Marvin

charlesn said:

However, the issue now is the paucity of compelling new apps to drive sales in 2025, since early adopters, developers and the wealthy with a taste for the latest tech toys have all bought their VPs. In Gurman's latest newsletter, he's lays out a damning case that Apple's hubris in expecting developers to develop for VP on their own dime is the main reason for that paucity. Big surprise, it iurns out that developing for a complex new OS with a tiny user base isn't worth their unpaid time, so they largely passed and here we are. Gurman also states that Apple's own internal data reveals that even the people who paid the $3500+ admission fee for a VP are only using their devices on a fairly limited basis. THAT'S not good.

I think it already has a killer feature with giant virtual screens. For movies, this will result in infrequent use but valuable enough for a hardware purchase at a reasonable price point. For computer mirroring, this will result in more prolonged use but the form factor needs to be more comfortable e.g AirPods Max + Visor, AirPods Immersive/Ultra.

I don't see apps or large numbers of games being the big selling point with AVP, same as with other VR platforms. VR games hardly have any users, peak users are a few thousand with 30m+ hardware units:
https://steamdb.info/charts/?category=54&sort=peak

compared to non-VR games, around 100x higher:
https://steamdb.info/charts/?sort=peak

If Apple has a few good evergreen games like Beat Saber for fitness, maybe some social game or MMO like Skyrim VR, that would be good enough for interactive content. They don't need a library with dozens of VR games, just a handful of good quality games that people will play regularly.

Movies are the big feature. A $1499 personal cinema would sell millions of units and people would play normal 2D games on it like Nintendo Switch.

AppleInsider said:

A new report claims Apple has approached Sony in an effort to bring handheld game controller support -- and presumably more games -- to the Apple Vision Pro. 

VR hand controller support could revitalize the software market for the Apple Vision Pro.

Top 10 VR games on Playstation reported by Sony for 2023 are on the following page:

https://www.roadtovr.com/sony-reveals-the-10-most-downloaded-psvr-2-games-in-2023/

These all probably work better with controllers, many simulate holding weapons or objects. The PSVR2 controllers are a bit bulky though:



There are more compact ones that do full finger tracking:

https://eteexr.com/



Apple could design their own compact controllers like these with full tracking and touch controls. It would be good if they could have wristbands that could track interaction with any passive objects. Then people could hold plastic replicas of any object.

Since games are already made to support the Sony controllers and millions of people already own them, it would help to have support for them too.

There are controllers here designed for AVP that have a nicer design, Apple could probably buy this company out or just sell their products in store:

https://www.surreal-interactive.com/
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/surreal-interactive/surreal-touch-1-controllers-for-apple-vision-pro





If Apple partners with Valve for SteamVR, AVP will be compatible with thousands of games, initially via streaming and then with native ports.

twolf2919 said:

When I read this sentence: “ For context, that Wall Street estimate matches almost exactly the money Apple made from the iPhone in 2008” I was convinced that a lot more iPhones sold the first year than Vision Pro - and, sure enough, google it and the result points to nearly 2 million iPhone sales the first year.  But then I read the above more carefully, and it actually talks about MONEY made on AVP vs iPhone.  While maybe true, I find this highly deceptive: for one, the author never gives figures on MONEY - only on units sold.  For another, the success of a product isn’t - at least initially - about money made, but about adoption/growth!  With 2 million sold in the first year and a unit growth curve that’s admirable, third party developers had ample reason to develop apps for it.  With 500,000 sales for AVP the same cannot be said.

The iPhone sold 4 million units in the first 6 months and 6 million in the first year:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-macworld-iphone-idUSN1551882120080116/

This was announced at WWDC 2008:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X5xOI_qu9I&t=5010s

(Sam Altman of OpenAI showed off an app early in this video)

The iPhone launch price was $499 (fully subsidized).

In their 2008 annual report in November, Apple reported 11.6m units:

https://d1lge852tjjqow.cloudfront.net/CIK-0000320193/f4e66939-3f5e-4751-8206-ae4c372faf6b.pdf

They reported iPhone 'net sales' as $1.8b, which is unusual as this works out to $155 per iPhone but maybe to do with how it was paid for via the carriers and initial revenue sharing.

In 2009, the unit sales were 20.7m with net sales of $6.7b, which is $323 per iPhone.

Today the lowest iPhone is $429 and highest $1599.
The most expensive iPhone is nearly $2000 less than the lowest priced Apple Vision Pro.

The year 1 revenue of the iPhone was 6m x $499 (+ carrier monthly fees) = $3b+.

If the AVP were to follow a similar unit sales trajectory to the iPhone, it would need to sell 1.5m units in year 2. This would be unlikely if it retains a $3500 entry price point. If it can reach a sub-$2000 price point, this is perfectly feasible. I think they can sell 3m units/year at $1999 ($6b revenue) and 5m units at $1499 ($7.5b revenue).

This unit sales estimate of 0.5m units in a year is probably overly high, this was how many units Apple produced before cutting back on production due to unsold supply. This year's wearables revenue was reported in November as $37b, down from $39b in 2023 and $41b in 2022, AVP revenue would have propped this up if it was near the sales estimate:

https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0000320193/c87043b9-5d89-4717-9f49-c4f9663d0061.pdf

macminion said:

What is the name of the power cable that connects from the battery powered unit to the Mac mini?

It looks like this one - AC to C7 non-polarized:

https://www.amazon.com/Goalfish-Replacement-Console-Speaker-Monitor/dp/B09KLQBJRZ

blastdoor said:

I don’t care for her vocal style. It sounds pouty and infantile to my ear. I might be a grumpy old man 

Some of her earlier hits were made when she was 15-17 years old:

https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/billie-eilish-interview-bellyache-debut-album-7736384/

Her vocals on other tracks sound more mature, she won an Oscar for each of these:





She is a very accomplished singer for someone so young, she's only 22 now.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_awards_and_nominations_received_by_Billie_Eilish