Sharp Tech with Ben Thompson - An All Things Apple Mailbag: AI and the Vision Pro, Gaming Ambivalence, Immersive Memories, VR Sports Rights

Episode Date: June 13, 2023

Responding to listener questions and comments in the wake of Apple’s WWDC and the announcement of the Vision Pro, including thoughts on the absence of AI in Apple’s messaging, a headset hater’s epiphany, gaming partnerships that should (but won’t?) happen, sports possibilities, immersive memories, and some obligatory speculation on the Apple Car.

Hello and welcome back to another episode of Sharp Tech. I'm Andrew Sharp and on the other line, Ben Thompson. Ben, how you doing? Do it okay, Andrew. Doing okay. Good. Well, I've got some exciting news for you. Are you ready?

What is that? Springing on me. Headset Week is rebranding. It's now headset Fortnite here. We're going to stretch it out for another couple days. Certainly one more episode. because look, last week, we put the call out for questions after Apple's worldwide developers conference and the porcupines were bringing back the porcupine name.

They responded in a big way with a bunch of different emails. But then when we recorded the second episode, we had so much ground to cover just recapping your experience and your thoughts on it that we were only able to answer one or two questions on the show, bad hosting by. me. And so today, I want to make it up to the listeners, the porcupines of the world and try to cover. It's a headset mailbag, basically. Exactly. All headset all the time. Continues for one more episode, although there are some general Apple questions here sprinkled in. And that's where we're going to start. Generally, Brian says, it seems to me that Ben has had two transcendent experiences with technology recently in his conversations with Sidney, the

chatbot and his demo of Vision Pro. I'd love to know what he thinks about them, given they both seem to signal something about the way we will live in the future. And also, speaking of Sydney, is it just me or did Apple's announcement of the Vision Pro cause everyone to miss the dog that isn't barking? They didn't have any major AI announcements in the keynote, and Siri seems to still be Siri. And then Nicholas adds. Do you have any thoughts on how long Apple can keep this going and keep up the lack of Siri usefulness? We got several questions about Siri and the lack of AI on the Apple front. Well, first off, Apple did not say the word AI that I can recall.

They did explicitly use the word transformer, which is sort of the technology that undergirds these large language models, this new way of doing machine learning, which is meaningful because it's a different way to do it than the way Apple has. been doing it with Siri, which is more sort of natural language processing. It's a much more sort of deterministic approach. I mean, Apple is doing machine learning, but Transformers is really a lot about a large amount of data and its ability to do sort of one-shot warning, figure stuff out very quickly by taking in more context and doing the sort of we talked about sort of predicting the next

sort of word sort of aspect. And they announced that in two contexts. Contacts number one was keyboard auto correct, which sounds like an excellent potential application of this, and they announced in the context of better speech recognition. So that second one is super important for the headset, for sure, in particular. I mean, I'll be the first one is two, but the one other sort of major interface that I didn't really use. It was more a matter of, I didn't think to use it.

I mean, I think there was one time I had a text field, which was in the browser, and I was more interested in trying to figure out the sort of touch keyboard, which was terrible. Whereas you can just read, right? You can just say, strategy.com. I would have loved to have seen had it actually fill that in correctly. The way it was shown in the demo, I thought was very impressive.

But, you know, Siri can look impressive with demos. It's definitely not sort of saying anything. I do think for the Vision Pro specifically, that is kind of the big question. If they can get their speech recognition really fast, up to par, works super well. that I think in that context you already have the headset in your face like speaking what you want to write I think is going to make a lot more sense than sort of sitting at your computer when the keyboard is right there now that was not what I had in mind and I was talking about productivity I was assuming you're going to have a keyboarded mouse there and you're just having a much more sort of expansive workplace but I when I went back and sort of watched I rewatch sort of the video or some aspects of it or maybe it was in someone's article or something thing. I do think that speech aspect can and will make a lot of sense if Apple can get it right.

And if they do, this is sort of a, you know, it's a bit Google-esque in that they have places to apply this sort of learning without having to be like explicitly come use the AI thing, right? Like, open AI, the reason why they're interesting to consider as a potential consumer platform is because chat GPT resonated so strongly that people actually. went to the chat GPT website and tried it out, right? Google, they're already going to Google. It's just the question to what extent are they going to surface that? There's all the cost questions that we talked about. The other thing with Apple is they're, you know, both of those applications to autocorrect and the speech recognition, I would imagine both of them are at least,

particularly the auto correct is something that's running on device, which it's tuned to Apple's chips. They have the best capabilities there. And it's free. Right? I mean, it'll cost money as far as battery goes and actually running it. It's free and getting better. One of the big stories to emerge from WWDC was that ducking is no longer going to be a problem with the auto-correct. A good TBD, right? They always look good in the demos, right? But I do think it's reasonable to assume. I mean, you use something like actually one of the ways you can experience is you can use chat GPT, the app. The app has Whisper built in. which is the open AI sort of transcription layer. And it's incredible. Like it blows Siri utterly and completely out of the water,

even to a great, I don't know, it's hard to compare it. Google's stuff is already much better as well. But, you know, if you can use chat TPT on your phone by talking to it, and it works really, really well. And to the extent Apple can achieve that, that will make their actual product that much better. So let me ask you, is it important to the Vision Pro product? because as a layperson, if Siri is a terrible product now and it hasn't affected Apple's business so far,

I'm not sure why it would in the future as far as an iPhone is concerned. Yeah, I mean, I think before the event, I ventured that Syria was going to be a real problem for this device. And then we get into the demo and I don't even think to test out the voice recognition. I think that was a bad take by me. The reality is, is the eye tracking interface is so freaking good. Again, for entering text, that virtual keyboard is not going to cut it. So I do think that having, you know, using the voice recognition, it's clearly going to be important. But it's not like you're navigating by your voice or whatever.

I mean, the voice, the eye tracking really is the star there as far as sort of the UI is concerned. And it's worth remembering. I mean, I think my big picture takeaway here to go back to Brian's question about Sydney and the Vision Pro and these sorts of things. Yes, let's power rank your tech epiphanies this year. Well, no, it goes back to 2020 when I wrote sort of the end of the beginning, which I, you know, I've taken a couple of Victorups on this, but I'm going to keep doing it because I got a lot of grief about that and people taking me to task saying that. So that was a ridiculous take.

But basically being like, look, we've established the foundation sort of of computing and what's going to come next is going to be sitting on top of that. And that's exactly what we're saying. We're seeing this AI stuff. Most of all, it's all in the cloud. It's in Microsoft's cloud. It's in Amazon's cloud. No one's building a new cloud service, right? Why would you do that?

It's just going to be in their clouds. Even in Vida, their cloud service is sitting on top of those clouds, right? Like, it's just like there's no point in duplicating that effort. It's done. That infrastructure is sort of built out. And then meanwhile, you have, you know, the devices, chat GPT is something you access on your Mac or on your phone. They're not coming out with sort of a new device. Now, Vision Pro is a new device, but it's built on sort of the foundation of Apple's device sort of dominance in general.

And one of the takeaways from that article is that long-term sustainability and long-term modes does come from not being an aggregator, which I spend a lot of time writing about, but from being rooted in the real world in a meaningful way. And the three companies that I talked about in that article that were was Apple, Microsoft and Amazon. Apple with the devices, Amazon with their massive investment into logistics and also all their data centers, Microsoft with their data centers. And this is kind of a fuzzier one,

which was their, you know, just their sales and like their go-to-market motion in general, and the way there's just a natural conduit for enterprise sort of stuff. Google was in there, but they were a little if you're, because there's more software,

but also they had Android. Android is sort of a huge sort of feather in the cap. And, you know, they have like Chrome and things on those lines. Facebook was the one that was sort of purposely excluded. And I think that is actually an excellent framework for looking at this. Why is Google feel a little more vulnerable? What they're rooted in, particularly Google.com, is that habit of people going to that page.

Right. But people could go somewhere else. Now, except for Android, it's always going to be Google, right? That is a meaningful moat in a really significant way. Facebook is trying to get into this with the physical sort of stuff, but it's not to the same extent these other ones. And I think what you're seeing playing out is now that foundation is in place, what can happen on top of that? What can be sort of be downstream from that reality? And, you know, it is quite exciting.

Like, like, I would say 2020 was a bit of the sort of nadir of, you know, of like, you know, there would tell on antitrust and like, you know, you've been around with these same companies for ages and X, Y, Z. And it's really cool to sort of leave the 2010s behind, the companies that want. and now we're exploring sort of new grounds. And I think that's definitely pretty cool. You know, I'm right there with you. And it's funny because last week at the end of our second Vision Pro podcast, I said, yeah, maybe we'll get to the haters case next week. And I'm not really interested in the haters case.

Like, I feel bad. This is incredible. I feel like I'm laying down my sword here. I'm sorry. It took you like six months. This is unbelievable. Well, it's tough because look, if I'm putting all my cards on the table, you know as my friend, and I'm sure at this point a lot of the listeners know, my instinct is that directionally, this is not something people want from their tech products, like the Vision Pro specifically. People probably want less immersion going forward, not more immersion. And it's possible that I'm projecting my own desires for the future of society onto a bunch of faceless consumers. But it's also possible that, you know, people, in tech underestimate some of the primitive reactions people have to headset technology that's as

isolating as this appears like it might be. But that said, the reason I am not going to lift the haters embargo and just crap all over this now is because you're right. Like, I don't want to talk about another of like 8,000 SaaS businesses and have that be what we do on the podcast. Like, This is new. This is exciting. And it's just more fun to watch these insane gambols play out and insanely ambitious ideas and see what it turns into. And I am jealous that I haven't been able to experience the Apple tech because I do feel like that was sort of pivotal in sparking this joy that I've seen in you over the last week or so. And I think it is something that people are going to have to experience in order to expand their mind and embrace like the possibilities of what this

could turn into. I mean, I'm floored by this take. I mean, it sounds like you're kind of Darren Rovel. You feel bad for society that is coming along, but it's tremendous content. It's great podcast content. And now that you're a content producer, that is that is over, that is taking over your contrarian sort of instinct, although in this case, I think it's not really a contrarian instinct.

I would say that's even though, I think. people are like they're kind of raising their eyebrows at the enthusiasm of people to this device. But that's the most they're going to grant. I think there was like everyone assumed they're going to hate it. And they're like, I'm probably going to hate it, but I do have to admit these people are pretty worked up about something. And everyone who has tried to swim in these waters has failed for the last 30 years. So it's not like you're going out on a limb to say that this will fail to.

and it's easier to be a hater on stuff like this. Like in sports, for instance, if you say player X just doesn't have what it takes, he's never going to win an NBA title, you're probably going to be right because it's fucking hard to win an NBA title. Sometimes you're going to be talking about James Hardin and you're going to be really, really right.

But at the same time, you just have to sort of, it's less interesting to be the hater, I would say. So I am embracing the possibilities. You're trying to drive me to being the hate. I don't know how I feel about this. But I mean, this is a Jedi mind trick here. It is an example of this is above and beyond the chip capabilities,

above and beyond the software capabilities, above and beyond the manufacturing capabilities, above and beyond the integration of all those aspects. This right here is maybe the single biggest reason why only Apple could pull this off if they pull this off, which is Apple has just a legion of people that, that will give them the benefit of the doubt, right? That they will, like, they will have not tried it on day one.

This thing's going to go on pre-sale. Yes, they'll have it in the stores, but it's not going to be the stores until it's actually available, right? So presumably they're going to put it up for pre-sale. There's going to be a bunch of people that have never tried it. Yeah. That will drop $3,500 because Apple made it. And those people are going to evangelize it and their friends are going to try it,

X, Y, Z. Now, there's going to be challenges around things like Wednesdays and stuff along those lines. you know, how do you sort of share a headset is going to be an open question. It turns out, well, it will recognize your eyes and log in as you. I think it only supports a maximum of two. And I think the one is like the logged in one. And one is like a guest account or something like that. That was Bill Bishop's question.

I promised I would ask it on Sharp Tech. Yeah, it looks like it's a little more constrained that then you might have hoped as opposed like being. But I mean, which is weird. When I was in there, they have, oh, it's modular. You can switch out the lenses and stuff like that. So maybe that's a short-term limitation. But I don't know, we'll see.

But, uh, but again, but Apple has that sort of, you know, this is really all their advantages and investments as far as brand and having a fan base and having people that, you know, because it's Apple, you know, just they have a degree of willingness to suspend disbelief that no other company has. And that may be essential to this, you know, to this succeeding. Well, speaking of Apple's reputation, Dan says, after reading Ben says, after reading Ben, Ben's report on the Vision Pro, I had to ask, what does Ben think about military and or industrial uses for the Vision Pro? Except for not squaring with Apple's marketing narrative and all-around positivity, this sounds like a perfect military and or industrial platform. From crane operators to tank operators to drone operators and all that jazz, is this a possibility? And with Apple, is this a good market for this hardware?

And I want to thank Dan because it really cracked me up imagining the visual of Tim Cook at WWDC saying, and one more thing and then strapping on the headset and simulating drone warfare in front of a horrified audience. Watch me bomb the shite out of these people. This is the future. So what do you think, though, in terms of its industrial applications? there's definitely an opportunity there. I don't think it's one that Apple is probably going to lean into at the beginning. But I mean, there's lots of really interesting angles here where there's a bit where this is kind of the counter to only Apple could bring this to market,

where it feels like there's a bunch of opportunities where if anyone but Apple had this, what they might sort of do with that. So industrial applications is certainly one. Microsoft was sort of weeding into that a little bit with the whole, Leds 2, which I think technically still exists, but is basically, you know, a dead headset walking. Microsoft has played this, I think, overall very well in that, like, they just don't have the hardware shops to keep up.

And that's not their business. They're not a hardware company. They are a services company that ought to have their software everywhere. And so remember last year, they were the highlight partner with the Quest Pro. And this year, they were in the keynote. Do Excel on your headset, right? Which, I mean, playing it very, very well exactly as they should. There is one angle that I think would be very, very interesting to see.

What should happen, but I doubt it will, because I don't think Apple has it in them, is there should be the Apple Vision Pro should be the Xbox's VR headset, where if Sony is building VR, they have the whole thing going on, they're trying to invest in it. This should be a case where, look, Apple, you're bad at gaming. You don't know how to build an ecosystem. Microsoft has invested in this, has done this. They already have this aspect of this cloud gaming approach. They should be your gaming platform. Xbox should be the gaming platform of the Vision Pro. And it's a shame it's not going to happen in large part because Apple will never, I think, allow it to happen.

But that would be like, that's a great example of where any company about Apple, like this is such an obvious partnership that would be a win for both sides. But I don't think it's going to happen. That's interesting because we got a note from Clay who said, I believe one of the most compelling uses for Apple's new headset is to play console games, even if they're not going to be 3D games. This device is perfectly suited for cloud gaming with Apple providing high-resolution screens and spatial audio while the cloud gaming platform handles all the heavy-duty graphics processing. This emphasizes the need for Apple and Microsoft to resolve their differences.

So what are the differences that are driving a wedge between, that potential partnership. I mean, I'm sure that could be a whole separate podcast, but can you give me a Cliff Notes version? Well, Microsoft wants their big strategy is this Xbox Cloud GamePass, right, where you should be able to access all your games, you know, through their service. Right. And the app store doesn't allow it.

Ah. So it's actually pretty straightforward. I mean, they say if you want to have a game, it has to be individually listed. So you have to break out all those games separately instead of having sort of one place and you sort of access it. They can have, you can access it via safari, and Apple has sort of begrudgingly caught Safari up in a couple important areas. So that's actually viable and playable, including sort of be able to use your controller without as much, you know, wait and see lag as there was a little bit ago. But it's still sort of an open issue.

I think they, you know, Microsoft's pretty irritated at Apple about that. You know, and, you know, it's kind of annoying. Well, and it'll be interesting because Clay added that. Microsoft's cloud gaming works great with meta thus far. Yeah, the issue is I don't think Apple cares. Like, like, I mean, I don't think, you know, we had this debate on dithering. And frankly, I think John was off as rocker. Like, you're showing, having compatibility with a PlayStation or Xbox controller and showing someone playing an iPad port of a basketball game, that's not a commitment to gaming.

There is no commitment to gaming here. There's an absence of a commitment to gaming. It's like a almost having that demo in was just to demonstrate. how little you care about gaming for a device that everyone thought would be about gaming. And how much of that is related to Apple maintaining its image and what it's trying to project about this product? Like it seems like there's good gaming capability that they're maybe under emphasizing because they want people to think about this as more than just a gaming device. Yeah, I don't, I'm not sure if there's good gaming capability, honestly. So there's this whole thing with the eye tracking and the hand tracking.

I heard it doesn't work super well at extremely high speed. Like if you're going around playing a game, there's a question of how much information they're actually passing about the eye tracking. Now, they talked about in the context of privacy, where websites and apps should not be able to know what you're looking at and thus be able to market at you sort of based on your gaze. But you could imagine some really cool games if they could track your eyes, right? If you could actually like imagine playing space invaders with like,

tracking your eyes, right? But it's not clear. I haven't gone through the WC session, so maybe this is addressed. I'm sure someone will emails in this case, but I don't think you're going to have that sort of direct sort of control, which, again,

there's a legitimate reason for that, but it also speaks to the idea of the people that are in charge of this device don't seem to have a very high priority on gaming. And again, that is in pattern with Apple historically. The iPhone is a huge gaming point. platform, but that's a function of it just being such a dominant, large platform that's a phone. People have made gaming work despite Apple. Now, Apple has to some extent, they have made

a lot of investments on, you know, with the metal and obviously they have, you know, very capable GPUs on a efficiency basis. It's not capable like an Nvidia car, like on a top end basis, right, where you're just drawing a lot of power. And, you know, even with the Mac Pro, which was announced and the fact that you can't expand it with external graphics cards. Like it's just not something that the company prioritizes. And, you know, it's just a fact of life. And, you know, I think that's- But they should do it with the headset is your take.

They should figure this out with Microsoft and try to optimize. No, I actually think, I think Apple not doing it is totally fine. They've shown for the last 30 years they're bad at it. So I think, but I think this is a great example where a partnership would be, be a massive win-win where you should be able to get the Xbox game pass in there. You can, again, all those things they show, like watching a movie in there is still super great because you're in this sort of immersive environment. You should be able to do the same thing with playing like an awesome console game.

Right. You know, like playing, you know, what Call of Duty is this, you know, at question with Activision Microsoft, imagine being, they'll play Call of Duty even in a two-day sort of aspect ratio. Even that experience has got to be one of the like, four or five most popular experience. Absolutely spectacular. Yeah. And they can get now they can get the movie experience because the movies, they'll sell movies to anyone.

All the streaming services will be in there. This will, this would be a killer app for the headset in my estimation. And just a question if they can sort of bury the hatchet. It seems like they should make a partnership with Microsoft. They should let Microsoft maybe, you know, they should let Microsoft have their own app with all their self. contains sort of games and you know maybe it's only on the vision pro it's not on like the iPad or something like that i don't know i'm sure microsoft would push for the opposite but it seems like just a real a real win uh for sort of both parties and but again i'm you're not holding

your breath is not what apple does yeah fair enough um okay well we'll keep it moving here we're trying to be efficient today cover as many questions as possible well let me jump on one more thing because i we did talk about a little bit on the last show but this bit about limiting Microsoft is assuming they will limit the operating system like they do iOS and iPadOS and that it won't be a Mac. If it's a Mac and it's open, Microsoft can just put their app on there and it's fine. Which goes back to the broader issues about, you know, what is the potential for this headset? Can it be a standalone computer for most people? Is that how Apple envisions the future for it?

And we don't know at this point? I mean, I think all evidence is that Apple, supports the Mac as that's the legacy platform that lets you actually do computing stuff. Yep. And they're Team Sharp. I like it. And to the extent that you use a Mac, you want Mac like capabilities in the headset, then you can project it into the headset. Okay.

Well, we'll continue to monitor their thinking on that over the next 10 years or so. That's what's exciting. We've got 10 years of taste to look forward to now because all of this has a pretty long timeline. Set it up. Then when they announce it, we can criticize it. Oh, yeah. So many different cycles. Two questions on price strategy. So first we have Anthony.

He says, in the long run, I imagine Apple wants to push in two directions. Making a more mass market affordable version of the headset, parentheses vision light, and making a smaller, lighter, truly portable version of Vision Pro that looks more like a regular pair of glasses. So, Ben, in your estimation, what comes first? A miniaturized Vision Pro device at a very high price point or a version of today's Vision Pro at an iPhone-type price. What do you think? Yeah, I don't think we're going to get an iPhone price anytime soon. That said, if I had to choose, I think that's coming before, like, eyeglasses you've been around. Again, everything that Apple showed here was about being at home

or being at an office and being relatively sedentary. Yes, there were people walking around. There was the guy at the counter and a guy at a standing desk, etc. But by and large, this was not a walk around on the street sort of thing. Even if that is, even if the pass through is so great

that it definitely would be viable. We didn't even see Tim Cook or Bob Eiger on stage in a headset, which in theory would have been like an obvious sort of way to display it. But everything were these staged environments at home or in offices. Yeah, and I thought that, Chris, and they're not wearing it, was kind of silly.

We talked about it last time, whatever. We need to get into it again. But I do think certainly the name Vision Pro implies there's going to be just a vision, right? And maybe, you know, or Vision Air, I don't think it'll be Vision Light. I think just Vision, right? There's just MacBook and MacBook Pro. Is there a MacBook now? There used to be.

There's just a MacBook error now. Yeah, the Air and the Pro. I've got both. Love both. So, both though, you know, so certainly I think they're going to try to go down market. But I do think the issue of where they can cut costs is going to be constrained. They've committed to this high resolution screen and this sub 12 millisecond pass through. And those two things are huge tradeoffs that are going to take a long time to sort of become more affordable as long as that's the case.

Now, if they want to have not have a low resolution screen and they want to not have this sort of. of real-time pass-through, sure, they could make a quest just like Facebook did. Those are the choices Facebook made. But why would they do that? Like, it makes no sense. They're not chasing that market that Facebook is chasing. All the things they put forward were about this sort of interpret, like being able to be present with, you know, see other people through it, to have this real-time pass-through,

not be locked in sort of a world, number one. And number two, productivity, doing work. sort of getting stuff done. And both of those are dependent on those two choices. So I don't think they're going to compromise on those two choices. And as long as they don't compromise on those two choices, it's going to take a while for these prices to come down. I think those are very expensive choices that they made.

Interesting. Yeah, that was Jesse's question on prices. Does it seem like we just need to wait while Apple finds its way down the cost curve for various breakthrough technologies that it's using. What I would love to see personally, so they could force people to use headphones, for example, instead of having like their speaker system. You could have a plastic headset, which I actually think would be much better because it would be lighter.

Like I would not like this whole glass and aluminum sort of thing. Like it's a pretty, it's a pretty heavy headset. They could also go away from the, you know, the front facing eyes. I'm sure that has a significant expense. but they could have fewer sensors, fewer cameras. But, you know, again, I just think my sense is that is integral to what the vision is. And so that's why my sense is it will take longer for the price to come down. They're going to sort of bet that people will realize the value that it's, you know,

that it's the high price that drives the differentiation and makes it so much different from a question. or Quest Pro. And if you want to do work, if you want to actually get these positive use cases, it's worth the price. That's my sense of where they'll go. But certainly there are places they, like, again, Facebook will be shipping a Quest 3 at $500 that does pass through, right?

It's not going to be as low latency and it's not going to be as high resolution, but it's certainly doable. Okay. Well, if there's an option to buy a version of the Vision pro, the vision that's $1,000 cheaper and doesn't have the creepy eyes that are projected outward. I'm in. So whatever that is contributing to the overall cost. We haven't actually seen it in practice.

So, you know, it's to be determined. Maybe it does make the experience sort of in an office much better. I mean, it is funny. Like, if you know anyone that works at Apple, everyone hates Apple Park. Like, it's very beautiful, but it's like a terrible place to work in. There's not enough conference rooms. Everything's open seating, blah, blah, blah. again, you'll hear a complaint sort of left and right up and down.

It feels like a San Francisco situation where you can't catch a taxi so they feel compelled to invent Uber. Maybe this is a situation where we had such a terrible office space that we need to actually create a headset where you could actually, you know, get away and get some done. Somewhere less miserable. But I don't know, we'll see. Yeah, well, I'll believe it what I see it as far as interacting with people well with the Apple headset.

TBD is right. Rob says, I was listening to the latest Sharp Tech where you discuss Apple's increasingly infamous detached dad segment with the father wearing the Vision Pro at his daughter's birthday party. While I imagine iPhones will get the capability to record 3D video at some point, an even more straightforward solution occurred to me. Couldn't you just hold the Vision Pro like a camera? It even has a shutter button exactly where you'd expect it to be.

this would be no more or less intrusive than an iPhone or a traditional camera, but still have the desired camera separation and so on. What do you think, Ben? Is that a hack through the problem we were discussing last week? Yeah, it definitely seems like a hack. I think the reality is, number one, there's going to be standalone cameras. And then number two, you know, if the most interesting question is will Apple actually ship an iPhone that can take stereoscopic video? Again, it's not going to work with an iPhone as it is.

The whole stereoscopic video, the cameras have to be separated. But is it enough to have one on each corner for an iPhone, for example? It's interesting because Apple redesigns the iPhone every three years. And so the new iPhone is coming this year, which will sort of, you know, would be, you know, would they be so aggressive as to release something this year that has a new way of sort of like, that looks as bizarre. It seems doubtful because by this point, it would have leaked, right?

But that's the most obvious solution is if you think the world is going to be sort of 3D, then slap 3D cameras on the phones that you're shipping in the, you know, hundreds of millions. Yeah, I was talking to friends about the Vision Pro over the weekend and trying to explain some of the different functionality that we were talking about last week. And the one piece that I feel like... I think you need to like record one of these conversations and then we just play it in place of a sharp tech, right? I can critique your...

Yeah, totally. You could break it down. The one place where I threw up my hands is the immersive memories. I feel like you have to just experience that to have a real take on what it looks like. But I've seen so many different reviewers who were just blown away by that particular experience. I wish you had a deeper reservoir of pop culture knowledge and had watched Black Mirror. There's one Black Mirror episode that it covers me. memory and vivid memories like that immersive memories in detail and it just makes you feel like

you're there. It seems like that's what it does. I don't know whether you have any more color on the immersive memory aspect of it. No, it's kind of been a bit of self-reflection about how everyone is like flipping out all this feature. I don't think I even wrote about it or maybe I just did slightly in passing. I think I only did in the context of observing this, you know, broader trend towards isolation and loneliness that they seem to be leaning into with that sort of divorced dad sort of

motif. It's incredible. It really, really is incredible. In addition to not being a pop culture connoisseur, I am not someone that is one to sort of live in memories and pictures and photos. I, you know, of course I take photos, but I throw them into photos. I'm like, well, if I want to actually organize them and have them edited and stuff like that, I could do that in the nursing home when I'm like 75 years old or 80 years old. Yeah. So I'm just the wrong person to ask. I've not Mr. Sentimental. I am all about being in the present, in the moment. And maybe that's part of the why the aspect of that sort of turn me off, right?

I mean, the Phil Knight is my hero for the, you know, the LeBron James setting the scoring record. Everyone's holding up their phone and he's the dude just sitting there sort of enjoying the moment. That's sort of the way I try to live my life. I mean, the Apple event is a great example. I go to the Apple event at Apple Park. I walk in there with nothing. I have my phone in my pocket.

Like, why do I need anything else? I don't have to go through a bank search. I don't have to X, Y, Z. If I need to reference the keynote. Now, again, part of this is the benefit of my job. Like, I didn't have to write anything until the next day. So I could go back and think about it. And yes, I'm up all night, but I can write an article and be thoughtful, X, Y, Z.

I always love seeing the verge guys there. They're unbelievable. And they're all loaded up with equipment. And they're pushing stuff out right away. Real time. Yeah. Yeah. It was funny because now that they're doing this watching it in real time,

there's like a 30 second advantage for people that were there. And so like for them, it's like live vlogging is back, baby. We are actually ahead of the stream. If you want the fastest thing. And so I don't begrudge that at all. But I certainly appreciate and am grateful that I can just sort of. Soke it in like a regular person. Yeah.

And watch the keynote. Phil Knight. Absolutely. Yeah. Well, to get sappy, Alice has started taking videos of little Charlie every morning when she wakes him up. And he's like strapped into his crib and he'll start grinning. And so I watched these good morning videos all day long. And I try to take one myself. And I felt really creepy holding like an iPhone six inches from his face trying to video this kid. Now imagine looming over him. I know. Like that headset would be. So much worse. So hopefully Apple develops a standalone camera, a nice middle ground for everybody. I think someone else will, right? I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if they're partnering with, they should partner with a Canon with a Nikon or Sony is probably, you know, they, you know, come out with a stereoscopic camera, then be marketed, be sold in an Apple store.

You know, this, this will show videos, make memories, right? Yeah. A memory camera. That's like, that's kind of the name for it. And something that allows you to be present. for the moment that also records the moment would be awesome. Right. I mean,

you think about just holding a camera is going to be better or holding an iPhone than having these things dropped. I mean, I guess we're describing video cameras and tripods. I mean, that was the one way to put it that makes it, I think, a little more palatable is just throw up a picture of a dad in the 80s

with a big camcorder on his camera, the big eyepiece, right? Like that's, you know, and what you did, you pulled it out for five minutes for the birthday party. and then the rest of the time you put it away. That seems like a non-objectionable. I'm going to put the headset on for the candles.

We're going to, and then I'm going to put it away and enjoy the rest of the party because who's going to wear it on their face for like a moron. And then eventually we'll get to the point where it's much more portable and easier. I think that's, you know, I don't think, I, again, I was surprised at the pilot. Because when I talked about it,

I actually brought it up to, you know, some Apple executives I was talking to after I had the demo. They seemed shocked. Like, really? That was your takeaway? I'm like, I mean, it's going to be a lot of people's takeaway. And then I get out afterwards or after I wrote my, because I, you know, that day I'm super focused. I was barely reading Twitter at all or anything.

And I'm like, oh, that was not the only person that noticed this. So I got a bad feedback from Apple. I'm like, oh, maybe I'm no one that noticed this. I kind of felt the need to talk about it. But no, I, yeah, it sounds like a lot of people. And that is, it's one of the most interesting aspects of this entire proposed transition is I think that people who are inside, either meta or Apple developing this technology don't have a sense for how complicated people's

relationship with technology already is. And so a lot of people watching that did have like a visceral reaction. And you could see that in the 72 hours of takes that followed. Sure. But I mean, you could make the exact same thing pre-Iphone, right? If you told people that you're going to be on your iPhones all the time, like going forward and it's, you know, you're, again, That was the frog with a slowly boiling pot.

We didn't realize what we were getting into with the iPhone. Now I think everyone's eyes are open in terms of some of the compromises you make as you get more and more reliance on this technology. The thing we see with technology, I think probably social media is the preeminent example of that, is it is a massive bifurcation between stated preference and revealed preference. People say they don't want to be on their phone. And they say they don't want to be using social media. They say, say, say, say, say, and their actions are the exact opposite. And now, some people might say, oh, that's because these products are so sort of abusive and addictive. Yeah, maybe there's probably some aspect to that.

I think it's probably overstated. I think people just actually really enjoy using it. They find it pretty interesting and more interesting than the real world. And they feel bad about that because to some extent maybe genuinely, maybe some aspect because they feel they ought to feel bad about it. it. There's a lot of things in life. People can feel bad about because they feel like they should feel bad about it. But the reality is, is their phone's pretty interesting. Social media is pretty fun. And that's how people actually behave and operate. And, you know, so when it comes to a headset, it's actually pretty cool. It's actually fun to use. And yeah, maybe you're not, it's, it's only a

couple people that will pull it out at a party because then other people might judge you and feel bad. But when you're home alone, more headset, please. Yeah, well, time will tell on that front. I'm not sure what the revealed preferences will actually be. But you get to play life coach with this next question. Sam says, I'm a young software engineer with big dreams. I have not worked on iOS development. But thinking back to when the iPhone debuted, it must have been an incredibly in-demand skill set with low supply to be able to write code for iPhone apps. Is this a new goldmine with the Vision Pro? Should I become a VR developer and fork over the $3,500 just for my own testing purposes? And to be more general for any non-developers out there, is this headset potentially as revolutionary as the iPhone was? Go Nuggets, Sam. Congrats to Sam on the Nuggets. They are rounding third here and about to seal the NBA title sometime in the next 96 hours.

Excellent. I turn that reverse jinx about three hours for the game starts. least I could do as an Eastern conference fan. Do you have thoughts here on what Sam should do? I'm not going to give Sam sort of specific advice. I would say, number one, it's not going to be an iPhone. Nothing is ever going to be the iPhone. And this goes back to the end of the beginning sort of bit. The iPhone is basically the perfect device. It is large enough to get done. Anything you want to get done and is small enough to fit in your pocket. Anything in either direction is a compromise. And that's, you know, even if we get to, the day where we can wear glasses around that sort of have these capabilities, imagine how powerful and capable your iPhone in that world is going to be. So no, it's not going to be that level of opportunity. That said, certainly any new platform is an opportunity, particularly because

the first version of apps are going to be sort of like almost any iPad or iPhone app can run on the Vision Pro with only a couple of like small changes, just like they can run on. And on an Apple, Silicon Mac. So right away, that whole market of like just basically doing in VR, what you can do on your phone is basically by definition going to be filled. But there will be a secondary opportunity and a larger one in the long run, which is doing stuff that is only possible in VR, that only really makes sense in VR. And if that's what you want to do, number one, it'd probably be good to have some sort

of vision, as opposed to just sort of like, if you're just chasing an opportunity with no idea what you're building or not scratching your own need. It's kind of hard by yourself. But number two, then, yeah, you're going to have to get one. So you understand the space and what is even possible. So, yeah, I do think there will be developer opportunity here. I think that as with Apple's platforms, there is interesting opportunities as a single developer. I think it would be viable and possible to build something.

The fact that it's like a 2D space projected onto the real world, as opposed to being a 3D space where you need textures, you need all the sort of stuff that drives up the cost of software does mean there will be viable sort of small businesses here. But I can't tell you what that business is. I would just encourage you not to like... Don't drop everything. Start developing for the Vision Pro.

If you want to drop everything, by all means, go ahead and do it. But like, don't, that's no guarantee of success. Yeah. But, you know, if you need a podcaster to tell you to do it, it, you're probably not going to do it. There's a bit where if you have it, if you have the it's, then you don't need me to tell you to go. Well, and this hits on the aspect that is most unknowable, but also most exciting. Like when you talk about your experience last week, I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt.

I'm not giving Apple the benefit of the doubt, but you came away so impressed that I'm open to the possibility that the experience of using this stuff is so thrilling that it's transformative in some ways. And there's definitely some tech that's so enjoyable to use. It doesn't matter

that it's not essential necessarily. It's hard, right? Because anything can look in a demo, right? You're always wary of after 30 minutes, is this something

that you're actually come after day after day? Right? I mean, go back to the quest, right? Like, the meetings were really compelling. And the reality is most people

fell out a date or it wasn't charged and we never went back to really using it on a regular basis, even though I thought it was a great sort of experience, this could be the case as well.

And I think the question is, I still want one really bad. I want to try it again right now. I wish I had one. I'm regretting this 15 inch or 16 inch computer I just bought because like, why do I need a big stream the future if I have a, you know, if I have my vision pro. Well, and I'm also just really curious to see what developers put together over the next five to 10 years if this really materializes because I'm sure there are ways to take it to a pretty crazy place.

So again, it's just sort of spitballing right now, but it's the one variable in all this and what the ceiling is for how we use it, how frequently we use it. Like a lot of it is developer dependent. The big takeaway is Apple has laid down the gallon of what is technically possible. There were high resolution headsets in particular. So that you, they cost a lot of money like the $5,000 or something. So you knew that high resolution was doable. but this sort of low latency pass through is to my knowledge something no one's done.

And that I think now it's been done. You can build to that. You can sort of aspire to that. And so I think to the extent they can make the market generally, it's just showing there's a level of experience and capability that is possible that people weren't sure if it was possible. And that's part of what is exciting about it. Right. All right. So along these lines, Aaron says, what can Apple?

learn from their difficulty nurturing the Mac Pro, Apple TV, HomePod, and Wi-Fi routers in the past. What risks does Apple face with all of Microsoft's recent strong efforts to centralize the broad developer community, parentheses GitHub, chat GPT, LinkedIn, etc., and unlock the value of corporate data leaks? Do you have thoughts, Ben? There's a lot of a lot of nomenclature in that question. Apple is a consumer company at the end of the day. They are always will be. Yes, the iPhone has a strong enterprise story, but that is 100% downstream from the iPhone becoming super popular as a consumer product,

and employees wanting to use their iPhone at work. And so Apple came along later and added things like exchange support and managed devices and all the sorts of things that are important for it to be used in the enterprise, but still they are always will be a consumer tech company. So stuff like corporate date, Apple doesn't give a shit on any of that, right? Like, now, if someone wants to build an app that takes advantage of that stuff, by all means, and, you know, I'm sure Apple will probably have some sort of, again, it's built on iOS. So all that bit they did for iOS to be a managed device and part of a corporate network and all those sorts of things,

I'm sure will be there on Vision OS from day one, right? If a company wants to buy a fleet of these and have it as part of their thing, I'm sure that will be valuable. Apple will take that business, but that's not sort of their driving, they're driving sort of business. I mean, you know, now what they also do to this point, they make personal computers.

So their difficulty nurturing these other products, to the extent, number one, it's not core of their business because it's like sort of tertiary accessories. But number two, consumer is high volume. They make a lot of something and they sell it to a bunch of people.

Yes, if something gets super low volume or isn't a priority, they do tend to focus and ignore the edges. And again, that is what a consumer company should do. Like, an enterprise company is the company that checks all the boxes,

that crosses all the T's, dots all the eyes, deals with every use case, and you get this over complicated software that's like, I don't use 80% of this. And the problem is every single business is I don't use 80% of this,

but a different 80%. And so it has all the feature. That's Microsoft in a nutshell, right? People want to mock Microsoft arriving at these overcomplicated UIs, all this backwards compatibility. The fact you can run programs over 25 years ago and how that makes the OS Krusty, that's not a flaw. That is why they win, right? Right. That's why Apple is not an enterprise company.

Apple cut stuff off. They trim. They focus. They want to do high volumes. All these things this user is complaining about is he's complaining about the reality of a consumer company versus an enterprise company. So how long do they stay? committed. If high volumes are the goal and they're a consumer company and you and I talking last week were saying it might be a failure after one or two years, but the entire story could be

different in 10 years. Again, depends how you define failure, right? I mean, like, is it contributing in a meaningful way to the bottom line? I don't think so. I don't think Apple signaled that it wouldn't be. But I think it's pretty clear. It's focused. Like the, I mean, it's, you know, this is now one of their core platforms. So yeah, maybe in 10 years. So, maybe in 10 years if there's nothing's going on. They'll pull the plug. But I think they're in it, they're sort of in it for the long haul, which is great. I'm glad they are. It's going to be very interesting. I have heard some rumors that one of the reasons they're projecting such low sales is actually very hard to make. I've heard like the screens in particular. It's just hard to get

good yields. And so it may be an issue where they're projecting such little sales, not because they're not sure if they can sell them. They're not sure they can make enough. Yeah, interesting. Okay. Well, Speaking of the driving business, this is a hacky transition, but we got a couple questions along these lines. Mike says, one thing that struck me while listening to last week's episode was the similarities in tech between the Apple Vision Pro and what an autonomous Apple car would require. From the LiDR to the infrared sensors and the R1 real-time computing chip, the tech feels nearly identical. Is this a pivot away from an Apple car, a happy coincidence, or perhaps a way to test this technology stack before introducing an autonomous vehicle? What do you think, Ben? I noted the similarities in the problem space and tech stack, at which point the PR person abruptly ended the conversation I was having with somebody.

So, no, I think it was kind of a joke. But, yeah, there are similar problems sort of real time, this real time aspect, the sensors, all those sorts of things. I think that's probably more of a happy coincidence than anything. I'm sure Apple, they've been working on these problems. You know, again, I just think that this is a personal computer. It seems much more in line with sort of what Apple does, even if arguably the car market is. a more defined market. You know,

let's come along and make a better Tesla seems less compelling and let's completely invent a new space and seems, you know, this, Apple does personal computing.

Like, to an even greater extent than consumer computing, they do personal computing. Right. And you go down from the Mac, you know, the hello,

the smiley face, you go to the iPhone, you go to this. Like, it's just getting ever more personal and it's leveraging all the same strengths Apple is brought to

every one of those platforms all the way, all along. And so, yeah, there are, there is similar tech here, similar problems to be solved, but I've always been skeptical about the car and I continue to be. Right. Okay. It's been sort of an urban legend for a decade plus now and it's probably going to remain that way for the next 25 to 30 years, right? It's like the Apple TV. Yeah, everyone talked, the one before this is Apple is going to release their own TV set, not like the Apple TV. And I kind of think they should have. Like I've got feels like a little bit of a missed opportunity, but, but it was just out there like Bigfoot

for years and years and years. And that's sort of the Apple car in this case. But it is, but to Mike's point, there is some similarity in the problem space. And I think it's noteworthy, if only, because it underscores how impressive the tech is and these challenges that people have been trying to solve for like 20 years that Apple appears to have nailed in ways that others haven't. Yeah, but to this point, to the. personal computing bit, what makes it different is the application of all this real-time capabilities and the sensors and all this is to give you as the user a space in which to do stuff, right? Whereas the reason they have all this stuff for a car is so the car can drive itself.

It's a different sort of view of computing. It's actually something I wrote about years ago, about, I called it text two philosophies, about there's some tech that just sort of like tries to help you do stuff. And there's some tech that tries to do stuff. And there's some tech that tries to do stuff for you. Right. And I sort of always put Facebook and Google more on the on the do stuff for you and Microsoft and Apple sort of more traditionally on the sort of help you get stuff done. And I do think there's something about that that is different that goes down to a company's culture and the way they think about things and they think about problems. And in that viewpoint, a headset makes more sense for Apple than a car does. Well, that spin is great. I'm now super

pro headset tech to help you do stuff as opposed to tech that just slowly replaces humans is definitely preferable in my eyes. So great job. This is why I had to invest in years of being anti-apple just so I could be ready for this moment and just completely kiss the rear end. Oh yeah. There's still so many things about them that I don't like. We're not going to talk about their. But they're so good at what they do. That's what's that's the thing. I know. Yeah. So as I said, we can't cover all the Apple questions we got, we did get a couple of questions about their new privacy measures. But I want to talk two questions on Apple and sports before we close out here. First, really are a sweet spot. Kevin says, Ben is on record saying that Apple probably hopes others will build the camera equipment to capture sporting

events in immersive video. No, Apple will build the equipment and partner with sports leagues. Apple will provide the equipment that makes lots of games available to consume right from the start, possibly at high cost. This is how Apple will crack the chicken and egg problem. And all Apple will ask in return is 30% of the purchase price of this sports Uber subscription on the back end. Luxury brands have always had attention between keep their brand scarce and valuable and cashing in on the wider market, thereby diluting their brand. Apple is in a unique position where they get to cash in, invent a new category, and repeat the cycle. Do you have thoughts on that idea?

Well, first off, I do reject that characterization of Apple luxury a bit. I do think what makes an iPhone is expensive. Make no mistake. But I think relative to the value and use you get out of it, $1,000 is a pretty compelling. proposition and it's a classic sort of John Gruber has made this point lots of times it's the Andy Warhol right everyone drinks coke right everyone has an iPhone now that's not true people have Android and particularly in other markets outside the US Android is is much larger but I do think Apple certainly makes expensive stuff but I think something like remember

when they have those gold watches for like $17,000 that was not Apple that's not what Apple is that was a perversion I think of what Apple stands for as far as a luxury good I don't think they're an Hermes or or even a Chanel or something along those lines, you know, they're mass market luxury, which is, you know, but that makes sense because it's tech. Tech needs to be mass market. It needs to be at scale. If you want a developer ecosystem, you need to have lots of devices out there.

So there's, that's the real tradeoff. And there's high performance that is baked into the equation that isn't with some of the more absurd luxury parallels you could draw. Right. No, exactly. Yeah. Like Apple's BMW, I think that's always been, or. or Mercedes. Those are the brands, I think, have always, like, you can get a cheaper version.

There are some markets like you go to Germany. It's not even that expensive. Everyone just drives a Mercedes or BMW, right? And they're accessible and aspirational to everyone. And you can also, like, go way up or buy a McLaren or Ferrari or something, right? Like so, so, but the difference is that's the best. The iPhone is the best. And so, you know, it's a very sort of great place to be. That's sorry, that's a total aside, just a little bit more Apple ass kissing. at the end of this sort of, this segment. We'll bash their privacy policies later in the week, perhaps. Yeah.

So the, the sports bit, I think the challenge is Apple can't do it all. There is an aspect of you do want this widely available and accessible. But I do see sort of his point where if you can only get this 3D experience on an Apple headset, well, how do you incentivize the sort of leagues to go? bother filming it. But again, I do think there's a bit where you just need to have a camera there. Like you don't actually want a producer. You don't want a scorebug. You don't need

production. You don't need an announcer. You just want to feel like you're at the game. Bucks vera. Absolutely. Just stick one of these at center court, right? You take up one seat, which again, they'll be well to do because those seats cost thousands of dollars for game. They've already bounced the actual TV broadcasters

up from court's side, but yeah. Which really irritates me. But yes. But, but have it there or with, yeah, with the, at the scoreboard table, whatever might be. And yeah, sell it for, again, I'll be, I'll be embarrassing about of money. That gets to our next question. Okay.

So Chung says, listening to Ben and Gruber's take on their mind-blowing court side experience with the Vision Pro, should we expect a big shift in Apple's sports strategy? They've been dipping their toe in to date with MLB and MLS, but is it time for Apple to go big and buy-up rights to some of the biggest leagues in the world. It seems like the tech press is really underestimating how big sports on the Vision Pro could be. To me, this seems like it might be the feature that takes the Vision Pro mainstream. I'm imagining a scenario where Apple splurges on rights to the NBA, NFL, EPL, F1, etc.

Not only can Apple unlock value from premium subscriptions for the VR experience, but also orthogonally drive the creation of compelling content. for the Vision Pro and thus mainstream adoption. Is this viable in your eyes? What's the size of the potential opportunity? And most important, to your point at the end there, Ben, as a sports fan, Chung says, I'd appreciate it if Ben would stop saying he's willing to pay thousands of dollars

for a VR court side subscription. Let's not give the greedy sports execs any more reason to charge more than they have for the sports VR panacea. What do you think? Do I have to go over the lecture about markets and pricing and people don't arbitrarily charge high prices because some podcaster said to, they will charge the price that balances supply and demand to optimize their revenue. So don't worry about me. Okay, good. Number one.

Number two, I do think, I can't remember if we brought this up last week, but the MLS deal looms very large here. They did also show us a soccer one in addition to basketball and baseball. I thought it was less compelling. In part, I didn't like the position as much. It was up above the goal. But it was still pretty cool. And I would bet this is going to be a part of the MLS package by the time this launches next season. So Apple has done that deal with MLS.

And it's a deal. Remember that MLS is available all over the world. We didn't even get to the messy signing, which apparently they're sharing like NLS subscription revenue with them. Like just a wild sort of thing. And you know what? They should be. Because look, I was never going to.

subscribe to the MLS season pass product they have, whatever it is. But if Messi is playing once or twice a week, like, yeah, maybe I will subscribe. And I'm sure a lot of people will buy into that because of Messi alone. And he's the only soccer player in the world who would make me even consider it. But I'm glad that he's getting it cut because I'm sure he'll drive subscriptions in a meaningful way. Yeah. And I would strongly bet that next season, MLS,

you will be able to watch in your Applevision headset. And that is going to be super killer because that's going to be a demonstration that if you buy an Apple Vision, you can watch an MLS game. And yeah, it's an MLS game, but it's going to be freaking amazing. And he might be there. What the other league should do is they should be carving out 3D streaming from any deals that they sign. So like they did. Remember Verizon did it's like mobile was cut out from streaming generally. And so they would sell or the NFL does, I say, they would sell.

that to Verizon in addition to general streaming. Eventually tech caught up, but it wasn't really sustainable to do that anymore. But the NFL, which is very good at making money, skimmed off a whole bunch of extra money by having a separate mobile package from their other packages, right? This is great, though. You're seeding ideas with sports executives to fleece other trillion-dollar companies. The consumer prices are going to be set according to the market and the demand and everything else.

Well, I mean, you know, you know, I didn't get a lecture to you about that. Someone's got to pay that. price at some point. So maybe I should apologize to Chung. But so, but no, that's what they should be doing. So the,

the NBA is coming up, right? The NBA should be carving out 3D streaming rights, independent from whatever deal they sign with ESPN or TNT or whatever it might be. And absolutely go back to Kevin's idea. Sell that to Apple. If Apple wants to keep it to all themselves. Hey,

if they want to, if they're willing to pay for it, you know, go for it. Now, I think ideally the leagues would prefer. And, you know,

in the long, run it might make more sense for Apple that there is just sort of a general they claim that this format the Apple 3D format whatever it's called that they want it to be a standard they want it to be broadly used they don't want to keep it exclusive themselves so that's that's what they said we'll even we'll see what because I this is something I mean I was very curious about this I was asking about this um so we'll see how that actually plays out in practice but uh yeah I agree with both Kevin and Chung that this is going to be a significant sort of use case and it's incredible it is really again it was a 10 second clip so i you know maybe we'll see watching

a whole game do you get motion sickness xyz yeah but uh i mean i cannot wait to try it again i i mean hopefully one day i will get to try it myself for now i'll close with this from peter it says you mentioned how you hate to work without your monitors on the road have you ever considered a portable monitor they're about 150 bucks impossibly thin and light Easy to slip into a backpack and require only one USBC cord to your laptop, which also powers it. I use two 30-inch monitors at home, and this is the only way I can survive on the road. Hopefully it can tide you over until you have the five-foot screens of the Apple Vision Pro. God bless southeastern Wisconsin.

Do you have a portable monitor, Ben? And are you feeling more comfortable now that you're set up in a more permanent office? environment. You've got portable monitors where you are now. Do you feel like you can finally breathe after being cooped up with just one screen? I mean, this goes back to my bit about walking an Apple Park with just a phone in my pocket. I don't want to carry around about four of a monitor. It's a good red line to have. I'm proud of you. I have been known to if I'm going to be in a place for an extended period of time to have a suitcase and just carry a full blown monitor and a mic stand and all that sort of stuff with me. But generally speaking, I did, again, I've always. always had a 14 inch MacBook. I did get a 16 inch because it was really getting to me. But, but no, I am back in, in my, yes, my own office in the U.S.

where the other thing is I kind of bizarrely, I like vertical spacing more than I like sort of horizontal spacing. So I have, here I do have a studio display that is like above where my laptop is. And I don't like turning side to side. I kind of like more like the up and down. So that's harder to do with a portable monitor. but it's fine. I am okay. I'm a big boy. I can survive. So, yes, it's all good.

Okay, good. Well, on that note, there has been other news in technology over the last two weeks as we've embraced the headset Fortnite here. And so we will get back to that. There appears to be some sort of insurrection happening at Reddit with moderators. There's a lot of funny observations to make about this. So here's the funny dynamic about the Reddit thing. on one hand, Reddit has benefited from giving all these moderators or doing massive amounts of free labor in exchange for them being able to be petty tyrants over their little domains, right? And because they're petty tyrants or the little domains, they can just turn off their domains and then Reddit is sort of hurt. The problem is it's by definition unsustainable because if they wipe out their petty domain, they're no longer a little tyrant. So like they will, they need the power. Reddit to come back even more than Reddit needs them to come back.

So it's going to be, it's a very, very funny little face off, to be totally honest. Yes. Well, I look forward to diving into that. You wrote about that on Strateree Monday. Yeah, I'm disappointed what I wrote. It was almost there was too much stuff to like talk about it. I'm going to have to do a follow up.

The dynamics here are actually fairly and fairly, fairly humorous. Well, I look forward to trying to wrap our arms around all of it. Because yes, even as you wrote about it on Monday, I was like, man, there's a lot going on here. And we also get periodic emails. People say it's about third party apps. I don't think like this is this is just like an insurrection because we can have an insurrection. I think like there's like it's like World War I was not about Art Stuke Ferdinand.

Sorry, I'm giving me. I'm giving way the next podcast. But I think that's that's a way to think about it. Well, people can look forward to that. And we have all sorts of other good questions that we're going to hit. But thank you to everybody who responded on Apple. and Ben, until then, I will talk to you soon. Sounds good. I'll talk to you later.