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Some great points made already.
The hardware requirement is really going to be the killer of VR IMHO. Anything that requires blocking your natural senses is something we're not wired to do. We wear headphones to block out unwanted noise in certain situations but we rarely cover our eyes.
Media consumption in any form is usually driven by whats 'good enough' to consume whatever format we're ingesting. VR as we commonly discuss it does not really fill any type o need. In fact, I see it very much like a Segway - a technology that everyone got super high on but ultimately ended up with niche uses - lazy mall security guards and middle-aged tourists on 'walking' tours.
From my perspective VR isn't truly VR until you're immersed in a fully interactive HD realistic environment. While we're willing to make the trade-off for video games it's not 'real', or we'd all be watching machinima. Haptic feedback is a great idea, but now we're entering 'special event' territory..suit up, put on your helmet and disappear from the world.
Fix point/path 360 degree rendered environments are no different than a big screen. Without control over the environment it isn't VR. While I'm sure that Facebook et al have some big plans for VR as a communication medium I can't imagine that it's going to be used at first for anything more than annoying twenty something females with kitten avatars and the males having jacked up he-man avatars and carrying nerf axes.
So how about adult? Cams seems to be the obvious option in the near term - production costs would be lower in relative terms since most girls seem to operate in a single small room that could easily be mapped and rendered. The only thing then is the tech to scan/map/render the performer from any angle. There's still the problem of POV paths, but this is more like an extension of a peep show booth so making the constraints visual shouldn't damage the experience.
I do think there's a future for VR Theaters where you can jump in a pod in a safe environment for 2 hours to experience something. The thought of widespread adoption at home sounds pretty sad.. an empty living room with enough pods for everyone and a dog whining and scratching at the door because it needs to go outside for a pee. Actually no, the dog gets replaced by a tamagotchi that interrupts the experience at a key point because it digitally crapped in the VRspace lobby you use to talk to your family because it's too damn annoying to face them in real life.
In conclusion, VR needs better definition for what VR is and isn't. Expect lots of kitten avatars and nerf axes but nothing overly useful. Did no one watch Disclosure? That had the worst VR interface ever.
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