<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><xml><records><record><source-app name="Biblio" version="7.x">Drupal-Biblio</source-app><ref-type>17</ref-type><contributors><authors><author><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Daniel Harley</style></author></authors></contributors><titles><title><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">The promise of beginnings: Unpacking ‘diversity’ at Oculus VR</style></title><secondary-title><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">Convergence</style></secondary-title></titles><dates><year><style  face="normal" font="default" size="100%">2023</style></year></dates><urls><web-urls><url><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">https://doi.org/10.1177/13548565221122911</style></url></web-urls></urls><number><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">2</style></number><volume><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">29</style></volume><pages><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">417-431</style></pages><language><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">eng</style></language><abstract><style face="normal" font="default" size="100%">This paper presents a case study of the inaugural year of Launch Pad, a diversity initiative by Meta’s virtual reality (VR) subsidiary, originally known as Oculus. As industry-led discourse presented VR as a vision of opportunity and change in the tech industry, Launch Pad presented a vision of social progress through improved diversity. However, a variety of contextualizing factors within that first year complicate these visions of progress, including the gendered and racialized norms of the tech industry, the politics of Oculus’s co-founder and the mixed feelings of the first beneficiaries of the program. I argue that even if Launch Pad is a good faith effort to address historical and current forms of marginalization and underrepresentation in the tech industry, such efforts must go much further than mentorship and tokenized inclusion, requiring a genuine recognition of the need for systemic change.</style></abstract></record></records></xml>