Apple Vision Pro can be used in public, but mind your manners
A video by Casey Neistat explores the potential of using the Apple Vision Pro in everyday life, as well as ways it could cause problems for other people.
![Casey Neistat [YouTube]](https://photos5.appleinsider.com/gallery/58451-119064-neistat-subway-xl.jpg)
Casey Neistat [YouTube]
The Apple Vision Pro offers promises of being the gateway to spatial computing, which could be a big shift in how people use technology in the future. In testing out Apple's latest release, social media personality Casey Neistat takes the concept to a fairly extreme level.
In a Saturday video on the headset, Neistat is shown traveling through New York City, including its subway system and on a Boosted board, all while wearing the device in its passthrough mode.
Throughout the video, he demonstrates using it to watch videos and to perform tasks that he can see, while still being able to view his surroundings. In doing so, he demonstrates some shortcomings of the Apple Vision Pro, as well as how it could impact daily life.
While Apple does market the Apple Vision Pro as being usable in an airplane, Neistat instead walked around and boarded the subway while using the headset. Neither are ideal situations for the Apple Vision Pro, with videos and windows disappearing from view as he walks along a street.
In the subway, a Mr Beast video slowly moved out of view as the train departed, before the Apple Vision Pro displayed a "Tracking Failed" notice.
Throughout the video, Neistat also demonstrated how the Apple Vision Pro may clash with everyday life, especially when other people are involved. He blocks a stairway to respond to a contact, while also standing in the way at a donut shop while he looked at a dinosaur.
A profound moment
At the end of the video, he then recounts an "unexpected" moment from extended usage on his travels. After hours of usage, he explains "my brain sort of clicked, and it just forgot that I was looking through cameras and screens, and it just took what I saw as reality."
Referring to it as a "profound moment" sat in Times Square surrounded by strangers and with virtual windows all around him, he thought "This is the future of computing that everyone's been promising for like the last 15 years." This gave him a "peek into where all this is going," and he offers "this isn't like the future of AR and VR, this is the, I think this is the future interface for all computing."
Despite this, Neistat says he doesn't know if he can recommend the expensive headset, "because I can promise you this will be the worst Vision Pro Apple ever ships. It is going to get so much better."
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
Paraphrasing Steve Jobs : the best pointing device : your eyes !
The future of computing will be many things and the fruit of many devices from many players.
There will be different elements to visor based computing (compute, network, sensor etc) and the different elements will come together as needed with everything converging at some point.
Currently, the VP recreates the passthrough experience replacing real elements with 'virtual' elements and leading the kind of problems mentioned in this article. That will improve but will never be a substitute for the real thing.
That definitely isn't the future as at some point 'true' passthrough screens will become available. Hopefully within the next four to eight years.
I'm basing this on white papers from 2017.
Cloud, Edge and On-device compute will become common choices, with cloud compute probably being the preferred option freeing up lots of space on the headset.
Charging will change radically and there is a real possibility of wireless charging with large air gaps.
Obviously on the network side latency, QoS etc will also be key.
On the format side, I hope interoperability is a goal and not fragmentation.
The last thing we need is more attempts to lock users into one particular system.
On the subject of our brains getting used to the virtual experience, if anyone has ever seen a show where five or six people dressed in black bring a dummy to life with each person operating a different part of the 'body', you will know that (if done well) it takes literally seconds for us to see the dummy as a new 'person' and make the operators invisible.
I don’t see public use of Vision Pro acceptable.
In public.
Seems like peripheral vision is greatly reduced. Distraction and ability to monitor your surrounding several times per second --the minimum to function in pedestrian traffic-- is compromised. I don't care about being recorded in public as it is 'assumed' with city public cctv that everyone is being monitored --one shouldn't be acting illegally, immorally, freely, or controversially anyway in the outside world-- that's what your private home is for. Though, i agree that 'safe/ private spaces' for people should be set-up - gyms, bars, clubs - restricted access areas -- where it is 'pre-agreed' that no recording devices be used be widespread - but not assumed - privacy in 'open' public is not a right but a privilege.
It may be possible to create a 'heads-up' quality system, like a fighter jet-- even to supplement your senses with collision warnings, etc. It's unclear how much off-wifi/ off-network content/interactivity/ stored content is available (movie in the subway would be great).
Point: effective/ polite VP use in public is certainly a skill to be learned, not natural or immediate -- but hopefully people will take the time to learn and become functional at it.
I've had a few uncomfortable interactions with airline flight attendants when I was wearing noise cancelling headphones on flights. Some of them would assume that I could not hear them while wearing headphones and would roll their eyes and gesture for me to remove the headphones. In most cases I had noise cancelling turned on without music playing while meals/drinks were being served so I could better hear the flight attendants talking to me above the background noise. Rather than getting into a lengthy conversation to convince them that I could in-fact hear them better than ever, I'd pop them off or at least pop off the side of the headphone closest to them.
It's going to take a while for the public at large to view Vision Pro wearers as being anything close to normal, and yeah, there will be predators who snatch Vision Pros off of people's heads just like they snatch French Bulldogs off of owner's leashes and from their cars. Anything that's in high demand, desirable, expensive, and quickly convertible to cold hard cash is going to attract predators. I won't even wear expensive headphones in public, other than on an airplane or in the waiting area of an airport where several others are doing the same. Nothing sends out a "Please steal me!" beacon more than Beats or AirPods Max headphones when walking around in public. That was, before the Vision Pro hit the market. With all of the stellar reviews of the Vision Pro the demand for Vision Pro is going to make them nearly as attractive as French Bulldogs, with none of the pooping and drooling.
The persona thing is a train wreck. I tried several times and eventually gave up.