Facebook Inc (FB) Deal Results In Death Threats To Oculus VR Employees

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Oculus, which has been recently acquired by Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB), employees are receiving death threats after the announcement of the deal with the social networker. Oculus Rift creator Palmer Luckey, talking on Reddit, revealed that following the deal with Facebook, Oculus employees have been subjected to death threats.

Facebook Inc (FB) Deal Results In Death Threats To Oculus VR Employees

Threats extending to families

Some of the comments went even as far as threatening not only the technology’s creators, but their families as well.

Last week, Luckey said in a Reddit post that they did expect negative sentiment for a short while, but never expected “getting so many death threats and harassing phone calls that extended to our families,” and added “We know we will prove ourselves with actions and not words, but that kind of s**t is unwarranted, especially since it is impacting people who have nothing to do with Oculus.”

Luckey himself agreed that even he might have had a negative reaction following the outside news if he were a VR fan; however, with the information that he has on the Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) deal and on the technology, he is not at all disappointed.

On being asked, on Reddit, if he would be “pissed” at the Facebook deal as an outside observer, Luckey replied “Knowing what the public knows, maybe. Knowing what I know, seeing the technology this deal will directly enable? No.”

Other executives also defending the Facebook deal

Luckey’s statement follows an interview given by Oculus VP of Product Nate Mitchell to Game Informer last week. In an interview, Mitchell expressed surprise on the extent of negative reaction following the acquisition by Facebook. However, the VP added that public opinion would change with the passage of time.

Mitchell said that they expected the initial reaction to be negative primarily from the core community, and from the outside community the reaction was expected to be positive. However, as more information becomes available, the mood of people will certainly change, and it is already happening.

Apart from Luckey and Mitchell, Id Software co-founder and current Oculus Chief Technology Officer John Carmack also came forward to defend the deal. Carmack said that though he has zero experience with Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) and there may be better companies “that would have more obvious synergies,” he does believe that the social networker understands the big picture.

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