I wouldn't compare it to mobile. IMO, current gen VR is best described as a new content medium. VR is to video what video is to recorded audio what recorded audio is to written language. Written language describes an event to an audience's imagination, recorded audio lets them hear it, video lets them see it (scaled either smaller or larger than real life, and viewed through a flat, square window), and VR astrally projects them there, for lack of a better phrase (I'm hesitant to say "takes them there" until we have haptic feedback). The immediate applications have mostly been gaming-related, but it goes beyond that. Think films that are more like stage plays where the audience member can float around and see events unfold from any angle, conference calls that give you the ability to see body language, CAD modelling done by actually walking around the object in question you're designing and manipulating it with your hands, the ability to walk around on stage at a concert next to your favorite band, to scuba dive or mountain climb or go on a safari without leaving home or being in danger.
That's part of the reason that so many people talk about needing to try VR to understand it. The experience just cannot be fundamentally conveyed via a flat screen (though I think this ad for the Vive does a great job: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYfNzhLXYGc).
I don't think that VR is the first step to AR. AR (virtual content graphically overlaid on the real world) is a fundamentally different concept and the applications are different. VR puts you in a different world, AR tells you more about (or modifies) the real world.
That's part of the reason that so many people talk about needing to try VR to understand it. The experience just cannot be fundamentally conveyed via a flat screen (though I think this ad for the Vive does a great job: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYfNzhLXYGc).