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Comment by textadventure | Hacker News Reader

How is it doomed? It's selling, and most people are liking it more than they are disliking it. And with like any new category of product (all based on existing tech, but there is no alternative to the Vision Pro, that does the same things), there is people that are going to make wild predictions of its failure, like they did with the iPad.

So yeah, VR/AR headsets aren't going to replace smartphones anytime soon. But they don't NEED to.

And it costs $3500 NOW, first generation product, but there is a reason why the put "Pro" in the name, the implication being that they fully intend to do a more affordable version.

So as usual, it's not going to be any of the extreme predictions. It's neither going to be a total failure that Apple will stop manufacturing them, nor is it going to be such an overnight success that the average joe will stop paying their mortgage and instead get a gadget.

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It has no market. Sales will peter out to nothing after the hype because there just aren't a lot of customers out there who can drop that kind of dosh on a computer at all, let alone something that isn't nearly as capable as a computer like a headset. When you look at the sales of apples higher price SKU computers they are terrible. Mac studio sales for example are 1% of their mac sales (1). There just aren't many fish in the sea biting at these prices.

https://9to5mac.com/2023/01/09/apples-most-popular-mac/

> It has no market.

You don't know that, it's way too early to tell.

> Sales will peter out to nothing after the hype because there just aren't a lot of customers out there who can drop that kind of dosh on a computer at all, let alone something that isn't nearly as capable as a computer like a headset

But A) There are people who do spend that much on a computer and tech in general and B) Just because it may lose momentum after the hype doesn't mean it's a failure. If you want such a product to succeed, you are going to have to bankroll it and invest on it for a few year for it to get a legitimate chance.

> Mac studio sales for example are 1% of their mac sales

And the places that have them, wouldn't have any other product. They work with Macs and they will continue to buy these premium Macs until the end of time. It's a small market but it's a loyal market, especially when entire industries (like film post production, the recording industry, pro photography, graphic design) are all Mac-based.

So this just seems like a generic anti-Apple rant.

A workstation priced high is at least something professionals already have been buying, Apple or no. Who buys at $3500 headset today? Time will tell but I think people who scoff at the price being no issue don't really grasp how expensive $3500 is for most people.

I don't scoff at the price. At $3500 it's undeniably a luxury toy, but just because it's very expensive, doesn't mean it's a failure. There is nothing else that exists that does what it does, cheaper. Time will tell how interested people are in the kinds of things such a VR/AR headset can do, especially if developers are interested in creating more apps for it.

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