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Comment by 5350-uiop-1130 | Hacker News Reader

there's going be a stigma to wearing this anywhere in public imo.

conspicuous consumption dialed up to 11. unless you're in business class.

Predictions on Apple stuff are... well, I wouldn't put much stock in predictions around how people will respond.

iPad is just a big phone, iPhone doesn't have a keyboard, Airpods look silly, removing headphone socket is a mistake (i agree but didnt stop them selling), etc.

Personally, if I had the money, I would buy a Vision Pro day one. Sadly, it's about $3000 out of my price range :( Would I wear it in public? Probably not, but then I have no idea what sort of applications people will create for it, so who knows!

If someone creates something like Pokemon Go using the Vision Pro, I could see it suddenly being everywhere. Although I worry that theft will be easy and they're so expensive that not enough people will have them anyway.

> Although I worry that theft will be easy and they're so expensive that not enough people will have them anyway.

Isn't iDevice theft really low because of the Find My lockdown on devices? I.e. if a device has Find My installed if a device is stolen it can effectively be bricked because it's tied to someone else's Apple ID? I thought this entire thing made theft of Apple devices a mostly non-issue.

You're right, I hadn't thought of that.

I think most phones now can be remotely disabled, right? This article from April says over 90,000 phones were stolen in London UK alone last year: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/mobile-phone-thefts-ro...

I'm sure a bunch of them were iPhones, so it still happens. I guess even if you just sell them for parts there's a lot of value in an iPhone and presumably that will be true for the Vision Pro too.

You can’t really sell them for parts either because each iPhone validates it’s particular components and can’t be switched into a different phone.

It's still enough value that people still choose to steal iDevices

I think it goes beyond that. Like, if you have Find My turned on, then you can't really sign into your own Apple ID on a device with Find My turned on. I think it's called Activation Lock. Basically, you can only sign back into that device with the same Apple ID.

This is why trade in services (including Apple's) require you to turn off Find My. I think you even have to turn it off to send your device in for repair.

A seat on a long-haul flight is short on personal space, it is pretty much "I'm in public, but I'd rather not be". So wearable devices and sleep masks that signal "leave me alone" are quite common already. Creating "virtual personal space" doesn't seem like a bad idea.

> Creating "virtual personal space" doesn't seem like a bad idea.

it's a luxury that many can't afford.

"i'm forced to sit among the riff raff of economy so i'm wearing an expensive headset to avoid them"

There are many good ideas that many can't afford, there's no contradiction here.

long-haul economy flights aren't luxury, but neither are they poverty.

If I have to long-haul economy, then I usually create virtual personal space by splashing out $10 on some kindle books, and when my eyes finally glaze over, a sleep mask as a cheaper VR headset and "leave me alone" signal.

"Being" in whatever virtual world you want isn't going to stop the person next to you from being rude and intruding in your space.

Plenty of people have zero issue with sporting luxury brands in public. And really something like this isn't even a particularly expensive item by luxury brand standards.

When I look around in the economy class (HKG-CDG), many people are sitting here with iPads Pro or MacBooks. The financial difference to the VisionPro is not that huge.

But in class, wearing those there would be (afaik), no clear indicator of you paying attention to the teaching, that would be more akin to wearing airpod max to the class.

I think you misunderstood OP's comment, they were talking about _economy class_ in airplanes, not school classes.

Does anyone remember wearing Airpods outside in 2017? I did. People starred at me. It looked weird.

Nowadays, wearing Airpods signals that you have money and wealth.

Give it a few years and no one would care if you have a Vision Pro on in public. And then the cool kids will wear one and suddenly, everyone in high school is asking their parents to buy them one.

Apple's brand is incredible, really.

20 years ago people who talked on the street or public transport with hand free kit were weirdos (« they are crazy, they talk alone »).

It’s sometimes a matter of how many people use the technology like you said. The more there is, the less it’s noticed …

That was a strange one. My Freshman year of college I wore AirPods and everyone looked at like I was an idiot with too much money.

By my Junior year everyone was wearing AirPods and there was a greater stigma against people with wired earbuds (“oh, you can’t afford AirPods?“).

That was only 2 years. I think this AVP is more of a dev tool than a consumer product, but I think by v2 or v3 Apple will pull it off.

Exactly. 2017 isn't even that long ago.

It'll look weird initially and people will only wear at home. Then by v2, some people will wear it at work and coffee shops. By v3, people might be walking on the street with them on.

Apple's brand makes it "cool". Basically, using Apple products is a way to flaunt that you have money and influence. So I don't see why the Vision Pro wouldn't end up being the same.

AirPods are just earphones without a wire. I don’t see how is this really comparable…

The jump from wearing headphones with wire to wireless is a magnitude or two smaller than this. IMHO it would require 15-20+ years to not look weird to most people

Maybe I’m out of touch in the UMC bubble, but aren’t AirPods pretty so common they they are no longer really a status symbol?

iPhones aren’t anymore either. You seen poor people with them all the time.

You don't need to be rich to buy them, but you do have to care at least a little bit to spend $170 on headphones (or $250 for the Pro). I think they've continued to be a status symbol to some degree.

I could see a kid wanting AirPods because his cool friend has them. I don't think I'd see the same thing with Skullcandy, or Bose for that matter.

I would expect people buying this thing to fly business, but I think I have an unusually high aversion to flying economy.

I fly a lot, would not hesitate to buy VisionPro as a gadget. But business class, nope. In most cases, the price difference is simply too great compared to economy.

If I could spend $1800 each way on a business class upgrade, or get a Vision Pro... I know which one I'm picking.

While I don't have any particular interest in these devices, and won't be getting one, I'm in the general demographic that could easily afford them.

I'd never fly business, not if I was paying for it myself. I don't think I know anyone who flies business routinely for personal stuff; it really tends to be very, very expensive for what you get.

If I'm going on a 20h trip where 14 of those are in the air, flying business means I'm tired when I get to my destination but can function the next day - as opposed to 5 useless days when flying economy.

If that trip is for anything less than 3 months, the price difference can be well worth it.

> unless you're in business class.

If you can afford one of those devices for around 3500$, isn't this almost a given?

I think that my personal PC and everything in my homelab is worth under a half of that.

Not really. Business class can easily have that much of a premium for just one roundtrip international flight. Lots of people would consider buying an expensive computing device they'll get a lot of use out of without also paying thousands of dollars extra every time they fly.

Business class tickets often cost more than 3500 above than coach ticket for a single round trip.

I've spent at least $3500 on my gaming PC, and I may even get an AVP, if the reviews are extremely good. But I would never fly business class unless my company were paying for it (which they only will for international flights ... and we're strictly US-only). It's absurdly expensive and the delta over coach is minimal.

This would look even less conspicuous than the Google glasses. And unless there is a clear recording indicator (which admitedly sound easier to implement) would bear the same stigma.

It’ll be like upright ostriches heads buried in goggles blind to the outside world. At first it’ll be jarring but as more get pulled in it’ll cease being weird to most people. Still it’s hard to believe people would give up reality to immerse themselves in their disconnected bubble while in public.

It’s like the person who loses their senses of perception through tragedy and must imagine everything —except the imagining is being done for them.

> blind to the outside world

So... exactly like the huge number of people who wear sleep masks or blackout sunglasses on planes already?

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