Apples and Oranges

Quest for a Vision…

There is a way to get a $500 to $1500 discount on the $3,499 Apple Vision Pro early next year. Just don’t buy a Facebook/Meta Quest 3 or Quest Pro between now and then. 

Meta founder/CEO made as good a case he could make today at a Facebook/Meta all hands meeting, why he wasn’t too concerned about going head on against Apple for the ‘Metaverse” bound VR/AR/MR headset next year. 

Public reception to both visions have been night and day. The Verge said “Get me out of here” after trying the $1,500 Meta Quest Pro. Their Editor Nilay Patel said the Apple Vision Pro was “the best headset demo ever” after trying it in person. 

Zuckerberg of course argued the 7x price difference (before the above discount), and the notion that Apple version is a lonelier version than the presumably more ‘social’ Quest. Why would anyone trade this

For this?

Arguing that the former is a better proposition than the latter is like making a case for the BlackBerry after seeing the iPhone in 2007. 

Or  Windows Phone. Remember, Microsoft Steve Ballmer tried then, like Mark Zuckerberg tried today.

It’s easy to do historical comparisons like that after the fact. But that’s not the point. 

Inventing new stuff is HARD. Especially in technology, where improvements in underlying tech stacks are unrelenting. And at times, exponential. AI alone changed the game here, and raised the table stakes dramatically in a short time. 

Mark Zuckerberg deserves a lot of credit for trying to innovate hard, building a path to the Neal Stephenson defined (1992) metaverse holy grail.

Billions of dollars expended. Facebook underwent a name change, the corporate version of getting a Tattoo.  

It’s time for a reboot. Another path to the destination. 

Maybe even Instagram, Facebook, Messenger and WhatsApp Apps on Apple VisionOS. 

Apple has shown the world now the way to a far better mouse trap. 

They could be Ballmered too. It’s tough to see that happening from here.