Virtual reality – a site of renewed interest for major players in the tech industry – is increasingly one fraught with questions of data capture. This article examines the case of the Facebook owned virtual reality company Oculus and its intensifying privacy and surveillance risks with respect to the data generated and gathered through its devices. To explore the surveillance-centred structures of Oculus, this article examines Oculus’ privacy policies from December 2014 (the first version following the company's acquisition by Facebook), and October 2020 (the most recent iteration of the policy). In so doing, we examine these policies as sites of discourse, asking how they frame and afford power and control to Facebook, and position Facebook and Oculus’ surveillant aims and logics relative to societal concerns about, and regulations of, data.
ApplinSFlickC (2021) Facebook’s Project Aria indicates problems for responsible innovation when broadly deploying AR and other pervasive technology in the commons. Journal of Responsible Technology. 5: 1–15. Epub ahead of print. DOI: 10.1016/j.jrt.2021.100010.
CarterMEglistonB (2020a) Facebook's virtual reality push is about data, not gaming. The Conversation. Available at: https://theconversation.com/facebooks-virtual-reality-push-is-about-data-notgaming- 145730.
4.
CarterMEglistonB (2020b) Ethical implications of emerging mixed reality technologies. Socio- Tech Futures Lab: University of Sydney. Available at: https://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstream/handle/2123/22485/ETHICAL IMPLICATIONS.pdf.
5.
CarterMEglistonB (2021) What are the risks of virtual reality data? Learning analytics, algorithmic bias and a fantasy of perfect data. New Media & Society1–20. Epub ahead of print. DOI: 10.1177/14614448211012794.
6.
ChesherC (1994) Colonizing virtual reality: Construction of the discourse of virtual reality. Cultronix1(1): 1–27.
7.
CorbinJStraussA (2015) Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
8.
CorriganT (2018) Making implicit methods explicit: Trade press analysis in the political economy of communication. International Journal of Communication12: 2751–2772.
9.
CouldryNYuJ (2018) Deconstructing datafication’s brave new world. New Media and Society20(12): 4473–4491.
10.
DuguaySBurgessJSuzorN (2020) Queer women’s experiences of patchwork platform governance on Tinder, Instagram, and Vine.Convergence26(2): 237–252.
11.
EglistonBCarterM (2020) Oculus imaginaries: The promises and perils of Facebook’s virtual reality. New Media & Society. Epub ahead of print. DOI: 10.1177/1461444820960411.
12.
EvansL (2018) The Re-Emergence of Virtual Reality. New York: Routledge.
13.
FaircloughN (1995) Critical Discourse Analysis: The Critical Study of Language. New York,, NY: Routledge.
14.
FoucaultM (1970) The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences. London: Routledge.
15.
GillespieT (2018) Custodians of the Internet: Platforms, Content Moderation, and the Hidden Decisions That Shape Social Media. New Haven: Yale University Press.
16.
GogginG (2014) Facebook's mobile career. New Media & Society16(7): 1068–1086.
HarleyD (2020) The politics of consumer VR: Framing contemporary virtual reality. Unpublished doctoral thesis, York University, Canada. Retrieved from https://yorkspace.library.yorku.ca/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10315/38266/Harley_Daniel_E_2020_PhD.pdf.
19.
HauptJ (2021) Facebook futures: Mark Zuckerberg’s discursive construction of a better world. New Media and Society23(2): 237–257.
20.
HeemsbergenLBowtellGVincentJ (2021) Conceptualising augmented reality: From virtual divides to mediated dynamics. Convergence. Epub ahead of print. DOI: 10.1177/1354856521989514.
21.
HelmondANieborgDvan der VlistF (2019) Facebook’s evolution: Development of a platform-as-infrastructure. Internet Histories3(2): 123–146.
22.
HeschJKozminskiALindeO (2019) Powered by AI: Oculus Insight. Retrieved from https://ai.facebook.com/blog/powered-by-ai-oculus-insight/.
23.
HoffmannAProferesNZimmerM (2018) “Making the world more open and connected”: Mark Zuckerberg and the discursive construction of Facebook and its users. New Media and Society20(1): 199–218.
HwangT (2020) Subprime Attention Crisis: Advertising and the Time Bomb at the Heart of the Internet. Farrar, Strauss; Giroux.
26.
JasanoffS (2015) Future imperfect: Science, technology, and the imaginations of modernity. In: JasanoffSKimS (eds) Dreamscapes of Modernity: Sociotechnical Imaginaries and the Fabrication of Power. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1–34.
27.
KatzenbachCMagalhãesJCKoppsA, et al (2021) The Platform Governance Archive (PGA). DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/XSBPT.
28.
KomljenovicJ (2021) The rise of education rentiers: Digital platforms, digital data and rents. Learning, Media and Technology. Advanced online publication. DOI: 10.1080/17439884.2021.1891422.
LaRoccoM (2020) Developing the ‘best practices’ of virtual reality design: Industry standards at the frontier of emerging media. Journal of Visual Culture19(1): 96–111.
31.
LiaoT (2016) Mobile versus headworn augmented reality: How visions of the future shape, contest, and stabilize an emerging technology. New Media and Society20(2): 796–814.
32.
LightBBurgessJDuguayS (2018) The walkthrough method: An approach to the study of apps. New Media and Society20(3): 881–900.
33.
MadaryMMetzingerT (2016) Real virtuality: A code of ethical conduct. Recommendations for good scientific practice and the consumers of VR-technology. Frontiers in Robotics and AI3(3): 1–23.
34.
McdonaldACranorL (2008) The cost of reading privacy policies. I/S: A journal of Law for the Information Society4(3): 543–568.
35.
MillerMRHerreraFJunH, et al. (2020) Personal identifiability of user tracking data during observation of 360-degree VR video. Scientific Reports10: 1–10.
36.
NakamuraL (2020) Feeling good about feeling bad: Virtuous virtual reality and the automation of racial empathy. Journal of Visual Culture19(1): 47–64.
37.
NevilleS (2020) Eavesmining: A critical audit of the Amazon Echo and Alexa conditions of Use. Surveillance and Society18(3): 343–356.
38.
NieborgDHelmondA (2018) The political economy of Facebook’s platformizaiton in the mobile ecosystem: Facebook Messenger as platform instance. Media. Culture and Society41(2): 196–218.
39.
ObarJOeldorf-HirschA (2018) The clickwrap: A political economic mechanism for manufacturing consent on social media. Social Media and Society4(3): 1–14.
40.
ObarJOeldorf-HirschA (2020) The biggest lie on the Internet: Ignoring the privacy policies and terms of service policies of social networking services. Information, Communication and Society23(1): 128–147.
41.
PlantinJ-CLagozeCEdwardsP, et al. (2018) Infrastructure studies meet platform studies in the age of Google and Facebook. New Media and Society20(1): 293–310.
42.
ReidenbergJBreauxTCranorL, et al. (2015) Disagreeable privacy policies: Mismatches between meaning and users’ understanding. Berkeley Technology Law Journal39: 1–36. Retrieved from. http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/faculty_scholarship/619.
43.
RiderKMurakami WoodD (2019) Condemned to connection? Network communitarianism in Mark Zuckerberg’s “Facebook Manifesto”. New Media and Society21(3): 639–654.
44.
SadowskiJ (2020) The internet of landlords: Digital platforms and new mechanisms of rentier capitalism. Antipode52(2): 562–580.
45.
SakerMFrithJ (2020) Coextensive space: Virtual reality and the developing relationship between the body, the digital and physical space. Media. Culture and Society41(7–8): 1427–1442.
WilkenR (2014) Places nearby: Facebook as a location-based social media platform. New Media and Society16(7): 1087–1103.
53.
WilkenRBurgessJAlburyK (2019) Dating apps and data markets: A political economy of communication approach. Computational Culture a Journal of Software Studies7(7): 1–26.
