Virtual reality: Is this really how we will all watch TV in years to come? Virtual reality (VR) is often used to illustrate the concept of being trapped within the cyberspace, or as a form of advanced technology. This technology ________ its place in popular culture through films such as The Lawnmower Man and The Matrix, as well as books such as Ready Player One, which Steven Spielberg is ________ for a movie. They presented ________ of technology by using a VR headset, which enabled people to explore virtual, computer-controlled worlds.

In 2017, these cultural touchstones are freshly in mind for the ________ industry, as it tries to understand whether real-life headset can be used to deliver new forms of drama, documentary and storytelling.

The promise connect a headset to a computer or your smartphone and you can watch video, play games and ________ virtual worlds, turning your head around for 360-degree vision, and interacting by means of a controller.

VR experiences in their current form ________ from fending off zombies (抵御僵尸) in survival - horror game Resident Evil 7 to exploring the ocean depths or exploring a Syrian refugee camp.

TV firms want to know more. At this month’s MIPTV industry conference in Cannes’ VR was a major ________ for producers, broadcasters and tech companies alike. “We will all have superpowers. Because in Virtual reality you can be anyone, you can go anywhere and you can create anything,” said HTC’s Rikard Steiber in a keynote speech. “We’re just at the beginning of what the ________ can do. It’s a new computing platform: it’s going to be the next mass ________.”

Still, with research company Green-light Insights ________ that by 2021 headset owners will spend $9bn a year on VR content, TV producers and broadcasters are keen to start ________ with the technology now.

This is as much a creative ________ as a business one. Many VR experiences to date have either been games or non-interactive video the equivalent to early television shows adopting the rules of radio, and early cinema doing the same with theatre. But like TV and films VR has the ________ to evolve its own language and formats.

Good VR has a value that is ________ to VR. It sounds really obvious, but it’s key. It has to be better in VR, or only in VR. A lot of media companies have a tendency to take what they have and put in VR. That might be a good bridge but it’s not the final ________ for VR.