Oculus VR has launched a new program, VR For Good, with the stated goal of promoting “philanthropic, socially beneficial projects” and two pilot projects that involve nonprofits and California Bay Area high school students making VR films.
These projects involve seeding schools and advocacy groups with funding, training and hardware to create said VR films, so Oculus’ platform will likely gain heightened recognition outside of the game industry and an uptick in non-game content.
That’s well in line with Facebook’s vision for Oculus, which has always gone well beyond the company’s initial focus on VR games.
“After games, we’ll make Oculus a platform,” Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg said back in 2014, shortly after Facebook bought Oculus for $2 billion. At the time, he alluded to VR’s potential to foster “a real breadth of interesting things we just haven’t seen before,” and this latest initiative seems like a feel-good effort to do just that.
VR game developers should note that Oculus is investing $1 million to kick off the VR For Good program, and hasn’t limited its purview to VR filmmaking. For more details, check out the company’s blog post on the topic.