With the release of the Apple Vision Pro come the usual litany of opinions and exasperated sighs, ending the day with the inevitable stock crash. Everyone with an opinion, from the executive suites of Wall Street to your favorite bloggers bedroom in his mother’s basement, is weighing in and the general consensus seems to be: Too much, for too little, and maybe even too late.
what are we dealing with here? And what’s the most likely future of this new effort at Apple. So the quick basics for the uninitiated: Apple announced the long rumored Apple Vision Pro. A standalone augmented reality headset that runs an offshoot of iOS called Vision OS, allowing you to run existing iOS apps and apps specifically made for Vision OS which essentially appear as floating windows or objects in your environment. Apple plans to release the Vision Pro in early 2024 for $3,500.
Since you’re watching this you’re likely a fan of VR, so you’re familiar with the advantages of augmented reality. Blending persistent virtual objects in space has been the thing of sci-fi for decades, and the fact we’re living in a time where AR headsets are real, and that multiple large tech companies are competing in the space, blows my mind.
It’s no surprise that the average nerd is excited by this, but passion aside there could be some very real practical uses. The problem is Apple didn’t give us that reason yesterday.
The reality (pun completely intended) of the situation is what Apple announced isn’t anything you can’t mostly get using the Quest 2 at $300. A passthrough system, running native apps which float in 3D space, a library of business apps, with the ability to access the web, email, and video calls, all within a virtual meeting place. And if you want a better version of it, then the Quest Pro is available for $1,500 - which, until yesterday, seemed really expensive. But I suspect Apple’s case wasn’t for what AR can do for us, but what Apple promises to deliver in the future, which is a classic page out of Apple playbook, and one that very often succeeds.
Truth be told, I’m really excited about an AR headset offering from another large tech company, and say what you want about Apple, but they tend to raise the bar, meaning everyone else has to deliver a higher quality, more competitive offering, which benefits all of us. But I think my biggest concern isn’t having to wait another 6 months until its release, or even that it’s $3,500, but Apple, at least as far as I’m concerned, didn’t deliver a compelling reason to use the device, or AR in general.
I mean, I want AR. I want to be the weirdo wearing something ‘cool’ on his face that blends the real world with the virtual. Part man. Part machine. All nerd. But Apple didn’t give me that reason yesterday, but I’ll tell you what Apple did deliver, much to Meta’s delight: A reason for everyone to purchase the Quest 3 this Fall, a product that leans harder into AR with color passthrough, a faster processor, and depth sensing, which at it’s announced price of $500 is now one hell of a deal.
