Facebook's Teleportation Station: 10 Things We Wanted Instead
Facebook accidentally leaked something called Teleportation Station and the rumor mill went wild. However, the rumors weren't that good, so we came up with something better.
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This is what happens when you accidentally leak something with a really cool name that wasn't intended to be a very big deal. When Facebook accidentally sent out a message early this week hinting at something called Teleportation Station, everyone created a big deal speculating over what the social media was trying to create.
A lot of other people thought that it just looks silly.
Facebook announced some interesting and useful things at F8 conference on March 25 and 26, but none of them was Teleportation Station, which was just an experiment with spherical video at their HQ. Mark Zuckerberg mentioned it once during his keynote and the folks in the station waved and that was all.
But the funny thing is that even the speculation didn't live up to the name.
People were thinking maybe Teleportation Station was the name of the developer platform for Facebook's Oculus Rift partnership. Others wondered if it was just an app test bed. In truth, while it did have to do with the Oculus Rift, it was really just a minor thing that gone blown out of proportion.
However, when you think about it, shouldn't something with that great name deserve to be something much cooler than even a developer platform?
Facebook has rising revenues, an expanding user base (despite the general impression that people are leaving for other social networks), improving mobile usage, and investments in Oculus Rift and machine learning. Surely, it could use all that strength to provide us something worthy of the name Teleportation Station.
Obviously whatever it is, given the name it should be about transporting something -- real or virtual -- or at least about a station where people can do something. Teleportation Station needs to be bigger than a developer platform and it needs to live up to the name. Here's what I think Facebook and Zuckerberg should have unveiled. Do you have a better idea? If so, let us know in the comments section.
OK, obviously I knew this was far-fetched. And I'm sure if they had invented an actual teleportation station they'd have kept it under wraps. But just the thought of Mark Zuckerberg beaming into the F8 keynote is worth it though.
One of my major complaints with Oculus Rift is that it replaces one sense in your body with virtual reality, while the rest of you is stuck in the real world. You are essentially blind while using it. That's fine if you're in a chair pretending to be on vacation in the Bahamas. But if you're playing a game or anything physically immersive, you're going to trip over the dog and break your leg. What about an Oculus Pod? A whole-body virtual experience that allows you to safely immerse all of your senses? What if it used haptic technology to create sense of touch and movement? What if it used surround sound and maybe even smell-o-vision to create an artificial experience with none of the broken bones (or broken dog)?
We're getting darn close to the replicator. We've 3-D printed body parts. If we can't teleport things yet, maybe we can make copies of them elsewhere. Facebook has long been trying to get into the retail game at one level or another. What if Facebook got into it by allowing you to print or replicate objects and skip right over Amazon's drone delivery? You can see the value to Facebook and its retail partners. Facebook's real announcements today were about bringing the personal experience back to shopping. What could be more personal than printing your own products?
Maybe 3-D printing isn't there yet. But another place where Facebook could compete with Amazon is on delivery. Amazon offers one-hour delivery to your home or office. That's great, but what if you're on the go? Amazon could leverage its existing location-based services to offer delivery of products where you are, whether it is at home or crossing a street. Retail partners could realize you weren't home to receive a package and reroute it to deliver to you anywhere.
To be honest, I don't know why Facebook would get into hyperloop competition except that billionaires like to compete and the hyperloop is an awesome idea. Still, this does lend itself to Facebook's social concepts. Hop into the teleportation station tube and in a mere hour, you could be talking face-to-face to your friend who was across the country.
We all wish we could teleport immediately to a vacation spot. We all use picture sites like Instagram as "vacation porn" to dream of our next great vacation. What if you could make an album out of your favorite Instagram photos and book a vacation out of it? Put a picture of the Orlando airport, DisneyWorld, Universal Studios, a Motel 6, and three or four restaurants into Instagram. Then push a button. It looks at what is in the picture and automatically books a vacation for you based on what you see. No travel agent. No trips to Orbitz and then to Hotels.com and then to each restaurant. It just books the whole thing. Instant vacation, just add the trip to the airport.
Rockin' out to the oldies, Zuck and three of his friends will take you back in time to the good old days, when songs were all about four-part harmony, and the hoodie hadn't been invented. Let's face it. This isn't happening. But wouldn't you like this to happen if only to see him wearing a bow tie?
Capitalizing on the need to make social contact as real as possible and getting into retail, Facebook announces coffee shops that include virtual coffee with friends. Using location based apps, Facebook will tell you which of your friends is also drinking coffee. You can hook up and do video chats, order friends drinks from across the country, and even pose for virtual selfies. It is the next best thing to teleporting right there to see your friend.
The biggest problem with Facebook is that if you've been on it a long time, you've got years of pithy status updates, funny comments from your friends, and hopefully -- if you did right -- some actual cherished memories. But it is really hard to go back and read old posts. It would have been nice if Facebook was just announcing a way to "teleport" back in time to more easily see these memories. Apps like Timehop are starting to do that, and Facebook is announcing a "day in the life" app that reveals old posts on days in history. But these apps are still cherry-picking. It would be nice to go back more easily and see anything you wrote, even when it isn't Throwback Thursday.
We all know Zuckerberg thinks "privacy is dead," but even Facebook has to listen to its customers. With all the changes and improvements, privacy and security is still the biggest flaw on Facebook. Don't know how the name applies, but wouldn't we have all applauded some extra privacy functionality?
Which of these do you wish Facebook had announced? Do you have a favorite? Do you think we'll be hearing about any of these soon? Do you care at all about Teleportation Station? Tell us in the comments.
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