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Comment by jsheard | Hacker News Reader

The lower cost successor mentioned in the article is rumored to be aiming for ~$2000, and I honestly can't see there being that many people who wouldn't pay $3500 for Apple Vision but would pay $2000 for it. That's still just too much money for a platform with no killer apps yet, and the way the hype around the first generation fell off a cliff once it was actually in the wild is only going to make the second generation even harder to sell. When's the last time you heard anyone mention using a Vision Pro?

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Half price is an insane difference, but there are also minor design choices that kept people from the original.

The digital eye screen, the way windows stay static in reality by default, the limitations on apps, the straps were bad for long duration, etc.

There are tons of tiny tweaks they can make to make it drastically more appealing So m

I would think “the way windows stay static in reality by default” was a huge portion of the engineering effort required to make this product.

Don't forget a tethered battery puck. Makes me feel like my 2019 Quest hardware is from the future when I put it on...

Just target the rich kids. A few million units there. Watched a guy drop $3700 on stocking stuffer iPads last Xmas. Had to call wife whether 1TB was enough. Sales kid said it had been like that all week. I apologized for buying a 64GB air.

Couldn't even get into the Apple Store this year, too crowded.

I myself and surrounded by early adopters - none have moved to this - it's cumbersome and uninteresting in general. Let's hope for a "glasses form factor" in the future.

I had decided before the keynote that I would insta-buy at $2k. But obviously it ended up being way more than that.

There’s no way I’m paying $3500 for it but I think I’d still give it a whirl at $2k.

I honestly feel that if they can get the sports content, it'll sell.

They have three short videos, one football/soccer, one nfl, and one nba and they are really compelling of an experience. If they can do them for the games, I think everyone I know would be buying one.

The problem with this is that it's not an AR experience. If 6DOF video streaming takes off, then Meta is going to explode selling $400 standalone headsets.

Apple doesn't seem to understand that they cannot rely on branding to compete in this segment. If you're going to sell VR at Macbook Pro prices, then you better be courting Macbook Pro customers and not casual iPhone owners.

I’m not sure what you’re trying to say. How is what you’re describing different than immersive video or the non-immersive sports apps that do stuff like project a diagram of the field and advanced stats around you?

You're right that there's no technical moat at play with immersive video, however, I foresee this as a licensing moat that Apple could capture. If they are the only cameras on the field, it doesn't matter if Meta's headsets are cheaper.

I doubt any big-time streaming services would sign onto that unless Apple ammortized the expected losses. The price of the headset means nothing to media rightsholders, they just want to sell their content to the platform with the largest audience. If Apple's got 50,000 recurring viewers and Meta's got 500,000, most platforms are going to focus on where the eyes are.

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