John D. Carmack (born August 20, 1970) is an American game programmer, founder of Armadillo Aerospace, and a co-founder and former technical director of id Software.

With more than two decades after revolutionizing the video game industry by creating iconic titles like "Wolfenstein 3-D" and "Doom," Carmack again got the attention of game enthusiasts in 2012. But that's not to say they all bought into his eccentric new vision: a virtual reality headset he literally cobbled together with duct tape and began showing off at E3.

Soon the world came around. He joined emerging VR leader Oculus in 2013, and Facebook bought the company for $2 billion in 2014. Today he is the driving technical force for a product expected to propel an entire industry forward when it launches in early 2016. "Every new platform starts with the familiar creative modes awkwardly pushed onto it. Only once a basic level of confidence is gained can the new aspects of the platform really start to come into their own. Next year will be 'year one' of consumer VR, and we won't be through the awkward phase yet," Carmack tells Adweek. "We probably have a decade of solid improvements to look forward to as the technology and content co-evolve before we start looking at it as a mature field."

Video Gaming, Computers, Computer Science, Science & Technology, Software, software development, Virtual Reality, Virtual Worlds, Internet & Technology Industries