Neither Microsoft or Facebook are making relevant money from hardware. All of those headsets (like all those xboxes) have only one purpose: selling software, which the platform owner takes a cut from.

Except that the main point I'm refuting isn't whether or not they're profitable, but whether or not people want them. The hardware sales clearly show that they are desired products.

From a profit and loss standpoint they may be failing, or they may just still be early days of investment and expected operating at a loss. Xbox lost Microsoft money for years before it made them any real money. It doesn't hurt to diversify your revenue sources.