Well, you could argue that the proper split of wealth between having the initial idea of "let's do X", and actually figuring out how X can be done and making it work is 0% vs 100%.
The concept of VR goggles is decades old, but going from goggles that work in theory to goggles that work in practice takes a lot of real innovation - and whoever implements that is able to patent the innovated concepts and earn money for it.
If the concept of "two really inexpensive lenses, put a SmartPhone screen a few inches away, and wrap the whole thing in an inexpensive housing" is novel and invented by prof. Bolas, then Oculus Rift will likely be paying him patent royalties. If that concept wasn't novel, or the implementation (i.e., actual invention) was performed by someone else, then nothing should be done.
I didn't read the article as being about wealth, but being more about credit.
I'm about to start work on an academic project that, if it goes spectacularly well, will make someone else a couple billion dollars. I'm not going to see any of that money and I know that going in. I just get the credit.
I'm okay with this arrangement. I don't want to run a billion dollar company. They get their money and I get my credit. However, I'll find it very unfair if they get the billion dollars and I get stiffed for my credit.
I was part of a university group that designed and built the first real-time baseband processor for 802.11a wireless LANs. In the timeline, we were sandwiched between the patent holders (CSIRO) and the start-up (Radiata). We removed the risk, by figuring out that it was possible to actually build the idea that CSIRO proposed, and filling in the details, such as how one built a real-time FFT (in 1995) and how to do the error correction. The result of the research was a paper in IEEE Micro [1], so we got the "credit", but how many people mention the Macquarie University team in the same breath as CSIRO (Prime Minister's Award+$1b royalties) and Radiata ($560 million)? When money is involved, people don't like complicated structures, with too many names attached.
Quote: "So yes, I understand why Mark is not getting the financial payoff here. Still, in all the hype in the press and elsewhere, shouldn’t the primary inventor of the technology at least be mentioned?"
You seem to be accepting the article's claim that Mark Bolas was the "primary inventor" very uncritically. The idea behind VR goggles is decades old and has been commercialized in the past in things like the Virtual Boy (1990s). I don't see what Dr. Bolas invented that was so interesting or novel, although his lab may have been good at throwing together prototypes cheaply.
The concept of VR goggles is decades old, but going from goggles that work in theory to goggles that work in practice takes a lot of real innovation - and whoever implements that is able to patent the innovated concepts and earn money for it.
If the concept of "two really inexpensive lenses, put a SmartPhone screen a few inches away, and wrap the whole thing in an inexpensive housing" is novel and invented by prof. Bolas, then Oculus Rift will likely be paying him patent royalties. If that concept wasn't novel, or the implementation (i.e., actual invention) was performed by someone else, then nothing should be done.