One More Thing...

I stood in line on a July morning for the second-generation iPhone in 2008.

It wasn’t my first cell phone, but it was a device I had never seen before.

The excitement I had for this pocket computer that could be a phone with endless applications can’t really be described.

Holding it and swiping the touchscreen looking at all the things I could do with it was overwhelming.

That 3G version came with the App Store and allowed for a wide range of functions that could be added later on.

With my older cell phones, I had the functions that came preloaded, plus developers were releasing new apps on the store all the time.

I could read the news, play games, and listen to songs.

Thinking about still brings back fond memories.

So, when the rumors of an Apple XR headset started swirling, it brought me back to how much iPhone defined the smartphone age.

But, when the Apple event aired earlier this week, I was nervous.

First impressions

Even though I followed the rumors buzzing around Twitter and tech news, I intentionally kept my expectations low.

Or so I thought.

Even though many rumors were confirmed like the battery pack on the belt and the eye-watering price point, it still felt a bit underwhelming.

When I think of XR, my first thought is stepping through the frames that we use for most passive content like web pages and movie screens, and into a digital world where we can interact in ways similar to or better than in the physical world.

But, what I saw were just floating screens.

2-D screens have no place in an immersive XR experience.

This may be controversial, but it is my opinion.

Even when Disney’s Bob Iger came on stage to talk about how the House of Mouse is going to focus on content for the Vision Pro, I felt very little.

Mickey Mouse jumping off of the wall and running around your house or a model of the Magic Kingdom on your kitchen counter means nothing to me.

Disney revolutionized animation and I expect nothing less from them in this new medium.

It only dawned on me after the event that I had lied to myself about my expectations.

My expectation for extended reality is the Holodeck from Star Trek.

My expectation is for Apple to revolutionize every sector they enter.

My expectation for XR design is to change how we view ourselves and our increasingly global society.

My expectations are sky-high.

In short, the Apple Vision Pro presentation left me disappointed.

Then I took some time to think

During and after the Apple event, I was on Twitter to see the responses of people in the XR world that I follow.

The reactions ranged from this being the best invention since the Polio vaccine to this device being garbage and everyone who made it should feel bad.

I’m exaggerating for effect but not by much.

Understandable because these are people in the XR world and Apple entering the space means that VR, AR, MR, spatial computing, the metaverse, and extended reality are here to stay and not just a fly-by-night niche technology.

Everyone probably had high expectations just like this XR newbie writing to you.

So, after seeing people, whose opinions on XR I respect very much, all had such wild takes on this new XR headset, I took some time to think about it.

That’s why it’s taken me so long to write this edition of the newsletter.

Taking my time, I watched reviews from people on Youtube that got their hands on it and other opinion videos, I began to think about Apple’s entry into the XR world in context.

I told you I bought the second-generation iPhone, not the first.

This is because I am not a pioneer or early adopter.

My strategy is to wait and see if the masses will accept new technology and what bugs need to be worked out.

That’s why it’s taken me so long to enter into the XR space in general.

The first device in a new category is basically a marketable prototype.

It’s full of bugs, subtle feature issues, and overall immature because any company, not just Apple, needs to see how people will use it and if it will sell a lot of units in order to gauge its success.

And at $3500, this device doesn’t have a broad appeal.

But, now the developers and studios that make XR applications need to look at this new device and see if they can make any interesting features and content for it.

After taking a few days to think about it, my disappointment gave way to an old familiar excitement tempered with patience.

With the release of the Apple Vision Pro, Meta now has a clear competitor which will help the consumer.

And Google hinted at a partnership with Samsung later this year as well.

In the end, it doesn’t matter what features the Apple headset will or won’t have.

It doesn’t even matter that the price of the thing is more than most mortgage payments.

It matters that the tech giants of the world are validating extended reality with their oceans of money and armies of engineers.

My uneducated guess is that over the coming decade, we will see devices more comfortable and inexpensive available globally.

After Apple’s announcement, this feels more certain than ever.

Only a fraction of people have even tried this technology, but soon they will be able to see if this way of interacting with a computer is for them.

This is the beginning of mainstream extended reality.

What happens now?

Extended Reality or spatial computing, however, you want to talk about it, is here to stay.

Apple Vision Pro has been in the works for almost a decade.

They saw what the teams at Meta and Oculus were doing and began to work in silence.

This is a strong signal that this technology will eventually be used in every industry just like the personal computer or smartphone before it.

We now have an overpriced first-generation device that is the beginning of fierce competition between rival corporations with more joining the war for attention and adaptation.

So, even if I was disappointed by what I saw that only means I was basing it on a potentially bright future for a new medium that I have fallen in love with.

If you would like to watch the official announcement trailer, you can watch that here.

Originally, I had planned on analyzing a VR game this week, but this is an important moment in the XR industry and I had to talk about it.

Hardware and news aren’t my interests, so I’ll get back to focusing on application design and development next week.

I hope you enjoyed yet another viewpoint on Apple’s Vision Pro.

Until next time,

Sean