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Comment by nordsieck | Hacker News Reader

> The more time passes, the less I can shake the feeling that the world would be better if we tuned out our environment less.

That may or may not be true in general, but air travel is one of the most oppressive environments people regularly find themselves in. Being in an extremely crowded environment with very little personal space is psychologically uncomfortable for a lot of people. And it's basically not possible to escape that environment until the plane lands, which is typically hours of time. If it's OK to tune the world out anywhere, it's got to be in an airplane.

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Weirdly enough I love being on a plane (and airports). There's something psychologically freeing about them that I feel whenever I fly. I look forward to flying so much. And it's not like I'm flying first class or anything - I fly economy every time.

Maybe if I flew more frequently I'd grow to dislike it (I fly maybe once a year), but honestly airports and flying are my favorite part of a trip (yes, I like them more than any possible destination). TBF I haven't flown to anywhere particularly exciting but I fail to imagine any place matching the pleasure of an airport + flight. After writing this it sounds ridiculous but I'm 100% serious - I can't quite explain why I enjoy it so much.

I don't like flying that much but airports are an interesting place. I like people watching and just the spectacle of it all.

There's some funny tweets about airports like: "The airport is a lawless place, want to get drunk at 7AM? Go right ahead. Tired? Just sleep on the floor. Chips cost $15".

edit: came back to post this, i definitely get an odd feeling of liberation once i'm at an airport. I travel sometimes for work and once i get in to the airport waiting to board I feel like work and every day life ceases for a time and i'm free to do whatever. It's odd because i'm trapped in this building with hundreds if not thousands of other people waiting to get on a pressurized metal tube blasting through the sky at hundreds of miles/hr. Nothing very liberating about that but for some reason being in the airport feels that way to me.

> I travel sometimes for work and once i get in to the airport waiting to board I feel like work and every day life ceases for a time and i'm free to do whatever.

Yes, this is very much how I feel. 0 responsibilities and there's nothing I can actually accomplish during my time there. I just sit there reading a book or something, just waiting.

Can't stand airports, because from the instant you arrive, the success of your trip is now basically out of your hands but also incredibly precarious.

Maybe there's some ticketing snafu and it takes an hour just to drop your checked bag (sanctimonious carry-on fliers hold your posts like you hold the seventeen bags you try to drag on the plane)

Maybe security is insanely backed up or just run by incompetents, like the time at SFO where it took them 30 minutes to screen the 10 people in front of me.

Then once you get past security, a whole new list of potential problems comes up:

Maybe the incoming flight is delayed, possibly delayed so much you're going to miss your connection.

Maybe you'll board but the plane will be broken because the airlines don't believe in preventive maintenance, and you'll have to deplane again.

Maybe you'll board but due to various circumstances in airport operations you spend 3 hours sitting on the tarmac while the airplane gets increasingly hot and your toddler gets increasingly fussy.

Do you have to deal with the TSA where you fly? I take psychological damage any time I have to deal with them.

I do - I like to arrive early at the airport so it's just a long line to me. Unpacking my stuff to get xrayed is indeed a hassle but it's not a big deal to me.

I have TSA pre-check and while you still have lines now and then 5 to 10 minutes is pretty normal when I leave for a flight.

Waiting in line is not the problem.

I actually don't mind the flying bit too much but I absolutely hate airports...

> Being in an extremely crowded environment with very little personal space

I don't disagree with you but I can tell you don't take the NYC subway or Paris metro or the London Underground with any regularity. If you think an airplane is "extremely crowded" then you have no words to describe actual mass transit.

> air travel is one of the most oppressive environments people regularly find themselves in

How much of this would be solved by VR though? To me the unpleasantness of flying mostly comes down to physical discomfort. The seats are cramped, the air is dry, the food isn't great, the bathroom situation is uncomfortable, and you can't really walk around. VR would visually transport you somewhere else, but physically, you're still very much on a plane.

There's a reason people watch movies on planes - it's to distract you from the uncomfortable environment you're in. VR is more immersive than a 2D screen so it's more distracting.

As someone with generalized anxiety I hate almost every part of flying from the point at which I leave the house until I arrive, but none of what you mentioned bothers me terribly.

I'd be curious to try a device like this and see if it helps. I usually just use noise cancelling headphones and play a game or watch movies, which isn't too different from removing myself into VR, but I'm also aware that sometimes completely removing my sense of my surroundings can be more unnerving.

> people regularly find themselves in.

To me this is the most intriguing part of it all.

I understand tech reviewers and journalists raving about having something to do on planes, as they probably spend an awful lot of time there. Then perhaps sales people also flighting on company's dime.

But regular people don't spend much time on planes, and many of them don't need it to be an entertaining or efficient time, they can just spleep if the flight is long enough (I can't imagine lugging along a luggage the size of the Vision Pro for just a 2 hour flight)

In particular the plane staff won't let you tune completely out if you're awake: the whole safety sequence , take off and landing, turbulences, the in-flight meal, all the guidance for international flights, your neighbours when you've pulled the middle seat etc.

Many regular people bought tablets, expensive noise canceling headphones and other hardware with the express purpose of using it on a flight 2-6 times (1-3 round trips) a year. Of course, it gets used outside of a plane too - but that applies to VR gear just as well.

If they can get the price below $1500, I'm sure many regular people will buy it even if they fly less than 10 times a year.

> That may or may not be true in general, but air travel is one of the most oppressive environments people regularly find themselves in.

Most people don't regularly travel by plane. This is a very "1%" (as shorthand for a privileged minority of people globally, not literally exactly 1% of the population) problem.

> Most people don't regularly travel by plane. This is a very "1%" problem.

Except, they do in a country like the US that has massive distances between cities.

Even in the US, most people (50+% of the population) certainly doesn't regularly (say, more than once a decade) travel by plane.

49% in the last year according to this https://www.airlines.org/dataset/air-travelers-in-america-an...

Statista survey pre-pandemic says majority fly every year https://www.statista.com/statistics/316365/air-travel-freque...

Americans fly quite often.

Oh wow, I didn't imagine it's this many people. I stand corrected, thank you for looking up the numbers.

One of many reasons why per capita CO₂ emissions in US are 14.9t while in Germany, country that is always mentioned because they closed nuclear plants it is 'only' 8t (which is still higher than EU average).

Families tend to get spread out and vacations tend to be very short. There is a strong encouragement to meet for recognized holidays, so these are by far the busiest times at airports.

Last year, the prediction was 4.7 million people in the US traveling by plane over the thanksgiving holiday, which demolishes the 1% comment immediately.

4.7m is ~0.05% of ~8bn

If you look at everything in the larger group of world population you’ll end up with a lot of useless info.

You are greatly underestimating how common it is for Americans to travel by plane. Almost half of Americans fly at least once a year. It is sufficiently inexpensive that almost everyone can readily afford to.

I think that's supposed to be

> Except, they do in a country like the US that don't have any other suitable alternatives

A little bit of both, and they are related. Trains are a tough sell because they aren't competitive for most travel. Even at 300kph, they're only good for local-ish travel (by that, I mean up to perhaps as much as 1000km). Would be great for Portland to Seattle, or Portland to LA, but if you're going out of region (which is extremely common), an airplane will be way faster and almost certainly cheaper too.

I'd love a moderately fast train, say 200kph, between cities like Portland and Seattle. That's a great use case.

But as a nationwide network, there won't ever be a suitable rail alternative, unless it gets subsidized. Amtrak is already stupidly expensive for what you get.

They didn't say most, they said people.

1% of 300 million is still a 3 mill market size in the US alone.

I don't think it's a 1% problem, but it's a 40% problem:

https://www.airlines.org/new-survey-nearly-90-percent-of-ame...

44% of Americans flew commercially in 2022.

There's a whole world outside of the USA.

Sure, but 11% of the global population fly in a year

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095937802...

And how many of those are regular vs. irregular trips?

Probably not enough to make the statement that flying is a situation people find themselves in regularly.

Yeah, but “Rest of World cannot afford luxury travel” is not a notable fact. The US is rich. Americans are rich. For many things, the US is the only market where it’s feasible. A self-driving car is useless in India (1/6 of all people), for instance. Labour costs are too low.

It’s clear the Vision Pro didn’t find its market but I don’t think it’s an air travel thing.

80% of those people are flying economy class and already get along fine with earbuds and their phone. The remaining 20% that can afford something like Vision Pro almost certainly will choose not to.

People used to get along fine with a magazine or book; that doesn't mean they weren't ready for something better.

If those uncertain people decide they want to distract themselves with VR, do you think they'll buy the $350 headset or the $3,500 one?

I just don't see the market Apple envisions materializing. I'd expect 20 people to be using a Quest in economy before you see 2 people using a Vision Pro in business.

The author specifically says he believes people will be using the 4th or 5th iteration of the Vision Pro for this purpose. Why are you comparing prices of devices that won't exist for another 5+ years?

Because you and I both know Apple will never be price-competitive with the commodity segment. They are a luxury brand that relies on luxury margins, so I want to know why their business model will succeed.

If plane seating is anything to go by, most people don't want a luxury experience but a practical and cheap one instead. Most seats aren't reserved for premium passengers because they are a minority, maybe a profitable audience but not at all the primary one.

> Because you and I both know Apple will never be price-competitive with the commodity segment.

OG iPhone: $799

iPhone 3G: $199

> They are a luxury brand that relies on luxury margins, so I want to know why their business model will succeed.

Apple has shown many times over they don't need to be price competitive with the commodity segment. If you want to know why their business model will succeed, why not just look at their current business model which has been massively successful? Arguably the most successful business model in the history of consumer hardware.

>The most recent such poll was conducted online between January 9-31, 2023, in which Ipsos interviewed roughly 11,000 adults age 18+ from the continental U.S., Alaska, and Hawaii.

Same poll can result with statement "100% of Americans use internet."

Well, about 94% of the American population use the internet so it's a good base by which to conduct reliable surveys.

And a lot of those probably flew once to visit family at the holidays.

Google’s AI tool says that 20-25% of the world’s population flies at least three times a year. Not a good source, but at least a surprising statistic if true.

Some hard data says that 12% of US flyers take 66% of flights [1]. Those are all likely very frequent fliers, and is much more than 1%.

1. https://www.businesstraveller.com/business-travel/2021/03/31...

> most oppressive environments people regularly find themselves in.

It's boring but not oppressive. It's okay to let the mind wander without completely disconnecting yourself from reality.

This completely depends on the person. The environment of a plane (dry humid air, loud engine humming, babies crying etc) is oppressive to a lot of people, even more so if you're neuro-atypical.

I hope you repeat that lecture to everyone wearing an eyemask trying to sleep, or wearing heaphones for their in-flight movie (god forbid they brought noise-cancelling ones!)

The flying experience is oppressive in the sense of being a constricting, heavy-handed and overbearing environment, indifferent to your inconvenience or discomfort.

Where else can you get a full body cavity search, be denied water, be delayed by several hours without so much as an apology, be nickle-and-dimed with overpriced shitty food and $5 fees for a cab to drop you off, and have your luggage smashed up, all under one roof?

Of course, I'm not sure the Apple Vision Pro can do much to improve on the situation.

>And it's basically not possible to escape that environment until the plane lands

Ever heard of closing your eyes ?

For five hours?

It takes a lot of meditation practice to get up to "entire plane flight" level.

> That may or may not be true in general, but air travel is one of the most oppressive environments people regularly find themselves in.

What do you think is going to happen if, as the author predicts, “Apple Vision Pro will be on the face of every frequent flyer”?

My prediction is that the experience would get even shittier. Since everyone would be tuned out, there’d be even less reason for the airline to care.

My prediction is that airlines will start offering VR headsets much like they added seatback screens.

Lovely, just what we need: cheap devices with a motion-sickness-inducing laggy passthrough, poor resolution screens (when they work at all), covered in other people’s face grease.

Solution: bring your own!

Devices owned by someone else pointing a camera at your eyes and doing eye tracking...

I'd bet on them removing screens and not replacing them, potentially also getting rid of the headphone jack.

Perhaps they extend the charging ports some airlines are offering, with a bit more juice than a phone's battery to let people use their device for a bit longer.

That's a really interesting idea. Do planes have access to Starlink now? I could see a market for passengers to purchase a vr headset and decent inet connection on a flight. It would be tough to keep the headsets in good shape and clean though...

> Do planes have access to Starlink now?

There's a number of airlines that have signed contracts, like United. I think it'll take a while for everything to be completely rolled out.

Sounds like a lovely way to get pink eye.

> My prediction is that the experience would get even shittier. Since everyone would be tuned out, there’d be even less reason for the airline to care.

What can the airlines do to make it worse? I suppose they could cut out soda and pretzels. And get rid of the HUD on the back of the chair. But I don't think most people care that much about that stuff, especially since a lot of chairs have power outlets on them, even in coach.

IMO, the thing that people really care about is the amount of space they have access to - both width and depth. And I'm not sure how much more airlines can realistically squeeze that.

In a crowded plane you don't want to sit next to someone who tuned out their environment

Why not? It sounds pretty good to me.

Tuned out, plays something like fruit ninja and makes a hard cut to the right … in your face

> And it's basically not possible to escape that environment until the plane lands

You can buy a business class ticket. I will hasard that the overlap between people who can afford to buy a 3000$ VR headset and people who can fly business is pretty much total.

And then the person next to you needs to jostle you because they need to use the bathroom.

> psychologically uncomfortable

My brother in god, you can travel from any point of the Earth to any other point on the Earth in less than a week. At what point are modern people going to “deal with it”?

> My brother in god, you can travel from any point of the Earth to any other point on the Earth in less than a week. At what point are modern people going to “deal with it”?

Clearly people do "deal with it" since lots of people fly all the time. But that doesn't mean that the experience can't be improved.

But the improvement has almost nothing to do with entertainment options. It’s about space and comfort. To a lesser degree cabin service but that quite a way down the list.

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