Everything that mattered at Facebook's developer conference

Facebook developer conference highlights

Facebook's F8 conference may be geared toward the guys and gals that help make our favorite social network tick but there were plenty of important announcements that will impact the everyday usage of folks like you and me.

Perhaps most telling from this year's F8 was the Day 2 keynote's devotion to virtual reality. Facebook bought Oculus one year ago, and Mark Zuck and Co were clearly ready for the Rift maker to take center stage in front of the developer crowd.

In addition to VR, we heard plenty about Messenger and Facebook's plans to have the service replace text messages and email. Whether you love it or hate it, it's not going to stop Facebook from going whole hog on Messenger.

The question is, just how much will these new bits make our lives (our Facebook lives, anyway) better? That remains to be seen, but for now tag along as we look at the top news to come F8 2015.

Oculus Rift in 2015

Probably the biggest revelation of this year's dev con came from Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer, who vaguely announced virtual reality will arrive in 2015.

While he didn't go so far as to say it will be the Oculus Rift we'll see before the year is s up, it's a safe bet this is the VR headgear he was referring to, namely because of the tiny detail that Facebook owns Oculus.

It also corroborates Oculus founder Palmer Luckey's statement that Rift will be out this year. Oculus CTO John Carmack's previously alluded to Gear VR for the Galaxy S6 releasing by year's end as well, which should put pressure on Rift to come out in time to compete.

Facebook Messenger applications

The other earth-shattering news out of F8 was Messenger related.

Facebook is positioning the chat client it forced onto users as an end-all-and-be-all communication station. How's it going to do that? For starters, by giving you third-party apps for new ways of expression and communication with friends.

The Messenger Platform allows developers to create applications specifically for these ends, though as we found out, it really comes down to GIFs and selfies, for now. TechRadar Wearables Editor Lily Prasuethsut checked out some of the 40 applications already created for Messenger, deeming them perfect for the selfie generation.

Facebook Messenger for businesses

Additionally, Businesses on Messenger seeks to revolutionize the way businesses communicate with customers.

Launching in a few weeks, the feature will let businesses send things like shipping details and order confirmations to customers, who must opt in to receive the notifications.

Customers can also ask businesses free-form questions, and Facebook hopes this kind of interaction will create a more personable e-commerce experience, one akin to what we used to experience back in the day of brick-and-mortar shopping.

The feature is currently being tested with Everlane and zulily, and more business integrations will launch in the coming weeks.

Spherical videos

Being that VR was a major theme of F8, it was no surprise Facebook revealed a feature perfect for the future tech during its Day 1 keynote.

Spherical videos, basically 360-degree streams that let users control where they're looking, are coming to the News Feed.

Not only will this lend a new dimension to Facebook's main hub, it also makes it VR-ready. Imagine wearing an Oculus Rift, popping into your Facebook News Feed and being instantly immersed in a video posted by one of your friends?

It seems like an early but important step in Facebook creating the kind of immersion needed for VR to succeed. We can only expect there will be more to come.

VR still isn't right

Michael Abrash, Oculus' chief scientist, was candid in his keynote presentation about the state of VR.

He said: "VR is just barely good enough. It can get better."

Blunt words from someone dedicated to making virtual reality viable, and his honesty speaks to the hurdles still remaining when it comes to improving things like sense of presence.

That being said, Facebook and Oculus are dedicated to making VR happen (they have that 2015 release date to hit, after all). Abrash said getting users' hands and bodies into virtual worlds, improving interaction with other people, and pulling in elements of the real world, like mice and keyboards, are areas being worked on. He also noted the tech can potentially change the world, so there's no sign of development slowing down at any measure.

By the numbers

As with every keynote by every company, Facebook had some bragging to do about its users and the amount of time they spend on the social network.

Among the biggest figures to stick out were 600 million and 3 billion. That's 600 million monthly Messenger users and 3 billion videos viewed a day in Facebook. Yes, that's "billion" with a "b" and that's a day, as in, every 24 hours.

Facebook is still raking in big numbers despite the rise of competitive social networks. It's still looking for the right formula to keep users - especially young ones - but it's seemingly working very hard to hit on the right mark.

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