“The story so far: In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” – Douglas Adams
“A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.” – Douglas Adams
“Would it save you a lot of time if I just gave up and went mad now?” – Douglas Adams
I came across a passage in The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy last night that pretty much sums up my thoughts on The Apple Vision Pro:
“For years radios had been operated by means of pressing buttons and turning dials.
Then as the technology became more sophisticated the controls were made touch-sensitive — you merely had to brush the panels with your fingers; now all you had to do was wave your hand in the general direction of the components and hope.
It saved a lot of muscular expenditure, of course, but meant that you had to sit infuriatingly still if you wanted to keep listening to the same program.”
To summarize:
It looks like a fun new way to watch a movie, but I have a hard time imagining it’s actually going to make our lives better, and a very easy time imagining it making our lives worse.
Yes, it’s new, and novel and, admittedly, extremely cool.
But new quickly becomes normal once novelty wears off and what is cool today will be boring and outdated tomorrow, so where exactly does this roller-coaster end?
And, far more importantly:
Do we really want to spend our brightest minds and biggest resources figuring out how to watch 4-dimensional Netflix, when we could be, let’s see…
…Curing cancer, eliminating fossil fuels, solving poverty and starvation, or redeveloping our painfully-dysfunctional schooling system?
Just to name a few ideas.
It is estimated that $20 billion was put into development of the Apple Vision Pro.
It is also estimated that $5 billion would wipe out hunger in Africa.
So my cranky 2 cents, for what it’s worth, is that we should slow down on building a new virtual reality until we start taking care of the one we already live in.
I could be way off the mark, and these shiny new goggles could be exactly what humanity is missing.
I just really doubt it.
– T
P.S. To play devil’s advocate…
(one more quote from Douglas Adams)
“I’ve come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies:
1. Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.”
…Maybe I’m just getting old.
