YouTube is planning another major push into virtual reality, the company’s Director of Creators and VR Initiatives Jamie Byrne announced on Sunday. While speaking on the sidelines of the Sundance Film festival in Park City, Utah, Byrne revealed how the Google-owned company is currently focused on not only delivering VR experiences but is also trying to find a way to make people want more and get used to looking for additional VR content on a daily basis. In other words, Byrne wants people to use YouTube VR just like they’re using YouTube.
This concentrated effort to promote VR content revolves around giving creators more tools to work with and consequently deliver content more frequently, Byrne revealed. As YouTube’s executive put it, some of the best video content on the platform is made by “individual creators in their bedroom,” which is why the company wants to put a larger focus on getting them everything they need to realize their ideas. Once the content starts rolling out in larger volumes, the audience will follow, YouTube believes. The firm and its parent company are currently in the process of delivering cameras and other equipment to popular YouTube content creators in hopes they’ll utilize it to create more VR content for YouTube VR. Byrne also said how he’s hoping that the virtual reality service will be available “on as many platforms as possible” in the future.
The YouTube VR app debuted on the Google Play Store in early November and has slowly been gaining in popularity ever since. The rise of this service coincides with Google’s efforts to promote the Daydream VR platform and related hardware as the Mountain View-based company is adamant to commercialize virtual reality as efficiently as possible. YouTube’s idea to provide content creators with hardware required to produce VR content isn’t new seeing how the firm is already utilizing a similar strategy to promote its popular video service and has been doing so for years. It remains to be seen whether the average consumer is ready to embrace VR as an everyday form of entertainment, but if they are, YouTube will seemingly be ready to provide them with all the content they can consume.