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Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

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Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#81

Post by chrisco255 »

shmatt wrote: post #49

Now lets hear the writers opinion on an iPhone with no App Store, no copy - paste, no video recording, and no front facing camera. Kind of like the original one, which we now can't imagine a world without

All of those features were implemented within roughly one year of the original iPhone's launch. It even got to the point where jailbroken iPhones already had much of those features before the 3G version. The App Store was announced, just not ready. Meanwhile, there were at least a dozen other killer apps built in to the original iPhone: GPS w/ Google Maps, Wifi, YouTube with widescreen orientation, accelerometers, visual voicemail, unlimited data, multi-touch gestures, full HTML/JS web browser with pinch to zoom for pre-responsive web, full iPod replacement with built-in iTunes, unlimited text, etc.

The killer app for this seems to be: block out the real world entirely, even from your peripheral vision.

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#82

Post by pzo »

chrisco255 wrote: post #74
ozten wrote: post #5

Steve Ballmer laughing at the iPhone as "the world's most expensive phone" type of moment https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U

This is a pretty lazy analogy. Mobile phones were already carried by a large majority of adults when the iPhone came out. The iPhone didn't prove that everyone needed a cell phone, or even that smart phones / camera phones were a valid market (remember Blackberry? Palm Treo? Windows Mobile? Sidekick?) it just made a much better phone and mobile OS than anyone else had up to that point. And it introduced a number of k…

First iphone didn't have gps, didn't have selfie camera it event didn't have a flashlight, gyroscope or compass.

Also only 2g and wifi g

Not to mention app store was launched 1 year later. Based on that first generation wasn't that much useful. Mass appeal was maybe starting with 3rd generation.

This is just first generation

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#83

Post by cassianoleal »

pixelbath wrote: post #18

Author has not tried the product, and their main points seem to be: 1. Meta makes VR headsets and failed. 2. Vision has a lot of fancy tech, but I don't understand how that helps Apple. 3. People who are excited about Vision also liked Google Glass, a failed product. 4. Big televisions are cheaper. 5. Apple didn't mention motion sickness, so maybe that's a problem. Hope this saves at least someone from a very clickba…

They did mention motion sickness. They talked about refresh rates and input lags and how it's important so that people don't get sick. Can't recall their exact words but they definitely did.

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#84

Post by HDThoreaun »

GaggiX wrote: post #56

A giant TV can also be shared with many people. The only use case I see for this thing is if I wanted to watch something on a big (fake) screen when I'm out, even though I didn't see this use case in the commercial maybe it's just a bit awkward using it outside.

Watching videos while laying down without craning your neck or holding the device in an uncomfortable position has always seemed like an obvious VR use case to me. I also spend tons of time reading in bed, a headset could make that much more comfortable. Seems pretty obvious that having an extremely portable monitor is quite valuable.

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#85

Post by chrisco255 »

Brendinooo wrote: post #80
chrisco255 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty lazy analogy. Mobile phones were already carried by a large majority of adults when the iPhone came out. The iPhone didn't prove that everyone needed a cell phone, or even that smart phones / camera phones were a valid market (remember Blackberry? Palm Treo? Windows Mobile? Sidekick?) it just made a much better phone and mobile OS than anyone else had up to that point. And it introduced a number of k…

I spent too long tracking down a figure and didn't come up with anything definitive, but > smart phones / camera phones were a valid market feels revisionist. Something like 70% of Americans had a feature phone in 2007 but smartphone market share was probably in the single digits before the iPhone launched. I had a Palm m100 back in the day; PDAs and early smartphones weren't all that great, and it wasn't obvious to…

>> smart phones / camera phones were a valid market

> feels revisionist.

Not revisionist. I worked in mobile phone retail from 2002-2007. There were popular, successful camera phones and smart phones even then. However, in the early 2000s, the U.S. wireless market was much slower to deploy 3G than Japan and many European markets.

There were a number of powerful handsets that couldn't even be practically offered in the U.S. as a result of the splintered TDMA/CDMA/GSM protocols and the dizzying array of licensing deals between regional carriers who owned significant amounts of spectrum at the time, making data and roaming plans very expensive and impractical for most retail users. Smart phone adoption was much broader in markets that had full 3G support earlier on.

In 2004, NBC covered the Japanese mobile market, mentioning: "The Japanese use cell phones to surf the net, watch TV, navigate city streets with built-in GPS, download music, take and transmit home movies, get e-coupons, pay bills, play games, and even program karaoke machines." By 2004, 70 million Japanese had internet access on their phones, a threefold increase from 2000 [3].

[1] https://gizmodo.com/i-miss-my-japanese-flip-phone-1843733494 [2] http://wirelesswatch.jp/2006/12/29/japans-mobile-year-in-rev... [3] "In Japan, a wireless vision of future for U.S" (2004) https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna4306834

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#86

Post by Brendinooo »

charcircuit wrote: post #73
Brendinooo wrote: post #3

Commentary feels a bit lazy. Seems to operate on the assumption that it's not different than previous AR/VR offerings in any way. If they can find a million people to watch movies on flights and/or use it as a monitor replacement, and if it works well for those use cases, then Apple will net $3.5B of revenue and have a solid foundation to build on. I don't think the first generation needs to do a whole lot more than…

>If they can find a million people to watch movies on flights and/or use it as a monitor replacement A million people who are willing to pay ~12 times more than a Quest 2 and 7 times more than a Quest 3 when those devices also can let you watch movies or use them as a monitor replacement.

This idea assumes that the Vision Pro offers the same experience as those devices.

My iPhone can let me watch movies and can be a monitor replacement, but it's bad at those things, so I don't do it.

I snooped around a bit online for something along the lines of "VR headset as a monitor replacement" - I'm not seeing any kind of consensus that these devices are up to the job.

If Apple's product is, then it's a game changer. It seems like they've put serious effort into some of the core problems: headset weight, refresh rates, AR concerns, pixelation. If that all sums up to be something that can be worn all day, then maybe people will see it as 7 times more valuable than a Quest 3.

A little under two-thirds of Americans have one Apple product, how good is the Quest at integrating into that ecosystem?

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#87

Post by ghusto »

babelchips wrote: post #62
ghusto wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's accurate. His main point is that there is no market for this, and the points you mentioned are just digs he gets in whilst Apple's on the ground.

Just like the market for tablets before the iPad and the market for smartwatches before the Apple Watch?

Who is buying those, and what for? I'm genuinely curious.

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#88

Post by gls2ro »

ghusto wrote: post #87
babelchips wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just like the market for tablets before the iPad and the market for smartwatches before the Apple Watch?

Who is buying those, and what for? I'm genuinely curious.

I dont know but if you thinking there is no market, the numbers are telling a different story:

Apple made 9 billion in revenue in Q1 2023 from iPad.

I think that is a lot of market.

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#89

Post by chrisco255 »

pzo wrote: post #82
chrisco255 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty lazy analogy. Mobile phones were already carried by a large majority of adults when the iPhone came out. The iPhone didn't prove that everyone needed a cell phone, or even that smart phones / camera phones were a valid market (remember Blackberry? Palm Treo? Windows Mobile? Sidekick?) it just made a much better phone and mobile OS than anyone else had up to that point. And it introduced a number of k…

First iphone didn't have gps, didn't have selfie camera it event didn't have a flashlight, gyroscope or compass. Also only 2g and wifi g Not to mention app store was launched 1 year later. Based on that first generation wasn't that much useful. Mass appeal was maybe starting with 3rd generation. This is just first generation

The first iPhone not only had GPS, it had Google Maps built in. Here's the timestamp of Jobs's 2007 presentation, showing the feature: https://youtu.be/vN4U5FqrOdQ?t=2207

Selfie camera was out by the following year. Flashlight was implemented as an app very early on after app store came out. The original version most definitely had gyroscope and compass.

Mass appeal was very much already there when iPhone launched. But it was hamstrung a bit by 2.5G and the exclusive deal with AT&T. Remember, mobile phones used to come with 2 year contracts with heavy cancellation penalties, and 3G took a while to roll out to the U.S. market. Still, it was a smashing success in its first year with 10 million units sold. Remember, back then the mobile market was very fragmented. Devices not only varied dramatically by manufacturer, but some devices could only be found with certain carriers (ie T-Mobile Sidekick). Any model that sold more than 1 million units in a year was considered to be a smashing success.

It was already very obvious what the killer features were or would be on the iPhone at launch.

Re: Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere

#90

Post by chrisco255 »

ozten wrote: post #78
chrisco255 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty lazy analogy. Mobile phones were already carried by a large majority of adults when the iPhone came out. The iPhone didn't prove that everyone needed a cell phone, or even that smart phones / camera phones were a valid market (remember Blackberry? Palm Treo? Windows Mobile? Sidekick?) it just made a much better phone and mobile OS than anyone else had up to that point. And it introduced a number of k…

The Varjo VR headset is the leader in Enterprise training and design. The headset cost more than $6,000 per unit plus it has an annual subscription fee more than $1500. The Vision Pro is a direct competitor to the Varjo. Early reports are that it is better. It comes in at half the price and no subscription fees. The Vario is what some Apple employees used as devkits during the software development phase. Apple is mas…

Got to be honest, I have never even heard of the Varjo. Nor have I ever even heard of anyone needing or using a VR headset in an enterprise setting, except for gimicky demos.
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