569: Do Grasshoppers Have Tongues?

38:30Exactly. It was in, I think it was the only thing in the original, like the launch video and all of the launch artwork for the headset with the exception of maybe one image. It was that one big single strap that goes behind your head and gets really wide when it goes in the back of your head. Then it also has a dual loop band, which Apple says gives users two options for the fit that works best for them, or I guess between the two bands. Is that the Hermes version that goes around your head twice? Duplator. It's one above your head and one behind your head, right? And then there's... Oh, that's what the two options they're talking about are.

39:05One is the solo. Right. I have these names. One is the single strap band, and one is the one with two straps, right? Yeah. Right. And then it also includes a light seal, two light seal cushions i guess what are the differences between them there so the light seal is the big thick part and the cushion is the part that's actually pressing against your face yes and i can tell you probably why as as the father of a child who has used a vr headset a lot very heavily the part that squishes against your face gets really gross and stinky cool so it's good to be able to replace those easily i wonder if they're machine washable yeah goodness who knows uh so yeah two light seal cushions an apple vision pro cover for the front of the device i saw that i saw that people have like patent filings on it and i'm like this is interesting i wonder if they'll ship this and lo and behold a few days later uh you know a cover for the front of the device like the front of the device i i know there's a screen there and it's made of glass and it shows your eyeballs or whatever but it really doesn't participate much in the process of what you see as the wearer so i guess you're you're covering the screen so people can get a scratch-free view of your virtual eyeballs?

40:12Will it operate with the cover, or will the cameras shoot through the cover? Are there openings for all the cameras? I'm assuming this is for storage and transport. Yeah, that's what I thought. I assume, because for a cover to actually have it be operated through, you'd have to have openings for all the cameras, all the vent holes, the digital crown, all the different parts of it that are required. They probably are not doing that. It's probably just a cover for storage. That would be a screen protector, but this has a cover for the front of the device i'm kind of picturing like the weird uh bra they have on the airpods max yeah but for this yeah because that went so well yeah well similar because like again if i'm going to transport this something that merely covers the screen on the front is not doing the job of making this transportable the whole rest of this ungainly thing is still out there flopping around right yeah and it's and that's part of you know that's one of the big um i think restrictions and challenges on this whole design they've gone with of having the outside be a screen like again look at every other vr headset the outside is just a flat piece of plastic with some sensors on it and apple's like no this is going to be a single giant piece of glass that will show some creepy version of your eyes through it and you know it's i mean it's a bunch of trade-offs for sure and one of the trade-offs is uh well it's more expensive and bigger and much heavier and everything else another one of the trade-offs uh is that it becomes much harder to transport all right and then you get a free for the low low cost of 3500 plus dollars uh polishing cloth which is uh very exciting you get a battery which is you know compulsory to use the device a usbc charge caper cable and a usbc power adapter so that is what's in the box which to be honest is not an insignificant amount of stuff i mean that is a fair bit of stuff i saw some rumors and discussion based again based on patent filings or whatever of other possible strap options uh including so the straps that they show in their pr photos have that little um i don't know a little pod that has the speakers in it that fires this the sound down into your ears but of course if you've decided that you're going to use your air pods or something with it rather than using those speakers you don't need those pods anymore so and like we saw uh when this thing launched these straps are actually made up of two portions one is kind of a stiff portion that connects to the headset and two is a like the loose sort of strappy thing that goes around your head that you could replace the stiff portions with ones that don't have the speaker pods in them for a sleeker lighter weight thing but it seems like that's not a thing that they're shipping was just something they considered during the design yeah overall like this is actually pretty well accessorized it seems like right in the box and this is just one of the wonderful things of it being a brand new product line you know like like originally the ipod came with like the dock and the cable like all this other stuff right and then as the ipod line went on it became you know cheaper and cheaper and there was a lot less stuff in the box and more stuff you had to buy separately same with the iphone you know the iphone used to come with more stuff in the box than it does now like a charger at least this comes with something you can charge it with right so so at least like you know right now we're still in the in the really early part of this and so they're going to give us all the accessories but i bet in five years you know whatever vision line products are out then you're going to see a lot less of this stuff coming with them i mean the most the most glaring one of the straps because it's like okay one of these straps is probably going to quote unquote win you know what i mean like i know people's heads are shaped differently and everything but like them shipping both the straps is kind of like we couldn't figure out one strap that worked the best for everybody so here's two good luck like and obviously the one with the top strap should help a little bit with the weight because it literally goes over the top of your head rather than having to pinch the thing against the front and back of your head to keep it from sliding downwards but they're still shipping the the the single one so it's like it's not even like you know the thing weighs the same no matter what is it just is the single strap one just for people like me with big noses who can support the weight of this or but you really don't want the weight to be supported on your nose so i don't understand like the the two straps being shipped here is kind of like they're just throwing up their hands and like it's 3500 we can afford it and we couldn't figure it out i have to think that the correct strap is probably neither of these it's something it's some it's an evolution of one of them and i think having real people buy this thing and use it and you know complain about it people with different hairstyles and different size and shape heads and different tolerance for pinching in different places and different size skulls because again this you know you can get a different face shield for this but it doesn't come in different widths it doesn't even come in two different sizes like the apple watch it is the size it is and they do the best they can to make it conform to your face but if you have a really, really wide head or really, really narrow head, there's only so much you can do and it's ditto with the straps.

44:55So this is definitely sort of an experimental kind of like, let's see what sticks. Here's two straps. Good luck. You know, it also might just be that the last thing they want is for someone to dislike the product based on some, you know, fairly avoidable comfort issue. They're really putting themselves out there with this. They're launching this whole new thing. It's a massive risk and you know there's going to be a whole bunch of people who get it and try to you know try to make youtube videos about how much it sucks whatever it's like you know they're trying to cover their bases they're trying to like make sure you know we don't want anyone to go through the process of spending 3500 plus dollars on this thing getting going to the store getting themselves fit for the shield getting the prescription optical inserts and all this other stuff like this is quite a process to get this thing you know made for you and fit for you only to then discover, oh, it's kind of uncomfortable.

45:45So that's probably why they're including both straps. Like give people all the options. I mean, that's going to happen no matter what, though. Like that's the thing about this, because they haven't like how many people have ever worn this in the entire world? You could probably put them in a pretty small theater. Not many people have ever used this. And now you're going to sell a million of them in a year. You're going to very quickly find out, OK, this part of this strap pinches this percentage of people and the bands are too wide or too narrow or tilt down too much or not enough like they could do all the testing they can internally but you're only going to find out once this and it's inevitable that it's going to be uncomfortable like it's i i know from again from wearing glasses glasses frames can be uncomfortable that's one of the main things that i use to choose my glasses frames and also one of the reasons i'm wearing glasses frames that are older than my children is because i find a lot of glasses frames uncomfortable and yes i know with glasses frames you can bend them and put them into little hot beads and try to get them all lined up and do all these things but the combination of like durability and comfort and which frames work rest on your face with your nose and your ears and all you know everything else it's a very personal thing and it's extremely difficult to find something that works like especially if things that get strapped to your head even you know shopping for things like ski goggles which are kind of similar to this and they have the advantage of you probably wearing a hat to cushion the strap going around your head so uh yeah i think they're probably doing the best they can but i look at all these straps and i'm like these cannot be the final form i mean obviously the the the real solution to this problem is make the headset smaller and lighter and i hope they do that but judging by their love of that stupid aluminum frame and curved glass front i'm not sure what kind of progress they're going to make on that in the next year or two i bet the front screen is the first thing to go in future revision of this product a cheap model you know yeah like i'm sure there's going to be a vision air or something like that they just put stickers there with eyeballs on them yeah yeah and it'll be because you know aluminum is much lighter than glass so if they if if the front of it becomes mostly a flat piece of aluminum with some cameras on it or whatever like that would actually be a significant weight savings they should really make it out of plastic like i think there's there's more of an excuse to use the airpods max because headphones at least get banged around and your head could hit something sideways but honestly this thing what is this going to be banging into hopefully nothing especially since they always want you to be seated while you're using it they never show you like up and plain Beat Saber.

48:01But that's during use. You still got to get it places if it ever leaves your house. Oh, just put it in that little cover. That'll totally protect it. Honestly, John, you're right. Like, I mean, honestly, both the AirPods Max and the Vision Pro should probably be made of more plastic than they are because that would make them both lighter and that would significantly improve comfort. That's why I keep hoping that Apple will get into like carbon fiber or something. I know it's not feasible. We're always looking for like, how about something that's lighter and durable, but is not metal and carbon fiber fulfills those things except it's extremely expensive and annoying to manufacture and has also also some other advantages but it's like if you're going to stubbornly refuse to do plastic is there some other material that you feel okay about using i don't know magnesium like titanium yeah i guess yeah i mean we'll see and also like keep in mind too like one of the major reasons they would want to save weight is to then immediately spend it by putting the battery inside the headset oh no they don't want to do that they i mean they don't want to do that but point yeah i mean so what what the other people do is they put the battery on the uh behind your head to try to balance the weight in the front but it's still weight it's not great well and even that like you know like the the the quest 2 well yeah because we because now adam got a quest 3 for christmas so now i have some experience seeing both of them around the house um they like all of those headsets have internal batteries to the front of the headset also but they now offer like extended battery head straps that have more battery on the back of the head i can see apple doing something like that down the road maybe but i think step one is get the price down of this product and then step two is get the battery inside of it and so i think any advances they're going to have and any any changes they make to eliminate weight or size should be spent then going towards those goals yeah maybe i'll have to see what this battery is like in real life to see like what kind of weight are we talking about because we know the battery doesn't last very long as it is so you know i think it should sound like a uh we talked about the uh the iPhone MagSafe backpack as the, like, a magnetically attached backpack strap.

50:02Imaginely an actual backpack that a human could wear with two straps and had a huge battery in it, and you could be in your Vision Pro for 48 hours. Oh, someone will definitely sell that, I'm sure. It'd be very healthy. Talk about a stinky cushion. Yeah. Wow. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, so Apple also noted that the Vision Pro is designed with the environment in mind with 100 % recycled rare earth metals excuse me rare earth elements in all magnets and 100 recycled tin soldering and gold plating in multiple printed circuit boards the frame and battery enclosure contain 100 recycled aluminum and the light seal and solo knit band are each made with over 70 recycled yarn the vision pro meets apple's high standards for energy efficiency and is free of mercury brominated do i hope i pronounced that right flame retardants pvc and beryllium the packaging is 100 fiber based bringing apple closer to its goal of eliminating plastics in all packaging by 2025 kudos to them yeah pretty cool yeah they've been pretty good effort here like we talked about the watch is like the one product that was totally carbon neutral and everything and it's like they're you can tell like there are some parts of it that they still couldn't do not everything is 100 % recycled but they're trying as hard as they can here to use recycled materials in all the places where they can which is good it's interesting that the solo uh knit band is 70 % recycled but the double loop band no recycled stuff well i'm sure some of it well i would assume i shouldn't say i'm sure listed it yeah but if it was only like 10 i don't think they would have listed it i mean it kind of makes me think that they're the original plan was hey this one strap is going to work for everybody and they eventually learned late in the game you know as in two years ago you know i know we thought this was going to be the strap because if you look at these two straps look at the one they show in all the pr things the single one with the big catcher's mitt and then look at the double strap and the double strap is like is that a prototype or is that the final it doesn't have that apple look and it would make sense that they spend all this time making sure they can make what was going to be the one and only strap make sure can we manufacture that with 70 recycled yarn blah blah and then you know i said like i said late in the game as in a year or two ago they said uh we need another strap this one doesn't work for enough people can we slap something together real fast fine but we can't do the recycled stuff fine just ship it fun all right so we also got some more vision pro info uh the vision pro well this is from bloomberg will be equipped with 16 gigs of ram the same amount of memory that was included in the vision pro development kits distributed by apple last year wish i could have got one of those uh german says that youtubers and members of the media selected for reviews will meet with apple on january 16th for a hand hands-on experience with a follow-up meeting to take place on the 23rd to go over the devices features a second time reviews are said to be published at the end of january uh i will be the canary in the coal mine and say, I did not get invited to this.

52:48I also did not get invited to this. So John, you're going to go? No, but the interesting thing about this is that, and they've done this with Vision Pro already. So like Gruber, for example, like saw it when it was launched and then they also called him back to have him like look at his, you know, photos in the spatial video thing and stuff. Like a bunch of people have done that, right? The whole idea of like, we're going to have media see this before everyone else, fine, that's normal. but having them come back twice, I think is especially for this product because they're going to, you know, meet with them on the 16th and give them a hands-on experience.

53:20And I'm assuming they're going to send them home with devices and then they'll come back on the 23rd. And I think coming back on the 23rd is where they're going to hear from the people who said, I tried to use this, but it's hurting my head here. And this is fogging up and blah, blah, blah. And I think I got the wrong prescription because that's the second for Apple to get the good reviews. Essentially, that's a chance for them to address the concerns that are only going to come up when the people take these things home and try to actually use them for extended periods of time for real work and that i think i feel like that january 23rd thing is essentially the uh the fitting you know the final fitting okay how did this work for you did we give you the right face shield thing or do you need a different one uh did that strap work for you which strap did you like better tell us more about why like all that uh that that is really kind of doing everything they can so that you know 50 of the first wave of reviews isn't just it was a little uncomfortable because i don't think it fit me right but oh well the 23rd is a chance for apple to fix that and say okay you did pick the wrong face shield try this one try the bigger one try the smaller one i'm guessing the 16th is a preview because pre-orders open a few days after that and they want people to talk about them so that people will pre-order it and then i'm guessing no one gets review hardware until the 23rd maybe i mean i if if uh what i said is not what they're doing it's what they should be doing well they should be inviting us right well no but like honestly like i think the having a second round where you where you hear people's complaints is so much more important like you're not gonna if they have complaints about like software or bugs you can't fix that right but if it's about complaints about fit it's like you can fix that we have different face shields i can you know give you suggestions on the strap tell me what problems you were having maybe we had them too we can help you with them it's not like when people get an early uh thing and there's a bunch of bugs in that they you know what are the marketing people going to do like well we can't fix that software before this launches So just, oh, well.

55:10All right. And then Apple released an ad for the Vision Pro, which they call Get Ready. And the general gist, it's only 30 seconds. And if I were to paint you a word picture, it's basically a bunch of movie characters either putting on helmets or face masks or things over their eyes. and I had forgotten about this but a lot of people pointed out that this is very much in the vein of the hello iPhone ad which was a bunch of people answering the phone from movies and saying hello how can I help you what's up etc etc and very very spiritually similar between the two I thought it was a good ad I mean it's not making me run up and get ready to order a Vision Pro immediately but it was a good ad the thing i like about the uh original iphone ad is the only people who remember that ad were people who are paying attention to the iPhone when it was launched because that was the launch ad for the original iPhone.

56:05And that means it was just a bunch of Apple nerds because everyone else was like, oh, Apple's coming out with the phone, whatever. But people weren't that interested in the iPhone anymore than they're interested in the Mac or anything else at that stage. And I guess the iPod was out there. Disagree. That's not how I remember it at all. No, I know there was lots of hype around the iPhone, but look at how well it sold in the first year. And it's not because they couldn't make enough of them. people were not that jazzed to get an iphone it's like that's an apple thing i like my ipod but i also like my current cell phone and it'll be fine or whatever i strongly disagree yeah i don't remember it that way well casey didn't even remember the ad and he is an apple nerd i think if you if you ask the average person on the street do you remember the original iphone ad and then ask the same question of like do you remember the original mac ad you're going to get very different answers that's not a fair comparison at all why not i don't because the first of all the Mac ad was during the Super Bowl and I don't recall when the Hello ad was.

57:00I think the Hello ad did get a lot of airplay, but I think people are like, yeah, that's that Apple phone thing anyway. No, I mean, I remember the time span from January to June. Like January was the announcement and then it was available in June. That time span, everyone was buzzing about the iPhone for six months. Everyone in our world, yes. No, I disagree. It was mainstream. It was everywhere. Everyone was buzzing about it for six months straight. But they didn't buy it when it came out because it was too expensive and who wants an Apple phone? No, no. A lot of it was like waiting until your contract was up on your current phone or whatever.

57:32Because that was, again, that was a very contract-based buying period. Everybody had like one or two-year contracts on their phones. And also, AT &T sucked at the time. And in America, anyway, you had to have it on AT &T. And I remember that was not going to happen for years. And then eventually, both for my own purposes, I didn't want to do that. And then eventually I decided I lusted after and wanted the iPhone so badly that I'd be willing to try AT &T. And then I had to sell Aaron on it because we were and are on a joint plan. Why'd you have to sell Aaron on it? Everybody loves the iPhone. The level of hype it had and buzz around mainstream audiences was way bigger than what the Vision Pro has now.

58:10Oh, I agree. I think they're both similar. I think you're misremembering the iPhone because the iPhone is now the iPhone. But back then it was like Apple's trying to do a phone and people aren't sure how well it's going to do. But anyway, it's coming out. nerds are excited about it and it's interesting but it's also just kind of a curiosity and off in the corner because the real cell phone market is Nokia or whatever. It took so long to turn people, just look at the sales figures look at the sales chart for the iPhone. No, but you're misconstruing two different things. The iPhone was crippled when it was new, which at first sounds like I'm agreeing with you.

58:40But so is the Vision Pro it's$3 ,500, you can't tons of things you can't do with it, you know, it's like it'll run iPad apps. No, a lot of people are saying with the Vision Pro, I don't even see why I would want that Whereas the original iPhone, it was like, okay, next time I get a new renewal on my contract slash when it comes to my carrier, I'm jumping on that. Bingo. Bingo. I think you have to look at the sales number and see that that's not the way it played out. I think you're misremembering history and thinking the iPhone was always a hit that everybody wanted, and it wasn't. It took a while to convince people.

59:10It was mostly a curiosity to have lots of hype, and I think that's exactly like Division Pro. It's a curiosity to have lots of hype. Will Division Pro prove itself like the iPhone? We'll see. I think we are all perhaps misremembering because I could not disagree more with your characterization of what it was like in 2007-ish. And especially, even if I were to take your incorrect memory as fact, I would say that the moment anyone put their hands on a smartphone, immediately it clicked. But they hadn't when the ad aired. That's my whole point. Skepticism. Skepticism about the iPhone. Well, but again, I mean, yes, I think there was a degree of skepticism, probably more than I'm giving it credit for, but certainly a lot less than I think you are remembering.

59:52I don't think people were near as skeptical as you seem to believe they were. But even on top of that, I think I agree with Marco that it was more about, wow, that sounds cool, but A, I've got another year and a half left on this phone. B, it is very expensive. And C, there's no frigging way I'm getting on Singular or AT &T or what have you, because they suck. And I mean, I cannot overstate at the time. Now it's very different. In fact, I would say even a few years into the iPhone, it was very different. But at the time, Singular and AT &T both were terrible. God, were they terrible. That's the reason people weren't as interested.

1:00:27Once they heard it was AT &T only or Singular only or whatever, it's just like, oh, it's a curiosity, whatever. It wasn't. Everyone in the Apple world was insanely hyped about it. Anyone who had touched it loved it. Tech nerds were totally into it. But look at the sales. Look, two years later, people's contracts drop. It's 2009. Wow, look at those sales. They're better than they were in 2007, but they're nothing like what they would become. No one's arguing that it sold massively the first year. We're not saying that. What we're saying is that there was huge buzz. That's what I'm saying. People were, and it's not because people were like, oh, I want to get one the second I can.

1:01:00They could, and they didn't. They chose not to buy it. Right, because of other circumstances. I don't think it was because they were unconvinced. It was because of other circumstances around it. I don't think it's like, oh, I wish I had one but they're not on my network i know that's exactly what it was for me that was a huge part of it what are you talking about that was a massive part of it that's why you could you could see the sales spike every time they would add a new major carrier the the sales spike for for this thing was the iphone 6 when they finally made a big phone oh my god no anyway the point is when that ad aired people were not like oh i can't wait to get an iphone nerds were like that but even among nerds not everyone got one because they were expensive and it was 18t only so the ad aired and people were not like, oh my God, it's that phone.

1:01:38Everyone's going to get it because everyone didn't get it. Look at the first year sales numbers. Look at the second year sales numbers. So when the ad came, people were not dying to get it. And unlike the original Mac ad, they weren't intrigued by a mysterious thing they didn't know anything about because they'd already seen the introduction. I still think you're 100 % wrong, but the Vision Pro does not have anywhere near the level of mainstream interest and hype as the iPhone did. Concur. I think it's going to be a much slower launch. And that's, you know, given like manufacturing and supply realities, that's probably fine.

1:02:07You know, I saw a few people on Maston over the last couple of days refer to it almost like launching a dev kit as a product. That's actually a pretty good analogy because what we're going to see over the next year with Division Pro is basically very low sales numbers. It's a budding market. it the initial buyers are going to be largely early gadget adopters at the high end of the market and then developers and people who are going to who are getting it for some kind of testing or development role and we're going to see the the app and content market i probably very slowly grow over time so it really is kind of like a tech preview that they're selling it's it's so early still and and the mainstream consumers i think are going to have relatively little interest in jumping on this yet you know the price obviously is a massive thing holding it back um the you know all the different physical limitations and awkwardnesses of it i think are going to keep it small for a while but it doesn't need more than that right now just because again like they can't make more of them anyway so like it's going to be a huge hit it's going to sell out it's going to be back ordered you know i'm going to try to order one on day one i think it's going to be very difficult to actually get like early delivery on it i'm sure team one of those things where like you like refresh the app store the apple store app over and over again until the time comes around and then all of a sudden it's like oh 12 weeks out 18 weeks out 24 weeks out like it's going to be that kind of thing but there is no comparison to the level of consumer excitement for the vision pro compared to the iphone i think it's pretty good comparison but anyway my point oh my my whole my whole point can everyone tell him how wrong he is please please write him right now and tell him how wrong he is don't ask for people to write in because you're not going to like what they say anyway oh oh that's fire because people remember so do we people who are not in the apple tech nerd sphere remember apple people being excited about the phone but them going yeah whatever i'll check it out later anyway my point is when people see this ad a they're not going to remember the hello ad just like you didn't casey and you were kind of into apple stuff at that point right they're not going to remember the ad that's echoing i did i it seemed ridiculous to me that anyone who was in the apple world would not remember it but experience has shown that talking to people that lots of people didn't remember it right so they're not going to remember that the hello ad when someone sees this ad on tv they're going to be like what is this that what they're going to say to themselves is oh yeah it's that apple headset thing i heard about and then they're going to forget about it and then in you know 15 years when we say hey do you remember the launch ad for apple vision pro they're going to be like no it was just like the launch ad for the phone the iphone you're like the launch ad for the iphone the what nobody's going to remember these things because it's not a proven product yet that's the whole point it hasn't people don't have it people haven't used it it's not a proven product and so when you put out an ad like this it's memorable to people like us who because we're super hyped about it because we're super big apple followers but unless it is like a big artistic statement or a tease that everyone was curious about like the 1984 ad it's not going to stick in popular culture's mind so that's why i think this ad is a good a good match with the iphone ad to you know to basically be a copy of the same ad but saying instead of people in movies picking up phones it'll be people's movies putting things over their eyeballs all i'm saying is kudos to apple because i think you appropriately calibrated this ad to be a match for the iphone and of course apple's hope is just like the iphone this is going to be a huge head and we'll see about that but that the the parallels are uh obvious to me both in the ads and in my expected reception of the device.

1:05:35I don't know. We'll see. I don't know anyone personally that is amused by the Vision Pro that isn't a tech nerd, like a true up and down tech nerd. And I think a lot of people are casually interested. And I think like amongst my peer group, for example, I think the assumption is I will probably get one amongst these people. And I'd actually like to talk to you two about that in a minute. But the assumption is I'll get one. And I think every single one of them will, figuratively speaking lineup to try it but i don't think that any of them are even for a fleeting moment considering buying one i think they are at most like oh i wonder what that's like to use no it's it's way more expensive than the iphone was obviously and it's and talk about the dev kit all vr headsets all things that you strap to your head that put screens in front of your eyeballs they all look like and essentially behave like not dev kits but like things that are tech nerdy in a way that is beyond normal what a normal person expects to endure right i mean it's usage it was used in jokes for movies for ages oh you put these big headset on with screens in front of your eyeballs and yes if people do vr gaming video and that is kind of nerdy uh anything this big, a big ski goggly screen thing that goes in your eyeballs has not penetrated to the point where like AirPods, they started off weird and then very quickly, oh, everyone just wears AirPods.

1:07:01It's fine. Again, Apple hopes that's what will happen with this, but at$3 ,500, it's not going to happen. Right. But right now this entire product category is a weird thing that tech people do. It has not graduated to a thing that everybody does or a thing that normal people do. And, you know i'm not sure this is the product that's going to put it over that line but certainly at the point now when it hasn't even launched everyone is just looking askance at this entire product category of like remind me again why i'd want to strap that to my face because they haven't tried it so apple hasn't had a chance to prove to them why they'd want to and and then the people who do use them are like okay well can i play my favorite vr game on it no all right well i'll just stick to my meta whatever no i'm very surprised that they didn't do some sort of keynote just just to remind us why we should be excited about this.

1:07:51And this ad, the Get Ready ad, I don't debate that it's a good ad, but it did not make me think, yes, I can't wait to do blank in my Vision Pro. It's for people who are already anticipating it. Well, I wonder if they're kind of holding back a little bit on how hard they push this to consumers yet because they know it's kind of a tough sell to most consumers right now. Yeah, and it gives them, like I said, it gives them breathing room to work out the issues maybe they still got the straps wrong maybe there is an issue with again condensation or breathability or something like whatever the first year like stories about the design scripts they did or whatever don't overhype it at this point like under promise over deliver have have this be a year where you work out the kinks figure out what works and what doesn't figure out what people want to use it for see what this deal is with the app ecosystem like apple has the breathing room to just spend this year doing that, which is why an ad that is aimed at people who already are anticipating this is good.

1:08:51It'll get those people excited. It'll let them, it'll be how to echo the other ad, but it's not, it's not over hyping it to people who don't even know what it is. I think they will show this like during big football games or wherever. Most people will not pay any attention to it. Or if they know anything, I'm like, oh yeah, I heard about that. It's that thing, whatever. Anyway, but it's not like Apple vision pro will change the way you live your life, right? It's not saying that in that language to regular people. It's not making that promise at all. It doesn't even show the product, right? Or maybe the very end it does, I guess.

1:09:17But it's definitely kind of an ad for the people who are already sold. I think, too, the initial batch of reviews is probably going to be all over the place. They're not going to all be universally positive. Because we know, like gadget reviewers, tech reviewers, tech people on YouTube, we know price is super important to those markets. And it's super important. And like anytime somebody releases something that's very expensive in a market, that's like the headlining theme of all the reviews. Well, it's nice, but it's really expensive. And so we're going to keep hearing that. That's going to be most of the reviews early on is, okay, I tried it.

1:09:55It's cool, but it's really expensive. It's accurate. It is. And so again, that's why I think they're going to actually try to kind of low play it because they don't want every consumer in the world to get the impression this is just some expensive thing they don't need. So again, I think they're going to play it a little more slowly, give it time to develop its ecosystem, which is not going to happen in the next three weeks. Just give it time to develop its ecosystem over a year, maybe more. give it time for them to maybe get a version 2 out there that can maybe get a little bit lower in price and then we'll start seeing them pushing it harder and harder over time but I think it's going to be kind of a slow ramp up to that level of promotion I know we're getting off on a tangent here, I know we've talked about this in the past, but as we approach launch day and as I see developers who are submitting their apps or thinking of submitting their apps I'm getting more and more of a terrible feeling about what the state of the app ecosystem is going to be oh it's gonna be bad like and and i was thinking about this the other day i i had mistakenly thought for a moment in my mind oh people can just use their macster because it's got that screen you know the thing where you can see your mac screen inside the thing and but but the thing i had my mind was like this product would almost be better sold as a display for a mac or as a or like you'd have a mac built into it like a little like the motherboard of a of a macbook pro like a little container with a battery or whatever like like that mac apps like the you know mac apps that need a really big screen that have multiple windows and stuff like that that is actually the best use case for this with no software until and unless an app ecosystem can build up around it i don't know that instead they're saying well it's ipad apps you can run your ipad apps on it if they allow you to do it blah blah blah but ipad apps seem to me i don't know like i've never had a dream of uh this ipad app would be way better if i could have it on a bigger screen or if i could have you know multiple copies of like because they're just so they're so focused on a single screen and yeah you've got slide over and split view and stuff like that but mac apps are the ones that you want to have a million different windows and big things out in front of you and everything like that but this is not a mac and you know it's trying to be its own platform and in the meantime it's like well i can run some ipad apps if you want and just that first year like especially with apple's general inability to foster a healthy app ecosystem on anything except for a device they sell billions of copies of makes me worry a lot about not so much the hardware and does it fit on people's faces and everything like that because that is going to be a problem but that can be worked out but like once all that's worked out what do i see inside this thing what software do i want to use inside it and i keep thinking mac software mac software would work well in there it's you know the next version of this could be the best screen you've ever had for your mac really complicated lots of windows using a mouse and keyboard in front of you that you can see because you can see your keyboard through the transparency mode thing or you can touch type or whatever like i don't know maybe i'm entirely wrong considering i've never used one of these things but i'm really worried about uh what's going to be inside that headset and you know and if it's a 3500 uh really good movie viewer then it's kind of like me buying the oled ipad to watch tv on it uh i mean it's a use case but i'm not sure it's going to be that common i would suggest don't preset expectations in your mind too much beforehand about how you might use this device before you've actually used one i think it will surprise you in a few ways i mean i would love to watch tv shows on about 3500 dollars is a lot yeah but you know i frankly i don't see that Mac use case being that big of a use case.

1:13:37I mean, I don't mean the one that they're shipping, which is like screen sharing with the Mac. I mean like Mac apps running on the headset. No, yeah, I know. I can imagine a future version of that feature where Mac windows actually get broken out and can free float in the space. And maybe I'm describing wrong. I don't mean like Mac windows with like the stoplight buttons and all that stuff floating in front of you. I mean like, what's what i said mac style apps you know what i mean like the the correct donor the correct donor platform for apps on the vision pro is not the ipad but it's instead the mac so that it just because the the limitations of ipad applications like the fact that they don't even have the concept of windows vision pro has windows i know they're not quite windows but like it has individual floating things that's its whole deal it's got the ornaments and separate accessory windows and you don't have to lay things on top of each other you can just put it next to it because you can turn your head a little bit and there's more crap over there that's a mac paradigm iPad doesn't work like that.

1:14:32So I'm thinking like native Vision Pro apps that are essentially Vision Pro-ified versions of the Mac apps, not Vision Pro-ified versions of the iPad apps. But again, I haven't used either one of these things, so I'm just speculating. I think you'll be surprised. Like when this comes out, when you do at some point somehow use one, I think you'll be surprised. And so again, like just I strongly urge people, like don't make too many assumptions about how you might use this until you have a chance to actually use one. And if that means that you can't justify paying$3 ,500 for it up front without knowing quite how you'll use it, that's understandable.

1:15:08You probably shouldn't jump on the pre-order then. Leave more room for me, please. But, you know, it's a very different device and paradigm than most people have ever used before. So, you know, like when the Apple Watch came out, or especially before anybody had actually used it, when it was announced, everyone was kind of assuming they would use the Apple Watch much like a tiny iPhone. And then we got the Apple Watch and anybody who tried that was very quickly disavowed that notion because it was a terrible tiny iPhone, but it was really great for other things. People thought the iPad was basically a giant iPhone and they would use it just like a giant iPhone.

1:15:45I mean, you kind of can, but it's better if you use it like an iPad. It's kind of its own thing. Even like the Apple TV, when the Apple TV, the one with apps, whatever generation that was that added the apps, when that was first announced and shown off, everyone's like, hmm, maybe I'll do some computing on my TV. And that didn't really pan out that way. Instead, we do other things with it. This is going to be the same kind of thing. We are trying to project onto it the paradigms we already know from devices we already have and have used and saying, okay, well, I'm going to use this like a giant Mac.

1:16:18Well, you might, but probably not. there's probably going to be other ways you use it that are that are like it there you know you're going to use it like you're going to use a vision pro you're not going to use it like any of the any of the platforms because it's very different from all the other platforms in so many different ways so don't go into it saying like okay well i can justify this because it'll be like a really big monitor and it's like yeah well i mean maybe you might do that but go in with a more open mind it might go a different direction for you and until everyone has these and you can try them and you can see all the video reviews, you can see what kind of apps come out for it and everything.

1:16:53Don't make too many assumptions early on. I mean, that's the whole thing. Apple needs to get enough people to write applications that are for this. But I'm saying in the meantime, in the meantime, Apple's stopgap is in the meantime, people can use iPad apps. Like in their announcement, which I think maybe we'll get to if we keep going here, they're like, oh, it has a million apps. What they mean is a million people have said, yes, you can run my iPad apps on your thing, I'm assuming. like because how do they know how many apps so they just they just opened up submissions the same day they put out their press release we haven't even opened submissions for the for the vision pro app store yet but we know there'll be a million apps why those are ipad apps that's their stop gap that's their way of like you get this what can i run out besides the built-in apps well you got a million ipad apps that you can run and that's not what we want you to do with it but it's something until those apps start shipping so it's up to apple to foster an ecosystem that makes people make actual native vision perhaps so what i'm saying is i think the correct donor platform for the stopgap apps is more it would be better to be the mac because those apps are designed to have multiple windows arranged maybe not all around you but arranged all over the place but but we'll say maybe just multiple ipad apps is exactly fine as a stopgap and but i would think if you if anyone i mean i know because of the api things that's not how it works but um someone porting a complicated app final cut pro for vision pro should it be uh should you start from the ipad version of that app or should you start from the mac version you're making a native Vision Pro version, but which version should you start from?

1:18:20And I think you should start from the Mac one, but they certainly won't because of the API differences. So that's a whole other kettle of fish. But, you know, spiritually, I feel like the canvas provided by the Vision Pro is so much more expansive than the canvas provided by the iPad. It makes me think more of the Mac. Well, I think there are some critical differences, though. Like, you know, as a lot of like the VR bloggers and stuff have pointed out, like the density of the displays and the sizing of them, I would think about it more like TV screens than monitors. Like, you know, you look at computer monitors, they're very dense.

1:18:52You look at them much closer up. TV screens are big and beautiful, and you look at them from like, you know, eight or ten feet away maybe, and it's a very different way of using it. Like, you know, imagine if computing was really fast and easy on an Apple TV, and you had an infinitely sized screen on the Apple TV, but you're still sitting on the couch looking at something six feet away. When you look at how windows are laid out in these VR headsets, like the distance they're simulating of how far in front of you they are, relatively how large they are. And you look at things like the density of the displays, like how many pixels they actually have.

1:19:26It's nowhere near the density of computer monitors. And so I would be surprised if when people actually use these, if they ended up actually wanting Mac-like density of controls and density of text and things like that. I think what we're going to want is going to end up looking kind of halfway between iPad apps and Apple TV apps. Yeah, well, with the current density, you're right, because, you know, it's 4K per eyeball. But as we talked about when these initially launched, your floating window does not fill your entire field division, probably. So you're not even getting a 4K screen, which is, you know, it's an achievement that they've apparently achieved the text legibility that they have.

1:20:06But it's not 200 pixels per inch, four feet from you. Not even close. and it'll probably be a long time before we have that kind of hardware i don't know how long well they're making good advances but yeah but the initial version isn't so that i mean that that's why a lot of these screenshots they do look like apple tv apps like viewable from six feet away big chunky controls but they do also have lots of accessory stuff floating around the yeah they do that's why i mean it isn't there is no like direct paradigm like oh it's just like a big ipad or whatever you can't say it's just like any of the platforms but i i really think it's going to end up being more like a combination of ipad plus apple tv than mac anything like i think the the sizing and the density and everything is all wrong for the mac i mean if we had displays that could support it though it would be great to doing for doing mac stuff in the same way if you had three pro display xdrs in front of you right if you had the density in that device to support the actual resolution of three pro display xdrs at arm's length around you that would be amazing and people would love it because it's smaller and hopefully cheaper than three bonus and you don't need to connect them with cables but that's not this generation or product yeah i do understand what you're saying though john that the mac does at a glance seem like a better donor platform but i think i have to come down on where marco is in that i think we're going to end up in this kind of weird and i don't necessarily mean bad but just maybe unusual halfway world between like iPad and Apple TV, like Marco was saying.

1:21:35And I expect that. That's another reason why TV applications, like as in watching actual movies and television shows, is great for this because you're not going to notice the resolution deficit because it's television. Yeah. So with that in mind, we've been talking and kind of glancing off the discussion about the app ecosystem and whatnot. So I've been thinking a lot about what I want to do with regard to this. And history says, I will be the first to tell you, I'm starting right out and telling you, History says I'm going to pre-order one because I'm a sucker and that's what I do. Of course you are.

1:22:05But I'm trying to be rational about this, which is not something I'm typically capable of doing. And I'm probably wasting everyone's time by even talking about this because I'll end up ordering one. But I don't think, coming back to our conversation a little while ago about did people really want an iPhone. Sitting here now, I don't know if I want to spend$3 ,500 on one of these. Starting at. As a consumer, now this is with my consumer hat on. I have not yet put on my developer hat, but as a consumer, I don't know what I would use this for that would justify$3 ,500. Like that is a tremendous amount of money, a truly tremendous amount of money.

1:22:54And for people who are saying, oh, you buy laptops like that all the time. You know what you're going to use a laptop for. Like it's not a speculative use case. you know you're going to get out of the box and you know exactly what you're going to use it for you know i mean just for the point of comparison though john how much is that really nice tv that you like i know what i'm going to use that for too that's what i'm saying like this is speculative because like it's not so much the price because i'm i'm preempting people who are going to say you're complaining about 3500 but every computer you ever buy is more than that yeah but we all know what we're going to do with the computers or the television we know exactly what we're going to do with them we know how the well they're going to do it and we know they're we already have something that we're doing and this is going to be a better one so we plunk down that money for those easily but for this one i think casey's question is apt which is like if i wasn't a developer even though it seems like a cool thing to get for 3500 what am i going to do with it again like the fear is you get it you try it you try the few pieces of software for it and then it's 3500 thing sitting in the corner of your room right exactly and and i think in the defense of expensive tvs and expensive computers whether or not marco or i change computers like underwear which i don't think either of us does as much as i give marco a hard time and i certainly don't think I do.

1:23:58But that being said, any of the three of us could use any of the computers that we've bought recently for years, years and years and years. And sorry, that implies that you are literally incapable of using a Vision Pro for years. That's not what I mean. But my M1 MacBook Pro that I just recently got rid of, I did not need to get rid of that. I chose to because I'm a sucker for space black and i'm an idiot but i didn't need to i could have held on to that computer for another probably two to maybe even four years which would have made a sum total of what four to six years of in service which for a laptop i know how much you hate we hate laptops john but like for a laptop i think two to somewhere between four and six years is a pretty good run it's not you know it's not a humongously long run but it's not a bad run by any stretch of the imagination.

1:24:52Your TV, when did you buy your fancy pants, uh, non-plasma TV? That was what, two years ago, a year ago? Uh, 2022, I think. Okay. So it was, uh, almost two years ago. And what's the likelihood you're going to replace that TV in the next two years? Very low. Exactly. And so whether now you might choose to do it in a couple of years because there's a technology that you're really jazzed by and you're really understood, but I'm saying like we could elect one could elect to replace these things but i don't think it'll be compulsory whereas with the vision pro i am less convinced that it will hold up for much more than two years it's like a series zero watch it's the first worst one right exactly this is going to be hopefully that will be the will be the worst one they ever make and right and and if they if they do any kind of like significant turns in the course they're taking like for instance if they did get rid of the front-facing display or things like that if they if they were able to integrate the battery into the unit like there there are like some turns that they that they might be making with subsequent revision of the product that will make this one feel and look really old within probably a much shorter time than the useful lifetime of the next one that will come out just because it is version zero don't buy the apple vision pro edition yeah some advice it's not gonna hold up So as a consumer, like, I don't, it's hard for me to justify spending$3 ,500.

1:26:14And the funnily enough, the thing that I think most strongly makes me want this as a consumer, again, we'll talk developer in a second. But as a consumer, I think the thing that I'm most interested in for this is if I could put aside the fact that I'll look like a total doofus wearing this thing, if I could bring this to like a library or Wegmans or, you know, a coffee shop or what have you, and if I could not care about what I looked like, which I don't think I'm capable of, but if in this fantasy world where I don't care what other people are thinking as they're looking at me, I guess I'm always in the completely, you know, what do they call it?

1:26:52the experience where you can't see anything around you. Immersive, there it is. I'm always in the immersive experience. So I can never see the people that are looking at me like I'm an idiot. But anyway, the thing that I think is most appealing about this to me is having a 4K version of my laptop screen wherever I go. And that strikes me as though it would be extremely cool because then I can have my 4K laptop screen right in front of me and I can have maybe the iPad version of Slack off to the side. I can have an iPad version, or Vision Pro, strictly speaking, version of Safari off to the other side.

1:27:23And now I've got one heck of a nice workstation that I can bring pretty much anywhere. And that does appeal to me. I don't think it appeals to me for$3 ,500, but it appeals to me nonetheless. And so as a person, I want Marco to buy one and I want him to tell us what he thinks. Well, you know that'll happen. Right. And I want like a local friend. I don't have one in mind, but just, you know, I want one of my local friends to buy one. A local friend with the same shaped face as you. Yeah, the same prescription. Well, no, you can snap in and out the prescription lenses, can't you? Oh, yeah, yeah.

1:27:56But no, I take your point, though. You know, I want a local friend to get one so I can play with it. But I don't know that I want one for me yet. And I'm not saying that's forever, but I don't know if I want one for me yet. So all that in mind, now I put on my developer hat and everything gets real muddy real quick. That's not muddy. Your developer hat is you need one because you're developing an app for it at the end. Well, but for what income? Well, so it's both sides of this, right? So on the one side, yes, I agree with what you said, John, that I'm going to have, I don't know if I'll have it on launch, probably not at launch day, but I will have a version of call sheet that works reasonably well, hopefully on the Vision Pro.

1:28:34And I think it makes a lot of sense in the Vision Pro because if you can have, and I've had people write to me and confirm that this is possible, because I genuinely, truly do not remember it from my experience at the lab. if it is possible to have a non-immersive video player, then you can slide call sheet right next to it, which people are telling me that's possible. You can slide call sheet right next to it, and you can be looking at a video and looking at call sheet at the same time. You know, mind exploding. It's amazing. And that sounds really cool, and it sounds like it would be a really great idea to have it there, and it would be very useful to have it there.

1:29:10Additionally, as the chat room is pointing out, if by some miracle I can get it there for launch and it isn't a pile of garbage, which are two big ifs, then I could maybe get Apple to feature it or have, you know, reviewers feature it. I mean, imagine if iJustine gets a copy of this and somehow stumbles upon CallSheet. I don't know how that would happen, but just for the sake of discussion, then suddenly I'm having my Widgetsmith moment. I don't expect that, but you never know. Well, on a platform that has no users. Yeah, you can have a Widgetsmith moment on a platform with a million users. Sorry.

1:29:37Even Widgetsmith won't have a Widgetsmith moment on this platform for some time. No, you can sell to 100 % of the user base and you're still not there. Exactly. And the problem is, and I was actually, I had a monthly FaceTime with James Thompson, friend of the show, James Thompson, who does PCalcom, among many other things. And he and I were chatting this morning, and he pointed out to me a really good thing, which is so obvious, but I hadn't thought about, that even if call sheet arrives on the Vision Pro, and even if I can get it to the point that it's not embarrassing, even despite those things, it's the same skew as it is on iOS, on iPadOS, on macOS.

1:30:12it's all universal it's all the same skew so a lot maybe even all of these users have already paid me they i've already gotten the money from them why is it necessarily the same skew you can make a dedicated vision i could but i don't plan on it i mean i could i absolutely could but i was not planning on it no you totally should why wouldn't you but you would have a shared um you know subscription model like that's you can you can have the same bundle id and have it still be running native like you can like there's all but you but you'd have to like submit it to the Vision Pro side of the app store separate.

1:30:43That's the only thing that has to be separate. I feel like universal apps where you write one app and it runs on all the platforms, you can pay for it once. Customers love them, but as a single indie developer, it's economically unfeasible, I feel like. Honestly, it depends a lot on how much work you have to do from your existing code base to support this new platform. I think we're going to see a lot of people doing what I'm going to be doing, which is I'm going to permit my iPad app to run for a while. And I do intend to have a native version of Overcast for Vision Pro. I'm not going to make it anywhere near launch day.

1:31:19So for now, iPad version, and then we'll see. Very similar in a lot of ways to if you have an iPhone app and you want to make it run on the iPad. Well, if the iPad is going to be a huge part of your market, maybe put a lot of time and thought into that. If it's only going to be kind of an accessory part of your market, you don't have to do everything custom for the iPad. You can just let the phone app run on the iPad with minimal modifications and maybe it won't be ideal, but it'll be fine. That's something we can do here. Like, you know, this platform is going to have very low sales volume for a while.

1:31:53So it's not going to be able to financially justify huge investments of custom work for it for an existing app necessarily, unless there's a really big market for it on this. And as mentioned last time, I don't think I have a big market. I think Casey, yours is bigger than mine, so your calculus will be different than mine here. But when I bring overcast to Vision OS, I have some ideas on how I can do it and the experience I want it to be like. And to be honest, they're all pretty simple ideas that will require a bit of a more limited experience than the full everything app with every single feature crammed into whatever window size I can get it crammed into.

1:32:30I'm looking at a very different design, but it would be a lower effort design for lots of reasons. That's going to be easier to justify because this platform is going to have no users basically for a while. And so what you're saying, Casey, is like there is a clear market for you to bring CallSheet to Vision OS with a native app that uses the same IAP as your iOS app. And much or most or all of the same code even. I don't know how much effort it will be worth for you to like invest two months of development time into it. That is probably not worth it. At least at this point. No, I don't think it's worth it at all.

1:33:06And I guess the question I'm really asking both indirectly and now directly is I think I should put a modicum of effort into it to the order of like two weeks, not two months. And I think that's fair. But I don't know if I even I think putting two weeks or so of effort is fair. But do I really want to spend$3 ,500 worth of money or leaving aside the effort? Do I want to spend all that money just to get call sheet on here? I don't know if it's – because I don't think I'll recoup. Well, it's not worth it for the two-week effort app. But I think – I mean, aren't you visiting a future where you would spend more than two weeks to make an actual really good Vision OS version of your thing to be alongside the video when people are watching it?

1:33:48Potentially, yes. But that would – I wouldn't be justified in doing that unless I felt like I was getting some sort of financial return from the effort. What you're getting is a first-mover advantage. You'd be early in the market. No, the first year you're not going to make that money back probably. But year two or three, you're already there. You're the one that people know when they read the reviews. Oh, if you're watching movies, you want to watch a thing. IMDb just has a shovelware port of their iPad app and it's terrible because she looks okay. Like you're getting in early in the hopes that you'll be the de facto look things up about the video that I'm watching in Vision Pro.

1:34:21Yeah. So I think from a developer's point of view, even though I don't particularly want to spend$3 ,500 on this, particularly after spending a whole pile of money on this laptop, which I probably shouldn't have done. I think I'm sitting here now. I'm leaning towards buying one. And then the other thing that I need to consider is I actually have a third hat, which is the one I'm actually wearing right now, which is as a podcaster. And I think it would make for much better programming on this very show if at least one, preferably two, or in a perfect world three of us have one of these to play with.

1:34:55Well, I have a solution to that, by the way. It's called Apple sends us review units. If only, John, if only. You don't get to keep them forever. I'll talk to Gruber about that. Define forever. On an infinite timeline, Gruber will return all his products. Yeah, exactly. No, I mean, I agree with you that I'd love a review unit, but ultimately, you know, for better or worse, I can continue to whine and moan about this. But ultimately, it seems clear that we are not on Apple's radar in that capacity. And so I have to just understand. I can't wait for that to happen. So I have to understand. That's not going to happen.

1:35:26Don't wait for it. Right. So I need to take matters into my own hands. And I think as a podcaster and as a developer, two of the three hats that I'm wearing say, I should probably try to pick one of these up. Now, I haven't talked to the family CFO yet, and I have a feeling they might have some conflicting opinions about this. But sitting here now, it seems like, and I still made a final decision, but it seems like it's probably prudent for me to get one. So that this way I can make call sheet as good as can reasonably be done. Because I can tell you, I don't think it's unfair for me to say that spending the day in the lab gave me a lot of useful feedback.

1:36:05And I'm saying just from myself, you know, like in using the app, it was incredibly useful to experience it on the actual platform as compared to the simulator. And the simulator is very good for what it is. But having experienced it on the actual device gave me all sorts of clues and ideas and things to do that I never would have considered had I not had the thing on my face. And I don't think Apple would be grumpy of me for saying that. So in so many ways, I think I'll probably also be lining up on the virtual queue on a week from Friday or whatever it is and trying to put my hands on one. And I will probably get the cheapest one they will possibly sell me, which is still a damn fortune.

1:36:45Yeah, I would call it the least expensive, not the cheapest. Yeah, exactly, exactly. But I don't know. And it's funny because I seem so morose and down on it. And I actually don't mean to. And again, now I'm getting into dangerous territory because I don't want to talk about what happened at the lab. but there is a lot about this platform to be very excited about and i think marco was hinting at the same earlier there's a lot to be excited about here it's just i find the price so off-putting it which is it may sound nuts but i think of myself as a relatively frugal person and i know especially in the last six months some of my expenditures may indicate otherwise but generally speaking i don't enjoy spending money just for spending money's sake and and i really try to be prudent and frugal with my expenditures.

1:37:31And it's so much money. It's so much money on what seems to be a hope and a prayer. And that's the thing that just freaks me out. And I hope so much that I can tell you there's a lot of potential in this platform. And again, now I'm starting to get into dangerous territory again, but there's a lot of potential in this platform. And I really hope that between Apple and third-party developers, it gets realized because there's a lot there. i think first of all like however much we want to hem and haw about the price will not matter at all because if there's any truth whatsoever to the rumors that they can only make say a million a year like there's enough rich people in the world who will jump on this that it won't matter what the youtubers say and what we all say about the price that's an interesting point yeah if they can truly only make it in relatively small volumes there are enough buyers out there who will buy it at that price, it won't matter.

1:38:24So, you know, setting that aside. For a developer's point of view, I think your suspicion is correct. You will not make$3 ,500 in sales on this platform in all likelihood in the first year. It seems very unlikely. And so, again, gauge your level of effort accordingly. For us in particular, I think it makes total sense to buy it just because, again, this podcast is a big part of our careers and jobs and income. And so we need it just for that, honestly. Even if none of us had any other use for it other than to try it and talk about it, we should probably all get it just for that purpose alone. Nerds like us are going to try to somehow rationalize this price because it's cool, but you don't need to rationalize the price.

1:39:08It can just be cool. There are concert tickets that are this expensive, and people pay them because it's cool and they want it. That's it. That's enough of a reason sometimes. we can try again try to justify it as whatever you need to do justify it justify it that's fine but many of the buyers of the vision pro especially in this first year are going to be people who are buying it because they think it's cool and they want it they don't need to say well i'll be able to get my work done or i can fund it with my development nope you don't and you can't it's just cool and you want it that's okay as long as you can lose that amount of money and not like harm your family as a result or something or not get yourself into like debt or like you know if you can afford it it's okay to spend money on things that make you happy and are cool to you that's all it needs to be and there's enough people in the world who can spend that money who will do it just solely for those reasons they'll be fine they'll be sold out and back ordered the entire year so doesn't matter if we think it's too expensive or if some youtuber with the oh face on their thumbnail says it's too expensive is this really worth it like you know you know you're going to see a thousand of those and the answer will be they're going to say it's not all the commenters are going to say it's not and you still can't buy one because they're backordered so it doesn't matter enough people think it's cool that they're going to sell all of them now whether there is an app market for you as a developer that's a different question of course i when it's so hard to step around lab experiences here um but so i'll make an analogy for something I can talk about because I had no pre-release access whatsoever.

1:40:45The iPad. I was running Instapaper at that time. That was my app. And the iPad came out. And as you recall, because we remember previous Apple product launches and their hype cycles, John. As you recall, the iPad was announced a few months before it was available. I believe it was announced in January. It came out in April, something like that. So during that time, we had the SDK for it. So we could run like the iPad simulator. exactly like we have the vision pro today like we had the we have the vision os simulator but we don't have the hardware yet as developers so just like that we had a few months where we had the simulator for the ipad and we could get our apps ready for the app store and get them there on day one great so i did that with instapaper i was and you know we did all sorts of things we like you know made like cardboard mock-ups so we would know how big the ipad was in our hands and print out like the screenshot like on paper at the exact right size of the ipad screen so we can see like is this big enough you know and all of that it felt like we were really preparing for this platform and then i remember i got the ipad on launch day and i launched into paper on it and i used it for like five minutes and i was like this is all wrong everything i had done for months with the simulator and with paper mock-ups and cardboard and everything it was all immediately upon using the real hardware i'm like oh yeah this is not a good design for this this doesn't work this is different this should be like this it was so clear to me that the design i had made based on the simulator and guesses uh was just not right i had the same feeling when i ran the app that i have in progress for overcast on the real vision pro everything i thought about the design of how it should be was wrong and bad i would strongly suggest to anybody who actually is going to take this seriously as a developer.

1:42:31If you really want to make a Vision OS version of your app that is not just your iPad app running on a window, if you're actually using the native controls, you want it to actually be a first class Vision OS app, not even, be a third class Vision OS app, you need the hardware. That's it. It is so different than seeing your app in the simulator. I have done zero further development on Overcast for Vision OS after the lab because pause, I learn in the lab, oh, I'm wrong about everything. And I need the hardware to know that. And I need to develop whatever I'm going to develop for it. I'm going to need to develop it with the hardware.

1:43:10So I have totally paused vision OS development of Overcast until I have a vision pro. And I strongly suggest for all developers out there, if you are going to take this platform seriously and try to make a good version of your app, don't even bother doing it now. Do it when you have the hardware and definitely get the hardware. Like you're going to need it. You're not going to be able to make a good app with simulators alone. You just can't on this platform. It's too different. It's way too different. You don't even realize how different it is if you haven't had the chance to go to a lab. So if you intend to have an app on this platform, you need the hardware, period.

1:43:42So don't even worry about the cost. Just consider it a cost of developing an app for this platform. Unless you're making the Vision Pro beer drinking app, in which case, just do it in the simulator. It'll be fine. I'm sure they'll get right on approving that in the app store. It's an impulse purchase. People will get it because they want to try something fun on the Vision Pro. oh, your Apple stink for the reasons Marco stated, but it doesn't matter because you've already got their money. All right, so then finally, Apple has some Vision Pro app submission advice. And there's a bunch of interesting things here.

1:44:10Some of which, I don't know, I'm really giving some serious side eye to. But, you know, John, you put an image in the show notes here. It says, don't tilt or distract from your app window. Don't depict cluttered surroundings and don't show foveated rendering. Do you want to tell me why? screenshots that you would submit for your app like hey here's my app in action and they give an image to show all the don'ts which i thought was hilarious so first of all the tilting i mean okay i mean i would do wonder if they're actually enforce this but it's like it's usually knows from past conversations a dutch angle okay so it's tilted right but the second one is the one that's getting the most play don't depict cluttered surroundings as someone pointed out a mastodon it would take me a week to get my house to look this uncluttered this is their example of of cluttered surroundings yeah it must pain apples like set dressers to try to make cluttered surroundings they're like i guess we can put an extra item on the coffee table and it's like oh it hurts me so much to do this but here's an extra item instead of just a plant now there's a plant and a book and oh on the floor on the floor is an item what item i don't know but there's an item on the floor and it's open and someone put their jacket on the table i can't look i can't look it's too cluttered this is like the neatest house you've ever seen in your entire life do not depict cluttered surroundings so ridiculous and then the final one is weird to me foveated rendering is when you render the part that the people aren't looking at at lower resolution is it even possible to grab screenshots in the vision pro with foveated rendering i thought the screenshots were always everything rendered at full res but i mean maybe i'm wrong and i don't maybe if maybe if you capture a video feed of it maybe it would follow your gaze i don't know i mean i guess you could simulate it but like why would you do that but yeah no you can't use foveated rendering if don't know where people are looking the whole image has to be rendered at the complete resolution yeah and and ultimately on the um on the clutter angle i think that actually might slightly hinder the product and because no one can have that no one has that environment yeah who like who who is working in an environment that is uncluttered enough to have all these windows floating on top of it i mean i guess you could just send simulator screenshots right yeah and yes i mean yeah the reality is like for app store screenshots that's what everyone's going to do they're just going to use simulator screenshots uh but you know for for actual use of the product with windows floating in space when you're not in an immersive environment i think that's actually going to be a somewhat of a limiting factor because like casey gave the coffee shop example earlier like i mean first of all i would never wear this in a coffee shop like i feel guilty wearing airpods in a coffee shop like so this this is way out of my comfort zone but you're gonna want if you're actually going to be computing in it you're probably going to want to be in the fully immersive mode almost all of the time when you're out in the world and even in your own house probably much of the time it's like my office is not that clean like where where am i in my house that is that clean it's never anywhere and i think most people don't have a space in their house that is anything like what apple shows in the simulator as like possible good environments for the vision maybe in a model home if you go to visit a model home or something Or like an empty museum is one of them.

1:47:13I guess, maybe, but it's a very ideal view of the world that I think does not reflect people's actual houses and offices very well. Indeed. So they continue, don't break Apple Vision Pro over two lines. Okay, guys. this this is hilarious okay so the name of the product is three words with spaces gmail apple vision pro like if i put that text somewhere in my description which we'll get to in a little bit but it's this thing they're actually going to allow thank you so much apple um i can't control if it's over two lines i don't know like non-breaking space baby yeah can you use non-breaking space apple amp nbsp vision amp nbsp pro well then why don't they just say that Is that what they demand?

1:47:54Or are they just saying, don't break it over two lines? They don't say it should be Apple Vision Pro with non-breaking spaces between all the words. And even then, non-breaking spaces that, you know, if it's rendered in some context, it doesn't honor them. Then it's such a demand. I'm sure Apple doesn't want them broken up, but it's like, okay, Apple, then you don't break them up. I can't control what you do with my text. yeah also like i i think it is they have their work cut out for them if they want people to use all three of these words because that's what they say in their guidance it's apple vision pro it's not just vision pro it's apple vision pro everyone's going to call it vision pro no one's going to call it apple vision pro well i mean this is in text that they can audit right so yeah but like it's just like you know when they launched like the apple watch no one just called it watch because that's too generic of a word but and and so if if they would have called this vision just by itself apple vision maybe they would have seen it sort of chance of people calling it apple vision or not just a vision yeah people would have called it apple vision with no space then yeah right but by calling it apple vision pro vision pro by itself is uniquely identifying enough in this time and place that everyone will just say vision pro like so i think that's going to go right out the And there were people pointing out that some Apple stuff just says Vision now, just says Apple Vision or Vision.

1:49:13I think even their navs just says Vision. So Apple itself is trying to do the generic term to essentially make room for the fact that they'll be a non-pro someday. Ultimately, I mean, maybe they should have actually called it Apple Vision, you know, just to get to kind of like lay that groundwork better. because now when everyone's going to be calling it vision probe without the apple for you know however many years it's the only product in the lineup and then once they make one that's not called pro at the end they're going to have to like we're going to all going to have to like retrain ourselves to start saying apple in front of it where we weren't saying it it's just it's it's a mess on their home page by the way apple currently has the apple logo no space vision space pro well we aren't allowed to do that right exactly i mean in all fairness they also style watch and TV that way.

1:50:01Yeah. Yep. Also, anyway, continue with the last of these, uh, Casey, cause they're all fun. Uh, this one drives me freaking party and it's consistent. At least they're consistent across all their products. It reads as follows. Don't use the article V before Apple vision pro. It's not the iPhone. It's iPhone. It's not the iPad. It's iPad. It's not the Apple vision pro. It's Apple vision pro. I don't know why this drives me nuts. It's it's, I should let it go to be honest with you, but it drives me nuts that they don't do this. And that's like, I'm going to say, oh, that's recent. Yeah, it's recent in the past 25 years.

1:50:34People always just talk about software being available on the Mac. But these, you know, in the past several decades, that software is available on Mac. Yep. It drives me bananas. Don't refer to Apple Vision Pro generically as a quote unquote headset. Good luck with that. Yeah. The phrase Apple Vision Pro can't be included in your app name, but it can be included in your app description. Oh, well, thank you. Thank you so much. Oh, thank you. Hey, you can't put the word iOS in your Mac apps description or it will get rejected, but we're allowing you to say the name of our product in your description.

1:51:07Not like it's like Macbeth or something. It's so generous to allow us to tell our customers what platform this runs on. Exactly. Updated for future versions of Mac OS. Don't mention Mac OS. We don't want people to know about it. Right. And then you should refer to your app as a spatial computing app. Don't describe your app experience as augmented reality, AR, virtual reality, VR, extended reality, XR, or mixed reality, MR. Even if it's one or all of those things, don't say it. Don't say it. We can say it. Apple can say it, but you can't say it. Yeah. Oh, God. What a... It's ridiculous. Oh, these are very...

1:51:45They're very Apple. These are very... They're very Apple. Persnickety little things that are, I think, a little bit optimistic, you know, on how people talk. This is Apple. this is part of one of the parts of apple i do not care for like i understand the motivation here on their end but just chill out you guys chill out i mean it makes sense as because to give the context again here these are app submission guidelines you and your regular life can call it a headset all you want we call it a headset on this program all you want apple would prefer us not to but in the end they have no control over it they would prefer us to just call it headset right but in but when it comes to the app store uh that they do have control over and they will reject your app if you put like vision pro the apple vision pro in the name of your app like new you know flappy birds for apple vision pro and that's the name of your app rejected well probably not because someone's gonna let it go through because they didn't read these guidelines but anyway to the extent that any app store stuff is applied consistently that's the one thing that they can control uh meanwhile everybody in all their reviews is going to be capitalizing vision pro when it's the first word in the sentence and or vision os when it's the first word in the sentence and you're not supposed to do that we're going to be calling it a headset people are going You mentioned an AR and VR, and there's nothing Apple can do about it, but somewhere, some Apple marketing person will have a single tear roll down their cheek as they read those reviews.

1:52:58And then very, very quickly before we go, Apple is going to offer Vision Pro demos at its retail stores for regular people. Apple writes - Do you mean Apple Vision Pro demos? Sorry, yes. Which one of you failed me in the show notes here? That's The Verge. The Verge failed you. Fair enough. Starting at 8 a.m. on Friday, February 2, we invite you to sign up for a demo of Apple Vision Pro at your local Apple store. Demo times will be available Friday through the weekend on a first-come, first-served basis. We can't wait to see you there. Interesting. And it implies, by the way, and I think The Verge said this, that it's only the first weekend, which seems bananas to me.

1:53:30But maybe that's the story? I don't know. They'll be sold out after that. It is probably quite an ordeal to provide those demos. Like time per person, how much staff, how much hand-holding. It's really a big time sink to run indefinitely. I don't know if it's just going to be the first weekend, but it seems like a lot. Yeah, we shall see. I only have one more question. How tall is Egypt? Someone will answer that, and then they'll get Amazon Karma for it, and then you'll be able to ask your little cylinder in the house. Was Superman real? Yes, yes. Superman's alive. Why is there a past tense? Oh, my God.

1:54:08All right. Thanks to our sponsor this week, Trade Coffee, and thank you to our members who support us directly. You can join us at atp.fm slash join, and we will talk to you next week.

1:54:43Find the show notes at atp.fm And if you're into Twitter You can follow them At C-A-S-E-Y-L-I-S-S So that's Casey Liss S-M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M-E-N-T-M-K-O-R-M-E-N-T-M-E-R-A-C-U-S-A-C-R-A-C-U-S-A-C-U-S-A-C-U-S-A. It's accidental. Accidental. They didn't mean to. Accidental. Accidental. Tech Podcast. So long. I have one more Vision Pro tidbit to smuggle into the after show, which I forgot to mention when we were talking about it before. I know I talked about it in Slack as well, but I'm still curious what the actual focal distance is. If Apple provided it to you, you can't tell me if they settled you in the labs.

1:55:34But anyway, as we discussed in the past, we all, at least I still think that it is a fixed focal distance inside the headset. What is that distance? Is it one feet, two feet, five feet, three feet, eight feet? And I ask again because I'm an old person and I want to know what prescription I should tell them. I think it might even be like in the HIG somewhere, like in the design guidelines for Vision OS apps. It might be stated there. I mean, I think they talked to like the default distance of windows that are floating in front of you and that you assume that's also the focal distance. But it seems like a tech spec.

1:56:05Like the reason I bring it up with the demos is when you sit to the demos, like we said, when we talked about it before, they're going to say, OK, well, what's your prescription? I'm like, tell me the focal distance. distance i would ballpark it as like whatever like in in a typical like living room like whatever you would use to watch your tv that's probably what you want i was gonna say the same thing my tv is kind of far away i just i just want to measure i'm trying to help you out man i know i know but it seems like it's it seems like it shouldn't be they're gonna have to ask people that right and that they're they're gonna find out when they give the people the lenses and they're like oh it's still blurry and they're gonna give them different ones and it's just like Just tell us the distance.

1:56:41Oh, my God. What does a princess mean? What is the focal distance of the Apple Vision Pro? Sorry, Apple Vision Pro, no the. Why don't you put that in the karma question? Someone will answer it. Yeah. Do you want that answer, though? Yeah, sure. You know, someone for Amazon Karma, someone will break into Apple Park and find out the answer. Oh, my God. How many cups is three-eighths cup? Mm-hmm. I think we've created a monster here, folks. If you could ask that to one of your cylinders, I thought that would be the right answer. Well, now it doesn't know because I'm so dumbfounded by the answer. Apparently, so was the Alexa system.

1:57:17And it also can't answer this and is asking people for answers.