Technology

(Personal annotations between parentheses. Edit: I know this is a long TL;DR, but it is an outrageously long article, especially considering its substance)

1. Person discovers VR at an arcade as a kid. Loves it.
2. Person stays tuned, life happens.
3. Person gets a Facebook Quest when it is out. Uses it daily. Loves it.
4. Person eventually stops using it. Can't say why exactly (Spoiler alert: lack of useful software, unpolished UX. Essentially, nothing beyond an awesome tech demo).
5. Failing to recognize the aforementioned conclusion (cue "spoiler"), person wonders if VR has a "fatal flaw".
6. Person states that Apple unveiling new tech is akin to major social and political landmarks (moon landing, JFK assassination, 9/11, ...).
7. Person depicts touch-centric (without proper buttons) interface as revolutionary (Looks to me as if this person never used proper, non budget peripherals[^1] ).
8. Person briefly strays to other cult-like tech firms and confuses scientific innovation (electric engines are hardly a revolution of this century) with (Tesla's) marketing.
9. Person states they were jaded by previous VR experiences, so the Apple Vision Pro (AVP) headset unveiling didn't wow them.
10. Person pre-orders one at 3.5k as soon as the pre-orders start anyway.
11. Cognitive dissonance due to the price, and Apple (religious) marketing kick in, and the person decides this is a life defining moment.
12. Person goes back home with their newly acquired liability, and informs their spouse that they will be intentionally failing their duties for a week, due to the previous point.
13. Person presents the product. At least, they don't hide the battery pack (as Apple did), nor some of the other flaws (FoV, avatars, etc).
14. Person also adds that the headset takes biometric information from you (iris scan, hard pass from me).
15. Person finally recognizes that UX is what was lacking all along.
16. Person also states that the screen and eye tracking is beyond compare (for 3x the price of the Kura Gallium, I sure hope so...)
17. Person also then recognizes that productivity apps were also missing all along, and that now, VR (magically) doesn't have any fatal flaw anymore.
18. Person makes predictions to justify their spending, stating that the number of apps will be multiplied by 1000, the technological improvement will also step up, and the price will (somehow!?) go down (original iPhone was USD 499 to 599, which is USD 750 to USD 900 in 2024 money, and that is lower than the price of the iPhone 15 models, which range from USD 800 to 1000 🙃)

[^1]: I personally hate touch centric interfaces with a passion. IMHO, no one in their right mind, who understands the prevalence of muscle memory/spatial memory, and the consequential importance of haptic feedback, of absolute coordinate systems, and of explicit information presentation, would ever even think touch-centric interfaces for sustained use are a good idea.