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Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

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Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were a lot of tablets before the iPad but it wasn’t until the iPad that tablets really took off as a serious market segment. Ditto with AirPods and Bluetooth earbuds. In the past, once Apple started pouring R&D money into a specific product type, the entire industry around it tends to advance very quickly. I’m optimistic about the Vision Pro, and I actually think the n+2 Meta release will be much better off for…

Correlation or causation? Apple tends to jump on the bandwagon late but then turns thing mainstream. That worked well for ultrabooks (e.g. sony vaio, then MacBook air, nowadays every laptop) or earbuds. The AR/VR or visionsomething^TM case is a bit different in that apple actually has to implement a new market. Thus far they don't seem to be trying that hard.

They don't really have to implement the market themselves - they just have to create the marketting buzz. Then they'll happily let Meta build the volume market where the profit margins suck (much as Android did for the iPhone business)

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what the nay sayers are about. Anyone remember the ORIGINAL MacBook Air? Hyper expensive, super underpowered, overheated alot. And yet -- as Steve demonstrated -- it fit in an envelope. THIS is Apple launching a new product line (and trust me I'm not a fan boi). And shortly after (2-3 years?) the MBAs were powerful cheap and barely powered up their fans. Mind you the MBA was maybe Steve's last obsession. Wha…

My problem with the vision pro is that it doesn’t do enough new, the iPhone and the MacBook Air let you use a computer in an area where you previously couldn’t and made it accessible to normal people. The vision pro isn’t that much better in terms of bringing the technology in a user friendly package to the masses than the quest. A good measure of an Apple product is if you can pitch a version of it to your grandma o…

A good measure for an Apple product was for me always: it makes tech disappear. That was always the differentiator, I feel: it doesn’t feel like tech and it doesn’t look like it.

Now, I guess, it makes reality disappear?

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#413
post #178

I'm going to die on the hill that gaze sucks. I really hate focus follows gaze and not having a workable keyboard or buttons makes it hard to actually use this for productivity. It's fine for an alt mode type thing but as the main form of input I kind of hate it. That said, forcing your hands to be full of controllers also sucks but at least you can play a game. I don't have a solution but it needs to get solved for…

I liked the thumb gesture idea they presented in Peripheral. Enough movement to be discernible by a camera, but really only requires a small amount of energy and dexterity.

Though ideally we probably want some sort of “force gloves” that allow us to feel the weight of and manipulate objects in a virtual world using. We need way higher resolution on inputs than we have today, though, which currently amounts to an x/y/z and some button presses.

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#414

I think the description of the VisionPro as a dev kit is spot on. It's also a beta product in many way. Apple know full well that this is not a mass market product, they have made no attempt to make it even remotely affordable to most people. But they also know that every aspect of the hardware will improve over the next decade, and as it does they will have ironed out many of the problems with how we use AR/VR and w…

> (I hear FoV is pretty poor at the moment)

I thought it was pretty good - but nowhere near ideal of course.

But discovered I could dispense with both of Apple's "Light Seal Cushions" and simply line the light seal with some 1/8 adhesive foam. It took a little experimenting to avoid hard pressure points, and then make it comfortable.

It is now very comfortable with the following benefits:

1. The field of view is noticeably wider. Yay! The immersion improvement feels cognitively significant.

2. I realized that greater peripheral vision downward is more important than upward. Being more aware of down makes us feel safer and is also where are our hands and keyboards live.

So I arranged the padding to wear the head set slightly lower, allocating all the increased vertical FOV downward.

3. The combination of being 1/4 inch or so closer to the face, and firmer padding, reduced the feeling of weight on the front of my head.

Warning - literally. I get an occasional popup warning that my eyes are too close to the lenses. The danger being if I were to fall I could potentially hit my eyes. I stay seated most the time, but occasionally walk through rooms, so it is worth being careful.

I use my Vision Pro for 10 hours a day on many days, comfortably. I had to switch to the two-strap support to do this. But I have ordered an adapter that allows the original behind the heat cushion strap to be used with a second cushion strap over the head. I anticipate that working even better, given how much surface area weight will be distributed across. (Also turning a knob is easier for adjustments than messing with velcro.)

Also, got some thicker (in width) lighter foam, to add some more light seal around the edges.

This feels like a real upgrade, a year or so before Apple will release a bump.

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#415
post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My problem with the vision pro is that it doesn’t do enough new, the iPhone and the MacBook Air let you use a computer in an area where you previously couldn’t and made it accessible to normal people. The vision pro isn’t that much better in terms of bringing the technology in a user friendly package to the masses than the quest. A good measure of an Apple product is if you can pitch a version of it to your grandma o…

A good measure for an Apple product was for me always: it makes tech disappear. That was always the differentiator, I feel: it doesn’t feel like tech and it doesn’t look like it. Now, I guess, it makes reality disappear?

Sure but why does Grandma want it? She has an iPhone so this isn’t an unanswerable question

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iPhones on average don't last 3 times as much ib people's hands as Android phones that cost 66% as much. Better resale value is fair, but I am contesting that 2N figure strongly.

I replaced my iPhone X this year, with a 15 that I anticipate owning at least another 5-6 years.

I'm still on iPhone X, runs super smooth. The older iPhone X runs better than my test Galaxy S20 which is newer than the iPhone X by many years.

I also have a Galaxy Edge from the same year as the iPhone X. The Samsung is completely unusable. Every tap takes seconds for anything to respond.

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#417
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it won’t. It will still be seen as 4x the price of the Quest 3.

Looking at the number of articles which compare m3 macbooks against "intel" but mean "the intel macbook from years ago", I totally expect to read lots of articles which pretend non-apple devices don't exist.

Given that those Intel laptops run Windows, which today is worse than any old version of MacOS, can you blame them?

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#418
post #410
post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their competitors are shockingly incompetent. Consider Google. A couple years ago, a reporter documented the nearly (iirc) 20 attempts Google has made at a messenger. Meanwhile, Apple made one and ground away at it until it became great. Google is a company that -- and this is true -- dropped trou and put apps on my phone called "Google Meet" and "Google Meet (Original)." And don't forget Duo. See also having "Google…

Are you aware that Google Pay and Google Wallet are completely different products, and that Apple has exactly the same counterparts even named the same? https://www.apple.com/apple-pay https://www.apple.com/wallet/

It is not the same at all. Google Pay used to be called Wallet for starters. https://www.reddit.com/r/GooglePixel/comments/12979ja/google... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Wallet

Apple does not have this level of product or branding confusion.

So you don't like Apple, fine. But using Google as a poster child of consistent product marketing is a fool's hill to die on.

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what the nay sayers are about. Anyone remember the ORIGINAL MacBook Air? Hyper expensive, super underpowered, overheated alot. And yet -- as Steve demonstrated -- it fit in an envelope. THIS is Apple launching a new product line (and trust me I'm not a fan boi). And shortly after (2-3 years?) the MBAs were powerful cheap and barely powered up their fans. Mind you the MBA was maybe Steve's last obsession. Wha…

My problem with the vision pro is that it doesn’t do enough new, the iPhone and the MacBook Air let you use a computer in an area where you previously couldn’t and made it accessible to normal people. The vision pro isn’t that much better in terms of bringing the technology in a user friendly package to the masses than the quest. A good measure of an Apple product is if you can pitch a version of it to your grandma o…

The first iPhone was a toy. It wasn’t until the second version (iPhone 3G) + AppStore that is really caught on with existing smartphone users.

I have a Quest and have used other VR systems, the Vision Pro felt like a huge leap forward compared to those.

I walked away from the demo tempted. Not by what is available today, but by what I want to be available and what I want to create with it.

Re: Vision Pro: What we got wrong at Oculus that Apple got right

#420
post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is it just the vast amount of money? No, it is the vast amount of risk they are willing to take. Microsoft/alphabet have vast amounts of money too, but no appetite for risk. Apple is willing to dump tens of billions and years into R&D for physical products, fail, and then try again. Microsoft half asses it, and then pulls back instead of plowing through (see them shutting down Microsoft retail stores and windows ph…

Please feel free to share what these amazing risk taking products are which Apple R&D have come up with. As far as I can see its all the same thin, flat device with a screen, just different sizes.

I have no interest in convincing anyone else, maybe they are only risky according to me.

But I do know they seem to result in net incomes that others would seemingly find envious, and yet the others are not able to replicate, so the empirical evidence doesn’t make it seem so easy.

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