month Apple themselves described developer support as ‘unbelievable’, and soon it seemed like every day there was a new exciting way ARKit was being implemented that the immersive tech community was raving about. From technical applications to bringing old pop music videos to life.

Google, of course, did not stand idly by and entered the mobile AR arena at the end of August with ARCore and bringing with it support from Unreal Engine and Unity. And between the pair fully formed apps have continued to appear. A number that was directly addressed by Apple’s Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook as part of the company’s Q4 earning call.

“There are 1,000-plus AR apps in the App Store already,” Cook revealed. “I think it’s very similar to when we fired the gun on the App Store overall in 2008.”

That’s certainly indicating some very promising levels of growth, and if it continues to match support from the store’s debut almost a decade ago that would, according to Forbes, see the store be housing 35,000 by the time of its first anniversary. This equated to a 4275% increase for apps on the App Store at the time.

Cook was also positive about AR’s role in general. In what could also be possibly seen as a slight dig at VR. “In my view AR amplifies human performance, instead of isolating us,” He said, adding that “It should be a help for humanity, not an isolation kind of thing for humanity.”

ARKit (2)This harks back to comments Cook made in 2016 where he was notably more positive about AR over VR: “This gives the capability for both of us to sit and be very present, talking to each other, but also have other things — visually — for both of us to see. Maybe it’s something we’re talking about, maybe it’s someone else here who’s not here present but who can be made to appear to be present. And so, there’s a lot of really cool things there.”

It’s a stance often repeated in subsequent interviews, which some have taken to be perhaps more due to Apple’s immediate future focusing on AR over VR, even though they have been investigating and investing throughout the last three years. It’s a two-pronged journey that continues for Apple, with VR on the slower path but VRFocus will be bringing you news throughout the months to come on how each continues to develop.

 

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Graffiti GIFs Become Real with the Gif-iti App

Graffiti is that homely artwork you’ll find scrawled across the bus timetable at your local bus stop, describing your mother in various illicit ways. Yes, the above might be your experience with graffiti, perhaps the most aimless method of insult, like subtweeting someone who doesn’t know what the internet is. But in fact, graffiti isn’t all bad, some of it is incredible, moving, and even… Well, literally moving.

Enter Gif-iti, the app that’ll literally bring street art and wall murals to life. INSA is the British artist, now world-renowned, who wants to bring street art to life – literally. By combining his new app, Gif-iti, with some very carefully planned artwork and augmented reality (AR), you can bring street art to life, as the app recognises and animates the art.

Now, this won’t work with the aforementioned “art” you’ll find at your local bus stop – INSA needs to design the art himself and animate it accordingly within his app before it’s updated. This does make one thing awkward however, as not everyone can easily travel to see INSA’s artwork…

Well luckily you can enjoy the experience at home too. All you need to do is download INSA’s Gif-iti app on the App Store, and visit his website here. Use the phone’s app and point your camera at INSA’s artwork, and they should spring to life.

If you’d like to see INSA’s art for yourself, you can find it all over the world, and he just might pop up at an art event or festival near you.

For all of the latest on futuristic artwork using augmented reality, stay on VRFocus.