Perhaps, but Carmack works on things he likes and is best driven by seemingly-impossible technical tasks. It's pretty unlikely he'd be anywhere near as productive in any other space if he truly loves VR.

I’m a skeptic too, but if there’s one person who can make this sort of moonshot project happen, it’s him. His expertise is right where it needs to be.

He's clearly doing what he loves there; I watched his key note on the Quest and while he's not the greatest speaker it's pretty riveting and in the end I disappointed they had to cut him off for time.