5 ms·

$3500 + tax device won't scale. It's not something that most people have a budget for.

screye 3y ago
A Halo device is not meant to sell, it is meant to impress. Apple doesn't want to sell this Headset at all. They want everyone to wish for a headset when it is able to sell one for $1000. This is what long term planning looks like. You need to prime your audience to buy something, before they actually want to go out and buy it. A few hundred millions wasted in the development of this device is pocket change for Apple.
- function_seven 3y ago
  > This is what long term planning looks like. You need to prime your audience to buy something, before they actually want to go out and buy it. When the Apple Watch was first unveiled, my opinion was something along the lines of, "What, I'm so lazy that I'll spend $400 to avoid pulling my phone out of my pocket?" When the AirPods were released, I probably said something like, "What, I'm supposed to hate a little wire so much that I'll spend $200 to eliminate it and now I have another thing to charge? Hah!" But with both of these, after enough exposure and seeing people I know use them consistently, I caved. And yeah, no way I'll go back to wired ear buds when I'm running or walking the dog. No way I'll ditch this watch now.
  - gavinmckenzie 3y ago
    100%. I thought the same thing with my Apple Watch and I resisted spending what I considered to be an unreasonable amount on earbuds as I didn’t care (or so I thought) about having wireless earbuds. But eventually so many colleagues had them and talked to me about how great they were that I caved and bought a pair. Wow was I wrong about how wireless earbuds was something I didn’t need. Then I started evangelizing to people about them, and the cycle continued.
    - jpeeler 3y ago
      You're supporting the idea behind "A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them." Except, it sounds like the barrier is even higher for some people.
      - gavinmckenzie 3y ago
        Very true. And I’m an iOS/macOS/tvOS developer who has all the toys, yet even I had trouble coming to grips with paying a premium for AirPods over a good pair of wired buds.
    - johnold 3y ago
      I agree, at first the watch was not really that interesting. Now, I can see it eating Garmin and wahoo for athletes. Why buy a separate device for tracking the bike rides or the runs when you can just use the apple watch. The vision pro will be the same thing. Give it 5 years.
mdanger007 3y ago
1st generation apple products are never for the masses. If you want to see what Vision will be in a few years, look at their other product trajectories.
- Tepix 3y ago
  The 1st generation iPhone was successful.
  - mdanger007 3y ago
    iPhone one was $500 when the average phone was $200. It was an upmarket device that eventually got cultural acceptance and reduced in price when produced at mass market scale.
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    Jobs stated goal for the first gen iPhone was to have 1% market share in the phone market in the first year. They barely made it. It definitely was a raging success
  - reaperducer 3y ago
    The 1st generation iPhone was successful. And it cost an unheard of $900 in 2023 money. The internet was awash in people howling that nobody would ever pay that much for a phone. Yet here we are today. (I still have my launch day iPhone!)
  - jack_riminton 3y ago
    For any normal company yes a home run, but small in relative terms to what Apple has now become iPhone sales by year: 2007: 1.3m 2015: 231m = 17669.2% increase over 8 years
  - tcmart14 3y ago
    While that is true, I would also say it was a little bit special. There are many reasons why, but I imagine one is, people loved their iPods. When iPhone came out, you now had both your phone and your iPod in a single device. I do think without iTunes and iTunes integration, iPhone may have been a flop.
slowmovintarget 3y ago
It's the Tesla S of headsets. It creates the market. We already know that Apple has cheaper tech in the works. There are manufacturers working on "lesser" versions that don't have the "amazing 3D knitting for the one-piece headband..." that will be more affordable down-market versions. But you need something that blows people's hair back first.
stocknoob 3y ago
It’s not a device for most people.

A Halo device is not meant to sell, it is meant to impress. Apple doesn't want to sell this Headset at all. They want everyone to wish for a headset when it is able to sell one for $1000. This is what long term planning looks like. You need to prime your audience to buy something, before they actually want to go out and buy it. A few hundred millions wasted in the development of this device is pocket change for Apple.

function_seven 3y ago
> This is what long term planning looks like. You need to prime your audience to buy something, before they actually want to go out and buy it. When the Apple Watch was first unveiled, my opinion was something along the lines of, "What, I'm so lazy that I'll spend $400 to avoid pulling my phone out of my pocket?" When the AirPods were released, I probably said something like, "What, I'm supposed to hate a little wire so much that I'll spend $200 to eliminate it and now I have another thing to charge? Hah!" But with both of these, after enough exposure and seeing people I know use them consistently, I caved. And yeah, no way I'll go back to wired ear buds when I'm running or walking the dog. No way I'll ditch this watch now.
- gavinmckenzie 3y ago
  100%. I thought the same thing with my Apple Watch and I resisted spending what I considered to be an unreasonable amount on earbuds as I didn’t care (or so I thought) about having wireless earbuds. But eventually so many colleagues had them and talked to me about how great they were that I caved and bought a pair. Wow was I wrong about how wireless earbuds was something I didn’t need. Then I started evangelizing to people about them, and the cycle continued.
  - jpeeler 3y ago
    You're supporting the idea behind "A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them." Except, it sounds like the barrier is even higher for some people.
    - gavinmckenzie 3y ago
      Very true. And I’m an iOS/macOS/tvOS developer who has all the toys, yet even I had trouble coming to grips with paying a premium for AirPods over a good pair of wired buds.
  - johnold 3y ago
    I agree, at first the watch was not really that interesting. Now, I can see it eating Garmin and wahoo for athletes. Why buy a separate device for tracking the bike rides or the runs when you can just use the apple watch. The vision pro will be the same thing. Give it 5 years.

mdanger007 3y ago

1st generation apple products are never for the masses. If you want to see what Vision will be in a few years, look at their other product trajectories.

Tepix 3y ago
The 1st generation iPhone was successful.
- mdanger007 3y ago
  iPhone one was $500 when the average phone was $200. It was an upmarket device that eventually got cultural acceptance and reduced in price when produced at mass market scale.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  Jobs stated goal for the first gen iPhone was to have 1% market share in the phone market in the first year. They barely made it. It definitely was a raging success
- reaperducer 3y ago
  The 1st generation iPhone was successful. And it cost an unheard of $900 in 2023 money. The internet was awash in people howling that nobody would ever pay that much for a phone. Yet here we are today. (I still have my launch day iPhone!)
- jack_riminton 3y ago
  For any normal company yes a home run, but small in relative terms to what Apple has now become iPhone sales by year: 2007: 1.3m 2015: 231m = 17669.2% increase over 8 years
- tcmart14 3y ago
  While that is true, I would also say it was a little bit special. There are many reasons why, but I imagine one is, people loved their iPods. When iPhone came out, you now had both your phone and your iPod in a single device. I do think without iTunes and iTunes integration, iPhone may have been a flop.

slowmovintarget 3y ago

It's the Tesla S of headsets. It creates the market. We already know that Apple has cheaper tech in the works. There are manufacturers working on "lesser" versions that don't have the "amazing 3D knitting for the one-piece headband..." that will be more affordable down-market versions. But you need something that blows people's hair back first.

stocknoob 3y ago

It’s not a device for most people.