Tim Cook says he always knew Apple would arrive at the Apple Vision Pro
In a new interview, Apple CEO Tim Cook was pictured for the first time wearing the Apple Vision Pro, and discussed the inevitable road to the headset.
Tim Cook dons the Apple Vision Pro | Credit: Vanity Fair
The Apple Vision Pro is set to start arriving to early adopters on February 2, after years of rumors about its arrival. In a new interview with Vanity Fair, Cook discusses what it took to make Apple's spatial computing headset.
According to Tim Cook, the first time he experienced the Apple Vision Pro was more than five years ago. The prototype he tried, however, was not the sleek mask we've come to know today. Instead, it was a crude, large box with multiple screens and cameras and wires that stuck out everywere.
"You weren't really wearing it at that time," he tells the interviewer. "It wasn't wearable by any means of the imagination."
However, that first experience took Tim Cook and put him on the moon -- and that's when he knew.
"I've known for years we would get here," Cook said. "I didn't know when, but I knew that we would arrive here."
The interview also examines other people's experiences with the Apple Vision Pro. Director James Cameron called his experience "religious." Technology Writer Om Malik said it was "amazing and incredible."
Even Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing, Greg Joswiak, points out how people's first universal experience with the headset is awe.
"You know, one of our most common reactions we love is people go, 'Hold on, I just need a minute. I need to process what just happened,'" he told the interviewer. "How cool is that? How often do people have a product experience where they're left speechless, right?"
Apple is obviously excited about its product. Not everybody is.
"I'm sure the technology is terrific. I still think and hope it fails," one Silicon Valley investor told Vanity Fair. "Apple feels more and more like a tech fentanyl dealer that poses as a rehab provider."
Cook wraps the interview by talking about how creating future-changing technology is less about plans and more about exploration.
"What we do is we get really excited about something and then we start pulling the string and see where it takes us," Cook said. "And yes, we've got things on the road maps and so forth, and yes, we have a definitive point of view. But a lot of it is also the exploration and figuring out."
"Sometimes the dots connect. And they lead you to some place that you didn't expect."
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Comments
Plus, from an environmental standpoint, this is a far better use of materials than screen based tech. Larger and larger screens = more and more e-waste. This product provides the huge screens and multiple screens with postage stamp sized material use.
Apple has said that AR is the future, and I agree. So they go and build a VR headset, something no one anywhere thinks is the future, and try to do AR with it.
AR is all about the view finder. We already have the ability in software to do amazing things with AR, but they're nothing more than a tech demo until we get the view finder right. And a VR headset is not it. No more closer than holding an iPhone up to your face and looking through the lens of the camera. Apple knows this, and knows that glasses are the wearable of the future, and that everyday glasses that can be powered by iPhone to project AR into your world are a game changer. They also know that the technology to do this well is still several years away, and Tim Cook knows he won't be CEO by the time that comes around. He wanted spatial computing to be part of his legacy so badly that he pushed a product onto market years before it was ready, bolstered by his successes with overcharging customers in the last several years. Things like raising the price of products every time a new feature is added is a Tim Cook invention that customers have rewarded him for, and it has led to some poor decisions...Vision Pro's release being the pinnacle.
Even Apple didn't design their campus to let each person stay at their desk. Apple HQ is designed to make sure people meet. This thing doesn't bring new connections. It isolates you. To me it feels like a Segway or entertainment device. But AR glasses... that would be something.
Of course, I’m no engineer, so maybe I’m way off base here, but it sure seems to me that the less electronics a user is expected to put on one’s head, the better the experience all around.
Just saying . . .
Nonsense. You have to crawl, walk, run. You cannot simply skip to sprinting. If you aren’t slightly embarrassed about your first versions, you released too late. These are things we know in the development world. No offense but your perspective sounds like a pure consumer’s — “Why can’t you just release a fully formed perfect product from day 1!” Not how it works, my guy. The innovations in AVP will be the launchpad for many more revisions and incremental, iterative improvements. That’s how technology works. See the first TVs, the first cars, the first washers, etc etc. And yes the incredible work put into this as a VR/AR product will be utilized for AR-only products down the line.
Yep he said he ran into some minor bugs but that didn’t damper his enthusiasm whatsoever:
https://daringfireball.net/2024/01/the_vision_pro
However, someone should have stepped in when he tried to sell it as 'future changing'.
That's cringeworthy.
The VP isn't any more 'future changing' than what we know is already out there or in the pipe.
The problem is actually waiting for technology to become affordable enough for the mass market.
Apple chose to run with a souped up option and the price reflects that.
Others have chosen to dial down the options until the devices become more affordable (but they are still expensive).
For me, I'm perfectly happy that it's made it this far, and personally, I think it will be here to stay although I'll be the first to admit that Apple can be weak on commitment.
Was it released too early? Maybe, but I don't see that as a problem for a non-mass market device. In fact I see it as an advantage. Real world feedback and issues will lead to a better product, and faster, down the road.
Some people will feel very uncomfortable with it because, in their view, Apple never releases anything until it's fully baked. That was never true but many have convinced themselves it was. The VP clearly needs a little more time.
That shouldn't be an issue, though. It's good enough as it is and promising.
There are some nice touches but, as expected, some disappointments.
One of my favourite announced features was EyeSight but sadly it seems to look nothing like what is seen in the promo material. It will improve in future versions for sure.
On the subject of isolation, I think we need to accept that all visor headsets isolate and even with pass-through capacity you are withdrawing from the outside world to a degree.
Reading a book doesn't isolate you from your sensory options.
If it were three times cheaper would I get one? I doubt it because I rarely jump on any first gen product but two or three years from now I would definitely be interested.
It needs time and I'm really optimistic. The same applies to all other headset manufacturers too. Once 5.5G and more content is available it will be an attractive proposition for a wider audience. Weight will come down. Batteries will be better. Comfort will improve...
You've not been paying attention... and you certainly haven't tried the VP. The device is capable of AR and VR. Apple has coined the term Spatial Computing, because the design and experience are not strictly one or the other, AR or VR. If you read Nick Bilton's article in Vanity Fair, he says the Vision Pro makes his 75" LG OLED look antiquated. While I haven't tried the VP yet either, I'm optimistic and not so silly as to make extreme, unfounded, negative comments as you are.
Also, you apparently are skipping over parts of the review. He said:
And:
Also:
So, like I said, it's an impressive experience. But it's a heavy, fussy device that *currently* is best suited to watching movies alone on a couch.
Sadly, visionOS doesn’t have any ability to share these windows or experiences with anyone else: two people in Vision Pro headsets sitting in the same room can’t see the same things floating in space at the same time. Apple tells me some enterprise developers are working on experiences with shared views, and you can mirror the view from one Vision Pro to another over FaceTime, but in the end, my big Safari art gallery only ever had one patron: me. It’s amazing you can do all of this, but it is also quite lonely to put things all over a space knowing no one else will ever really experience it.