Apple’s Best Hope for New Headset: a Smartwatch-Like Trajectory

HoloLens is (soon to be was) a great AR device. Certainly useable and competent but it suffered from the same issue over and over: once the gee wiz demo was over, outside of a few very niche uses, people went back to using their laptops and smartphones. Because it’s easier to just pull out your smartphone, get whatever you need done, then put it back in your pocket.<p>This rapid and random access is why people love smartphones so much. With a headset, you either have to be wearing it all the time (something people aren’t willing to do; it’s like wearing sunglasses indoors no matter how good the waveguides are) or have to take the time to take a fragile headset out of its case, put it on your head, adjust to the complete take over of your field of view &amp; environment, then figure out what you need to do using an input modality (be it voice, gestures, an input peripheral or some combination) that is far inferior to a touch interface for the 90% of tasks.<p>People like to claim that AR is less intrusive than a smartphone but all the cases they present are carefully crafted demo’s. If you watch actual people use AR devices trying to accomplish some task you immediately notice that isn’t true at all.<p>It will be interesting to see how Apple has addressed these problems but AR needs to be better at doing tasks average people can already do well with a smartphone, and like I mentioned you have an uphill battle due to the headset form factor alone.

Initial product will be weak, just like the original iPhone (no App Store, slow, poor battery life, etc) and Apple Watch (no development, no health tracking, small screen, poor battery life).<p>The thing about Apple is not to judge based on v.1 but to watch the iteration. They are the most persistent company in the world. Compare to Google which seems to have ADHD. Apple will iterate and iterate and in 5 years we’ll all be shocked that it is an “overnight success” and undisputed market leader with an unassailable ecosystem.<p>If their stock tanks after the release I’ll see it as a good buying opportunity!

If it is as described I think it is insane for Apple to launch this product.<p>Comparing it to the state of the Apple Watch is pretty strange because if nothing else the Apple Watch was functional, self contained, worked, and was under $1,000. Even if it didn’t work you could put it on and ignore it. A VR&#x2F;AR headset is nothing like that and at $3,000 is a significant investment for most everyone.<p>But who knows. I haven’t seen it. Maybe it will be amazing and exactly what the VR space needs. I suspect it is a really fancy Meta Quest with significantly more processing power. Certainly Apple is in a unique position with their Apple Silicon. But will Apple open it up enough for gaming if that is what it is? Because that has been the problem in the past. Gamers aren’t going to want to buy this thing unless you can plug it into a PC and have it function as a regular VR headset and the Meta Quest crowd isn’t going to shell out 3 grand.

The reason the Apple Watch took a few years to get traction is that:<p>- Apple initially positioned it as a fashion accessory, which few people cared about<p>- the public wanted it to be like a smartphone on your wrist, and were let down by the limited features<p>Then Apple realized the value was in the health features. They started positioning it properly and people bought it more. All at the same time the tech improvements made the watch more capable and started becoming even more useful. But at the core, it’s the health focus + typical Apple ease of use and quality that made it take off.<p>I can see the same trajectory happen with VR:<p>- Apple starts positioning it as a metaverse &#x2F; HoloLens type headset, which few people care about<p>- People assume it’s an « iMac in VR » type device and get disappointed that it isn’t.<p>But over time, Apple realizes that the number one value is in gaming, and gradually shifts focus and positioning. It attracts more and more people while at the same time the tech improves. Then eventually the tech allows for a headset that can fit in a smaller for factor and truly helps people beyond gaming. As an enhancement to day to day tasks with light enough glasses for example.

Apple has come a long way from the time when not even the engineering team working on a product would know what it really was until Steve Jobs unveiled it on stage. Now everything gets leaked like at every other company.<p>Did Apple even have a hundred executives in 2008?

I&#x27;m interested what this will look like in 5 years. Apple&#x27;s ecosystem is currently hostile to the largest market for A&#x2F;VR so far, gamers. However if there is one company I would bet to pull a completely brand new market segment out of their ass it would be Apple. Should be exciting to watch.

I may be anti-Apple, I am excited for this release. All the XR headsets I&#x27;ve owned had terrible UX and no product vision whatsoever. Just &quot;make a bad videogame and users will find something to do with it&quot;. The Quest pro has hilariously bad software.<p>Apple excels at opinionated product vision on new form factors and finding new killer features. And that&#x27;s what the dying AR space needs the most.

My prediction: it will suck. Why? All AR devices suck, the tech just isn&#x27;t there.

I&#x27;m an Apple user and love all things VR &#x2F; AR, probably spend 10hr&#x2F;wk using Quest 2.<p>Tempted to get the Reality Pro&#x2F;One on launch, but at $3k and the tech team saying that not only will there be nothing exciting software-wise at launch, but a cheaper version and a more advanced version are on the horizon (no pun intended), I can&#x27;t justify getting it.<p>If someone like me who is basically the perfect demographic crossover doesn&#x27;t want it, not sure who will... but time will tell.

Maybe Apple could market this thing simply as a hi-res monitor and focus only on productivity side. If they have dual 5K displays and lenses, that seems like a safer bet and avoid the metaverse and gaming altogether. They charged more than 3000 for their pro monitors.<p>Recently they have Wi-Fi 6E across new products and it could be for pushing compressed pixels to the headset which needs only to be a thin client like the studio display.

&gt; With that in mind, executives are striking a realistic tone within the company. This isn’t going to be a hit product right out of the gate. But it could follow a similar trajectory as the Apple Watch.<p>Their confidence is blinding.

As someone who really does enjoy being terminally online, but who also enjoys being out in the world, I have to say I&#x27;m kind of excited about the possibility here.<p>The whole wearable &amp; ubiquitous computing dream greatly motivated me as a grade schooler. The idea was compelling then &amp; still interesting&#x2F;hopeful now. Given the specs (below) of the hallmark display, the p4 Private Eye (1989), I am excited to see what we can do. And Apple&#x27;s general competency at hardware will be interesting to see at play as we go-forth-again:<p>&gt; <i>Mounted on a pair of glasses, with a 720 x 280 pixel red monochrome screen in a 8.89 x 3.81 x 3.18mm casing, the actual display measured 1.25-inches diagonally but appeared as though you were viewing a 15-inch monitor from 18-inches away.</i><p>The possibility of me owning an Apple product is up from 0%.

One of the biggest problems with the metaverse is content. It&#x27;s pretty clear that AI can do a great job generating the artwork needed for great 3d content. It is very expensive and time consuming to do so with human artists... which makes me sad.

Jobs referred to early Apple TV as a &quot;hobby&quot;. For years. Time enough for a nascent market to mature, for the technology to catch up with the ambitions.<p>That&#x27;s how Apple&#x2F;Cook should refer to Apple VR&#x2F;AR.<p>Under promise, over deliver.<p>Projecting 1m unit sales the first year is nutty. Sure, they might sell that many. And then what?<p>Also, the initial models should be over priced, specifically targeting sexy use cases. Ridiculously expensive, maximally awesome, hype building applications. Like telemedicine, protein folding, and walking tours of fictional settlements on Mars.<p>Let people imagine and build boutique applications for a couple years, normalize the emerging market, <i>before</i> introducing a consumer mass market model.

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Paul Krugman famously said in 1998 that &quot;the growth of the growth of the Internet will slow drastically [...] the Internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s&quot;<p>I am going to go out on a limb and say unless headsets change profoundly they will have limited impact on most people&#x27;s daily lives. I&#x27;ll have to remind myself to come back in a few years and check this post.

Mixed reality headset, not virtual reality headset.

This device needs to have WebXR support on it, day one. This will enable VR browser games, and immersive web applications for retail. Also important to ensure we have cross-platform metaverse experiences.

Until the technology exists that can make something that looks like cool glasses with a mixed reality hud that you can wear all of the time like airPods or the watch they should stay out of this business.

Did we go back to thinking we wanted to be less connected to the world around us, and we&#x27;re looking for a $3k device to help us do that? I thought maybe society was admitting there are major, inadequately examined problems with device addiction, social alienation, mental health, and so on. I guess maybe we were just in a lull between product launches, and I mistook that silence for introspection. My bad.

In which way will they make it different from the Meta headsets? The Apple branding won&#x27;t be enough to turn an average headset into a successful product.<p>My guess would be that their headset is just a set of goggles that requires an iPhone for computation. Then, they can sell them for $300 or even $150.<p>The article suggests that VR is a tool for long-distance relationships. For $300, that could become possible.

hahaha, meta are going to have to actually compete. I suspect the MR experience will suck from apple, but the reality distortion field thats still lingering will tide them through.<p>At least we know that the apple device, whilst limited in screens and slam, will have a decent software stack that will put consumer&#x27;s ease of use first, rather than bullshit promotion driven dev from oculus.

I think entertainment is still the biggest market for AR&#x2F;VR, Apple is investing $1B in original content next, won&#x27;t be surprised some of that goes to bespoke production for the new headset. Paired with a powerful apple tv and apple watch (doube as a gesture remote?), I can see some creative content revolutionize home entertainment.

I&#x27;ve always found the Apple Watch to be more of a fashion accessory or a toy. People seem to really love them and showing them off.

The simple things I want from Apple, that seemly would be not to difficult from a company with so much money and talent are left to linger. But every half baked idea is rushed to the front of the line.<p>If during the VR headset announcement Xbox was somehow involved, it would get my attention though.

Has anyone heard of this launch will be associated with a launch of an SDK for app developers as well?

I’m never going to spend £3000 on a headset. For that I could get an absolute top of the line desktop. Hell I could get a car for that. Both would be far more useful.<p>It’s just ludicrous money for a shit product. Even the first full VR headsets came nowhere close to that price.

It&#x27;s worth remembering that the first headset is aimed at developers, and priced like Hololens.<p>This isn&#x27;t the less expensive mass market consumer device that people have been calling &quot;Apple Glasses&quot;.

Headset is something that you wear, there’s a personal connection and an aspect of fashion.<p>Apple can be fashion too.<p>As long as the product is closer to AirPods Max than Mac Pro, people will buy it.

Apple entering the AR VR XR space may be a good thing, more competition = better products?

I’d think they’re hoping to do way better than smartwatches with this investment.

I wonder if we&#x27;ll now see &quot;VR was a bad bet&quot;, when everyone is turning into LLMs and hoping Apples comes up with something on their own.

When do we get updates on their internal stock buy&#x2F;sells :)

Ideas for product names:<p>- Clear Vision<p>- Reality Field<p>- Apple Reality<p>- Reality HD<p>- eXtended Reality

This sounds like Apple strong-arming their staff to try and rally around a mediocre product. The Apple Watch comparisons don&#x27;t make sense. Even the Apple Watch Series 0 was totally worth it. You could get notifications on your wrist, fitness tracking (totally replacing RunKeeper and similar apps at the time), pause music, locate your phone, etc. I happily used the Series 0 for 3 years.

This will be as successful as Animojis.<p>This headset will have a loyal customer base, will make a big splash, but will not transform computing, creative work, or anything for the everyday user.<p>Apple Watch got so extremely lucky. I do not ever want to see Apple make product decisions like &#x27;well this worked, so let&#x27;s see if this will, too.&#x27; There is <i>zero</i> taste in that, <i>zero</i> craftsmanship, it&#x27;s just AppleGPT Product Edition.<p>[not done]: Have we really all forgotten how we all fell on our collective a** we were when we saw Mac, iPod, M1, iPhone? How hard is it to know - &quot;guess what, this was kinda &#x27;meh&#x27;&quot; vs. &quot;well that changes everything&quot;?