Pros and Cons of the Vision Pro

Plus: Piracy Is Back in a Big Way. Streaming is to Blame.

Author

Steve
February 06, 2024

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Pros and Cons of the Vision Pro

There’s probably no bigger tech news this week than the release of the Apple Vision Pro, except maybe my fantasy football group chat discovering my 2003-era LiveJournal account and relentlessly mocking my teenage posts using multiple screenshots. What can I say, I loved emo music and writing cringe posts incorporating the lyrics!

Speaking of cringe, here is my current favorite “viral” Apple Vision Pro video:

You can’t walk and use the Vision Pro, thus I’m unsure about the provenance of this clip. Is it real or staged, promotional or satirical? One thing it definitely is not - pace Teslanomics - “the hardest, most futuristic exit of a Cybertruck owner.” The hardest, most futuristic exit of a Cybertruck owner will actually be when one inevitably crashes into something while using their Vision Pro and goes flying through the windshield.

Luckily for this gentleman, he was simply arrested.

All right, I’ve spent enough time mocking our modern day Glassholes. What impact will this tech have on this newsletter’s purview: entertainment? As Wired notes:

Neither [Netflix or YouTube] would have native apps on Apple’s new spatial computing device. Netflix’s co-CEO, Greg Peters, went on a podcast and wondered aloud if the Vision Pro was even “relevant to most of our members.”

The article goes on to suggest that large-scale movie consumption and TV binge-watching is unlikely to emerge from this first generation of Vision Pros, but could eventually arrive as the device gets smaller.

That seems to be the bet Disney is making, per Fast Company.

Without disclosing any specifics, [Disney] told me much more is on the way. “This product has touched every part of our company, from the studios to the teams that manage our streaming services to our mobile developers,” says LaBerge. “Even our teams at the parks have been involved in the things that we’re doing.” Behind the scenes, he adds, the headset is also “going to change our entire production and post-production pipeline. It’s going to change how we make content, how we operate our environments. It’s a big deal.”

So what’s my take? Well, I don’t want to have too firm an opinion until I can try one out. I would go to an Apple Store myself but unfortunately I’ve been banned from them due to my repeatedly watching gory horror movies on the display MacBooks. I was just testing the color space!

The folks walking around performing conspicuous consumption are annoying but that doesn’t mean the product itself isn’t interesting. I think the $3500 price tag will keep the Vision Pro out of any widespread adoption, but I agree with Zuck that it will create more general interest in these tools and likely push sales of other, less expensive headsets.

Will it be an industry-changing device like the iPhone? That’s less certain to me. Until the technology can be worn like a pair of sunglasses instead of a heavy, clunky headset with limited battery power, it won’t achieve any sort of mass adoption, price point or not.

As always, my favorite tech writer Ed Zitron has his own very skeptical take on the Pro which is well worth reading.

Piracy Is Back in a Big Way. Streaming is to Blame.

Recent articles from Bloomberg and The Daily Beast indicate a rise in Hollywood’s ancient nemesis: online piracy. Once thought vanquished, it’s on the rise again, and for reasons that may surprise you. From the Beast:

“I think there are lots of reasons why people download or use digital file sharing to access movies,” Giancarli said, “from ease-of-use, cost- and space-saving, because the film may not be available where they live or may be too expensive to obtain through traditional means.”

But Giancarli noted an ironic twist: “The people I know who do [pirate] are some of the most rabid cinephiles I know.” They’d happily pay for a movie if they could.

The Beast article cites recent actions like Warner Bros. Discovery removing the HBO show Westworld from its Max service and canceling Batgirl. As the article notes, “So what are a viewer’s options when a studio or streamer abruptly yanks a film or series from distribution or, eyeing a tax writeoff, cancels it right before release?”

As I’ve regularly observed, the streaming business has expanded to the point that it is no longer consumer-friendly. Customers are not going to continue shelling out for streaming services that can’t even offer the content that is supposedly exclusive to them. This is why AVOD, FAST channels, and yes - piracy - are growing alternatives to the subscription streaming model. As the Beast article concludes:

“The streaming industry has to converge towards a system where consumers can watch pretty much everything they like for an affordable price,” Van der Sar said. “That sounds straightforward, but in an industry that’s built around licensing silos with billions in revenue at stake, that’s easier said than done.”

Here’s a round-up of cool links about Hollywood and technology:

Can Apple keep spending $200 million on big screen gambles? (link)

Where to stream this year’s Best Picture nominees. (link)

The world’s most popular video game is a huge mistake. (link)