Day 0: Arrival — Day 1: Virtual Reality
There is something exhilarating about walking into a room and seeing Barry Diller wearing a virtual reality headset, gesturing wildly and emitting sounds like a child at Disneyland.
Actually there is nothing exhilarating about it. The word I meant to use was “wrong” – “creepy” would also work.
Supposedly, the 15-year-old founder of Oculus Rift set Mr. Diller up with a interactive western experience per his request.
I walked up to Barry as he made wild gestures in the air:
“What you watchin, Bar?”
“It’s an interactive movie – a western. Piss off.”
“Can I see?”
“No, fuck off.”
I was able to get a screenshot of his VR experience.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Virtual Reality and realize it’s going to be a huge business for a very small percentage of the world (0.01% at the high end).
During a VR panel featuring Oculus Rift founder Skippy Youngone (or something) we learned that Oculus was planning some disturbing new uses for the VR headset including the ability to feel real pain when shot or stabbed during a video game (it only will cost an additional $600 for that feature) – though actual bleeding is still “years away,” Skippy said somewhat sadly.
The most astonishing new business was a super clandestine project developed in the basement of the Oculus lab (the Sub-Zero 4T lab) focusing on real life end-of-life-solutions in which terminally ill people can choose the way they will die, i.e., getting eaten by piranhas, jumping into a volcano, ninja battle, dying in your sleep [my personal favorite].
Just put on the Oculus headset (for extra cost you can add the pain feeling armband and touch finger sensors) and when you’re ready to die someone will assist you with your pre-selected choice and you will die virtually… and actually.
Those of us in the room closer to the end of life than the beginning were thoroughly enchanted / horrified by this idea and wanted to learn more.
But then, Actual Reality took over the room as we started to see that the world outside of Sun Valley is falling apart.
China (which we all rely on to save our businesses from stagnant growth because of an inability to grow domestically) has returned to being a third-world country after the past month’s epic stock market collapse which has left villagers (who invested so many chickens and goats into the booming market ) longing for the old days of famine and misery.
Herb Allen attempted to keep the conference on track by going forward with a few lame panels (some bullshit about solar, something stupid about colonizing Mars and Defense Secretary Ashton Kushner assuring everyone that everything is awesome except ISIS) but you could tell the mood of the conference has shifted.
All around The Great Hall of the Moguls (The Limelight Ballroom), Captains of Industry were just staring at their phones not knowing what the F was happening (though they all claim to know).
It was decided by a core group of us that the plan for the rest of the conference is to get drunk, eat steak and worry for a couple more days in Sun Valley and then get back on our planes – whether it be to the Hamptons, Hawaii or Europe – and then continue to worry the rest of the summer.
Jeff Katzenberg – ever the failed optimist – is heading to Comic-Con as though that means anything anymore.
Not that the sky is falling… but, yes, the sky is falling.
And Manka Bros. just finished our five-year-plan in which 80% of our profits from 2020 are projected to come from China.
I think we’ll just change “China” to “Bulgaria” in the plan because that has a better chance of working out.
As Simpson’s Comic Book Guy would say: “Worst Herb Allen Sun Valley Conference ever!”
Khan Manka, Jr. – Chairman & CEO – Manka Bros. Studios – The World’s Largest Media Company
Herb Allen’s Sun Valley Conference – 2015
Herb Allen’s Sun Valley Conference – 2014
Herb Allen’s Sun Valley Conference – 2013
Herb Allen’s Sun Valley Conference – 2012
Herb Allen’s Sun Valley Conference – 2011
Herb Allen’s Sun Valley Conference – 2010
Khan, you sound down. Herb must have left you over at the Inn (again), but I have one of the new rooms at the renovated Lodge and it’s pretty nice. In fact, I have a big, new room facing the ice rink this time, so when Herb fires up Dawn of the Moguls, I can hear it clearly through the ice rink speakers at 6 AM.
Frankly, I thought things were going fine until Herb hired a spiritual healer. I immediately recalled the Acid Trip from the Limelight Room. Where were you when they put us all on the buses and took us to the ‘undisclosed location.’ Things got weird north of Ketchum.
As we stepped off the bus, we were each given a bobblehead in our own likeness and asked to place them in a circle in front of us in the grass field. The healer then kept all of us back 100 feet, not 99, not 101, 100 feet, and then she (I couldn’t tell, it might have been Caitlin?) proceeded to caress each bobblehead. We had to be silent. Next thing I knew, one of the new Saudi attendees (Sheikh/prince-ali-baba-something) was holding hands with Jeff Bezos and they were moaning in unison. Chris Christie started speaking in tongues and rocking back and forth like he was in one of those snake throwing churches. Then he crosses the circle to get in on the action with Bezos, lifting his shirt and rubbing his belly up and down on the Sheikh, first, but Christie’s sweating profusely and whatever trance Bezos was in ended because he jumped back like he’d suddenly been oiled with Hawaiian Tropic in an unwanted manner. Bezos screamed something about ‘curlies on his Allen and Company polo shirt’ and wetness. It was gross. Most of the rest of the group was confused like I was, but we were allowed to keep the bobbleheads, so it wasn’t a total loss.
I peeled out of there in time to see Nick Woodman at the Gun Club placing his GoPro camera on top of the trap dugout. Frankly I was hoping he’d blow up his camera, but he actually managed to get some clays. I’m sure he’ll have some flunky edit out the all the clays he missed. What do you do with that video anyway? If you’re not in it and it’s just the clays getting blown up, really, what do you do with that? Not my kind of kink, but ok…
Poor Tim Armstrong of AOL…you know Herb is just salivating at trying to help Tim bail out of AOL by selling that digital dump to somebody else. I almost feel sorry he’s here. I saw him trying to get in on the driverless car action, but the AOL stink is as unwanted as a smoking hitchhiker. Ah well, I’m sure Herb will keep AOL on deck because time is short. That will be a money-maker for Herb in time, no doubt, and probably more than pay for next year’s mogul fest.
Herb’s sausage fest perfectly encapsulates what is wrong about corporate America (though I’m sure you like it)…forget about the tech to entertainment weighting of this mogul f*ckfest. It’s the male/female ratio that matters: 50:1 male moguls to female moguls. There is no way to get laid in a place like this unless you count Sheryl being back on the market. BTW, Stacey Bendet needs to lose the Mr. McGoo glasses.
That Battlestar Galactica bullsh*t artificial intelligence from Elon made me think of you…perfect material for a sequel to the Manka original “Cow Jumped Over The Moon.” I doubt you’d even have to pay Elon for the rights. Just get him drunk at the Drankin’ Hole. Speaking of that, I’ve located Bin Tran. If you want to see him again, come find me this time. Tony Parkhill, the resort’s #3 guy, told me where he went. Bin’s not far. Let’s get hammered for old time’s sake. I need a solid hangover so I don’t have to be awake when my G6 lifts off from Hailey in the lightning tomorrow.
By the way, Khan, where are Day 2 and Day 3? You need to share the story about the Amazon drones…
So sorry, Terry – as you may know – I had to cut the trip short because I was speaking on an insipid panel at Comic Con about the over-saturation of comic book movies coming to theaters. Manka Bros. has announced 157 movies based on MC Comics characters through 2050:
http://mankabros.com/blogs/chairman/2014/10/31/manka-bros-to-produce-157-movies-based-on-mc-comics-characters-through-2050/
I would have loved to see the Amazon drone demonstration. It would have been followed by my suicide – which is long overdue.
I think virtual reality will give new breath not only for attraction but for education as well. My sister is working on her term paper referred to interior design, she uses PC for this, what if she could use virtual reality to get inside the thing she is modeling.
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I think virtual reality is a step up. It will give new life not only to entertainment but education and training as well. Making designs for buildings for example or building models of details, or training in their techniques for doctors, would be great with virtual reality.