Watch Google I/O Live in 360-Degree Virtual Reality Video on Cardboard

Google’s biggest event of the year, Google I/O, in which it spells out the future of the company and by extension all our lives, kicks off with a big keynote today at 10 a.m. on the West coast (1 p.m. Eastern time). It’s too late to get a ticket, but Google is allowing online viewers in via virtual reality.

For the 5 million people with a cheap Google Cardboard headset, YouTube is streaming the event in full 360-degree video. So you too can enjoy the excitement of listening to a bunch of executives talk about tech and business models, while simultaneously watching the guy next to you text and live-blog the event.

Of course, if you want to bypass all that, Inverse will be serving up coverage of the news coming out of the event all week.

Google is expected to make some big announcements around VR today. Rumors have suggested the company may introduce a competitor to Samsung’s Gear VR or even just a version of Cardboard that won’t exhaust the user’s arms by having to hold the headset up to their eyes for extended periods of time.

But what’s more certain is that Google will somehow integrate Project Tango, which is one of the company’s subsidiaries working on giving smart devices sight — not real human eyeballs but an ability to sense space and depth in rooms.

Hopefully next year’s 360-streamed Google I/O will be more high-tech and less straining on the arms, but for now we’ll settle for what we have. Viewers without a Cardboard headset can (like a peasant) watch the regular video live stream of Google’s event at the I/O website.