After years of rumors and speculation, Apple finally unveiled their virtual reality headset yesterday in a classic “One more thing…” segment in their keynote. Dubbed Apple Vision Pro, this mixed reality device is perfectly Apple: it’s human-first. It’s centered around extending human productivity, communication, and connection. It’s telling that one of the core problems they solved was the VR isolation problem. That’s the issue where users of VR are isolated from the real world; they don’t know what’s going on, and the world around them sees that. Insert meme of oblivious VR user here. Instead, with the Vision Pro, when someone else is nearby, they show through the interface. Additionally, an outward-facing display shows the user’s eyes. These two innovative features help maintain the basic human behavior of acknowledging each other’s presence in the same room.

I know a thing or two about VR and building practical apps for VR. A few years ago, in the mid-2010s, I cofounded a VR startup called Transported. My cofounders and I created a platform for touring real estate in VR. We wanted to help homebuyers and apartment hunters more efficiently shop for real estate. Instead of zigzagging across town running to multiple open houses on a Sunday afternoon, you could tour 20 homes in an hour on your living room couch. Of course, “virtual tours” existed already. There were cheap panoramas on real estate websites and “dollhouse” tours created using Matterport technology. Our tours were immersive; you felt like you were there. It was the future! There were several problems to solve, including 360° photography, stitching rooms together, building a player, and then most importantly, distribution. Back in 2015–2016, our theory was that Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Sony, and Apple would quickly make VR commonplace because they were pouring billions of R&D and marketing dollars into the space. But it turned out we were a little ahead of our time.

Consumers didn’t take to VR as all the technologists predicted. Headsets were still cumbersome. The best device in the market then was the Oculus Rift, which had to be tethered to a high-powered PC. When the Samsung Gear VR launched, it was a game changer for us because the financial barrier to entry was dramatically lowered. But despite the big push from all these tech companies, the consumer adoption curve still wasn’t great.

For our use case—home tours—consumers were fine with the 2D Matterport tours. They didn’t want to put on a headset. Transported withered as the gaze from the tech companies wandered elsewhere. Oculus continued to come out with new hardware, but the primary applications have all been entertainment. Practical uses for VR never took off. Despite Meta’s recent metaverse push, VR was still seen as a sideshow, a toy, and not the future of computing.

Until yesterday.

Apple didn’t coin the term “spatial computing.” The credit belongs to Simon Greenwold, who, in 2003, defined it as “human interaction with a machine in which the machine retains and manipulates referents to real objects and spaces.” But with the headline “Welcome to the era of spatial computing,” Apple brilliantly reminds us that VR has practical use cases. They take a position opposite of the all-encompassing metaverse playland that Meta has staked out. They’ve redefined the category and may have breathed life back into it.

Beyond marketing, Apple has solved many of the problems that have plagued VR devices.

• Isolation: As mentioned at the beginning of this piece, Apple seems to have solved the isolation issue with what they’re calling EyeSight. People around you can see your eyes, and you can see them inside Vision Pro.
• Comfort: One of the biggest complaints about the Oculus Quest is its heaviness on your face. Apple solves this with a wired battery pack that users put into their pockets, thus moving that weight off their heads. But it is a tether.
• Screen door effect: Even though today’s screens have really tiny pixels, users can still see the individual pixels because they’re so close to the display. In VR, this is called the “screen door effect” because you can see the lines between the screen’s pixels. The Quest 2 is roughly HD-quality (1832x1920) per eye. Apple Vision Pro will be double that to 4K quality per eye. We’ll have to see if this is truly eliminated once reviewers get their hands on test units.
• Immersive audio: Building on the spatial audio technology they debuted with AirPods Pro, Vision Pro will have immersive audio to transport users to new environments.
• Control: One of the biggest challenges in VR adoption has been controlling the user interface. Handheld game controllers are not intuitive for most people. In the real world, you look at something to focus on it, and you use your fingers and hands to manipulate objects. Vision Pro looks to overcome this usability issue with eye tracking and finger gestures.
• Performance: Rendering 3D spaces in real-time requires a ton of computing and graphics-processing power. Apple’s move to its own M-series chips leapfrogs those available on competitors’ devices.
• Security: In the early days of the Oculus Rift, users had to take off their headsets in the middle of setup to create and log into an online account. More recently, Meta mandated that Oculus users log in with their Facebook accounts. I’m not sure about the setup process, but privacy-focused Apple has built on their Face ID technology to create iris scanning technology called Optic ID. This identifies the specific human, so it’s as secure as a password. Finally, your surroundings captured by the external cameras are processed on-device.
• Cross-platform compatibility: If Vision Pro is to be used for work, it will need to be cross-platform. In Apple’s presentation, FaceTime calls in VR didn’t exclude non-VR participants. Their collaborative whiteboard app, Freeform, looked to be usable on Vision Pro.
• Development frameworks: There are 1.8 million apps in Apple’s App Store developed using Apple’s developer toolkits. From the presentation, it looked like converting existing iOS and possibly macOS apps to be compatible with visionOS should be trivial. Additionally, Apple announced they’re working with Unity to help developers bring their existing apps—games—to Vision Pro.

While Apple Vision Pro looks to be a technological marvel that has been years in the making, I don’t think it’s without its faults.

• Tether: The Oculus Quest was a major leap forward. Free from being tethered to a PC, games like Beat Saber were finally possible. While Vision Pro isn’t tethered to a computer, there is the cord to the wearable battery pack. Apple has been in a long war against wires—AirPods, MagSafe charging—and now they’ve introduced a new one.
• Price: OK, at $3,500, it is as expensive as the highest-end 16-inch MacBook Pro. This is not a toy and not for everyday consumers. It’s more than ten times the price of an Oculus Quest 2 ($300) and more than six times that of a Sony PlayStation VR 2 headset ($550). I’m sure the “Pro” designation softens the blow a little.

Apple Vision Pro will ship in early 2024. I’m excited by the possibilities of this new platform. Virtual reality has captured the imagination of science-fiction writers, futurists, and technologists for decades. Being able to completely immerse yourself into stories, games, and simulations by just putting on a pair of goggles is very alluring. The technology has had fits and starts. And it’s starting again.

This was originally published as an item in Issue 003 of the designspun email newsletter.

It is no secret that Twitter has enabled and emboldened Donald Trump by not restricting any of his tweets, even if they violated their terms of service. But earlier this week, they put misinformation warnings on two of his tweets about mail-in ballots. This angered the President but also got the ball rolling. Snapchat shortly followed by saying it will no longer promote Trump’s account. Against the backdrop of growing protests against the murder of George Floyd by police, some tech companies finally started to grow a conscience. But will Silicon Valley change? Mary-Hunter McDonnell, corporate activism researcher from the Wharton School of Business says, “Giving money to organizations that are out on the front lines is more helpful, but it’s also to some extent passing the buck. People are tired of that.”

As designers, we have some power over the projects we work on, and the products we create. Mike Monterio wrote in February, “At some point, you will have to explain to your children that you work, or once worked, at Facebook.”

While at Facebook, Lisa Sy designed ways to flag hate speech on the platform—using Trump’s account in the mockups. In 2016. Four years later, Facebook has not implemented such a system and continues to leave up dangerous posts from Trump, including the highly-charged “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” post.

Tobias van Schneider wrote in 2016,

The role as a designer, or even as an engineer has become more influential and powerful than ever. The work we do makes an impact and naturally brings up the discussion around ethics, responsibility and accountability.

Many of us will work on pieces that are seen by hundreds, maybe thousands. A few of us, having larger clients, or working at a tech company, might work on something used by millions, if not billions of people. We hold great responsibility.

We produce work for audiences, users. Humans who are on the other end of that screen, poster, or ad. Mike Monterio again:

You don’t work for the people who sign your checks. You work for the people who use the products of your labor. If I were to put my hope in one thing, it’s that you understand the importance of this. Your job is to look out for the people your work is affecting. That is a responsibility we cannot defer.

This post was originally published on Medium.

I have longed cringed at how the mainstream media reports on the technology industry to the public. From use of randomly-selected synonyms to just downright misunderstanding of particular technologies, it’s sort of embarrassing to the reporter (usually someone who calls themselves a “technology reporter”) and the publication.

The latest examples come courtesy of The New York Times. I was alerted to this via a piece on BGR by Yoni Heisler titled, “The New York Times’ latest Apple hit piece is embarrassing and downright lazy.” Disclosure: I am a subscriber to The Times because I support their journalism. Their political reporters in particular have done a tremendous service to our country over the last couple of years. I usually trust what The Times writes about politics because I am not an expert in it. But the two pieces mentioned by BGR, about screen-time apps, and the editorial about Apple’s supposed monopoly are downright silly, because I do know a thing or two about technology and Apple.

Privacy, Security, and Violation of Terms

The premise of the article is that Apple has “removed or restricted at least 11 of the 17 most downloaded screen-time and parental-control apps” over the past year. There are quotes and POVs from app developers and parents, and there are a couple quotes from Apple defending its actions. This is the full quote of what they printed from Phil Schiller, Apple’s marketing chief:

In response to this article, Philip W. Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of worldwide marketing, said in emails to some customers that Apple “acted extremely responsibly in this matter, helping to protect our children from technologies that could be used to violate their privacy and security.”

When the article broke, an Apple customer wrote to Tim Cook who had Schiller respond (emphasis mine):

Unfortunately the New York Times article you reference did not share our complete statement, nor explain the risks to children had Apple not acted on their behalf. Apple has long supported providing apps on the App Store, that work like our ScreenTime feature, to help parents manage their children’s access to technology and we will continue to encourage development of these apps. There are many great apps for parents on the App Store, like “Moment — Balance Screen Time” by Moment Health and “Verizon Smart Family” by Verizon Wireless.

However, over the last year we became aware that some parental management apps were using a technology called Mobile Device Management or “MDM” and installing an MDM Profile as a method to limit and control use of these devices. MDM is a technology that gives one party access to and control over many devices, it was meant to be used by a company on it’s own mobile devices as a management tool, where that company has a right to all of the data and use of the devices. The MDM technology is not intended to enable a developer to have access to and control over consumers’ data and devices, but the apps we removed from the store did just that. No one, except you, should have unrestricted access to manage your child’s device, know their location, track their app use, control their mail accounts, web surfing, camera use, network access, and even remotely erase their devices. Further, security research has shown that there is risk that MDM profiles could be used as a technology for hacker attacks by assisting them in installing apps for malicious purposes on users’ devices.

When the App Store team investigated the use of MDM technology by some developers of apps for managing kids devices and learned the risk they create to user privacy and security, we asked these developers to stop using MDM technology in their apps. Protecting user privacy and security is paramount in the Apple ecosystem and we have important App Store guidelines to not allow apps that could pose a threat to consumers privacy and security. We will continue to provide features, like ScreenTime, designed to help parents manage their children’s access to technology and we will work with developers to offer many great apps on the App Store for these uses, using technologies that are safe and private for us and our children.

Here is a layman’s summary of the above. The parental control apps that Apple kicked off the App Store were using a technology intended for large corporations to control their company-owned devices. This technology gives the corporations purview over, and access to all their devices’ location info, app usage, email accounts, web history, camera usage, and network access, and can remotely wipe their devices. In other words if an end-user installed one of these parental control apps that used MDM technology on their child’s phone, that app developer had access to all that information, and would be able to control and wipe that phone.

The Times and the general media have been lambasting YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter for allowing users and other entities to stay on their platforms and abuse their policies. From hate speech (white nationalists, Alex Jones) to huge privacy gaffes (Cambridge Analytica), the media and the public have demanded these companies take responsibility and action, and prevent such episodes from happening again.

And yet, when Apple does take action here—when about a dozen or so companies release so-called parental control apps on the App Store using Apple technology in a way that violates its policies and gives access to thousands of iPhones belonging to kids, The New York Times has a conniption.

Apple does not have an issue that there are apps that compete with its own apps in the App Store (Apple Music vs. Spotify, Pandora, SiriusXM, iHeartRadio, SoundCloud; Safari vs. Google Chrome, Opera Mini, Firefox Focus). That’s what a vibrant developer-centric marketplace is: competition. But when an app violates its policies, Apple should be able to act.

Who Owns a Marketplace?

The second piece referenced by the BGR article is an op-ed by The Times’ Editorial Board, “Why Does Apple Control Its Competitors?”

First the op-ed compares Apple to Microsoft. Kind of ironic since Apple was on the brink of bankruptcy in the 1990s:

Apple’s management of the App Store is also dangerously reminiscent of the anti-competitive behavior that triggered United States v. Microsoft, a landmark antitrust case that changed the landscape of the tech industry.

Then the piece complains about Apple’s control over the App Store marketplace and its fees:

But Apple’s operating system for mobile devices makes it almost impossible to get an app outside of the App Store that will work on an Apple phone. Ultimately, the company controls what a user can or cannot do on their own iPhone. Apple also takes up to a 30 percent cut of in-app revenue, including revenue from “services” fulfilled in-app — like buying a premium subscription or an ebook. Because all apps go through the App Store, this 30 percent cut is nearly unavoidable.

Apple doesn’t ban apps like Amazon Kindle or Spotify, which compete with Apple Books and Apple Music, respectively. But the 30 percent fee still stings. That’s the reason you currently can’t buy a Kindle ebook through the Kindle mobile app. Spotify, a much smaller company, now pays Apple between 15 and 30 percent of its in-app revenue in order to serve streaming music to its premium subscribers. Spotify recently filed a complaint with European regulators, accusing Apple of anticompetitive practices. In the United States, an antitrust lawsuit pending before the Supreme Court alleges that the 30 percent cut drives up prices for consumers.

Let’s try this analogy. Suppose Apple is a department store. This department store has products lined up on shelves and racks, organized by sections and aisles so customers can find what they’re looking for. This store has endcaps that feature certain promoted products. What The Times is asking is this: Why can’t any company that wants to sell in Apple’s department store just set up shop inside the store and sell direct? And why should Apple make 30% gross profit on selling each item in the store?¹

If Apple allowed any product inside its department store, what if the product is shoddy and doesn’t work? What if there’s a safety issue? What if a seller wants to line the shelves with porno magazines? This tarnishes the reputation of Apple’s store. Customers will start to think Apple doesn’t care about the quality of products it sells, or that the store is now inhospitable for families with children.

(If the department store analogy doesn’t work for you, what about a farmers’ market? The App Store is the market and the developers are the vendors. Organizers of farmers’ markets decide who to allow in to sell, and what they can sell.)

A core of The Times’ monopoly argument seems to be around the fact that the App Store is the only place to get apps that work on an iPhone:

But Apple’s operating system for mobile devices makes it almost impossible to get an app outside of the App Store that will work on an Apple phone. Ultimately, the company controls what a user can or cannot do on their own iPhone.

True. But time and again Apple has argued that its thorough review process is critical to prevent malicious and low quality apps from appearing in its App Store.

And consumers face compatibility or “walled garden” scenarios with lots of things they buy. Printers need specific toner cartridges. Coffeemakers only accept certain shapes of pods. Video game systems can only their own cartridges or discs. In all these examples, including iPhone, consumers can find workarounds. But use at your own risk and don’t go crying to the manufacturer if your product breaks as a result. Fair enough, right?

And finally…

Even if we take Apple at its word that it was only protecting the privacy and security of its users by removing screen-time and parental-control apps, the state of the app marketplace is troubling. Why is a company — with no mechanism for democratic oversight — the primary and most zealous guardian of user privacy and security? Why is one company in charge of vetting what users can or cannot do on their phones, especially when that company also makes apps that compete in a marketplace that it controls?

Short answer is because Apple created the marketplace and controls the rules. eBay is a marketplace and controls its own policies, banning the selling of body parts, government IDs, and Nazi-related artifacts. Airbnb, Uber, and Upwork are all marketplaces with their own policies.² Why is Airbnb — with no mechanism for democratic oversight — the primary and most zealous guardian of what hosts can and cannot do with their listing? Why is Uber — with no mechanism for democratic oversight — the primary and most zealous guardian of how drivers should behave with their passengers? Why is Upwork — with no mechanism for democratic oversight — the primary and most zealous guardian of how workers should interact with clients?

But again, I go back to the two-sidedness of The Times. In one breath it wants Facebook and “Big Tech” to be better at preventing the viral spread of horrific imagery, by removing posts with said imagery, thus having a tighter grasp on its own platform. And in another it wants Apple to loosen up its control of its own marketplace. Comparing the spread of a video of a mass shooting with App Store policies is crass, I know. But they are sending mixed messages to Silicon Valley.

I actually agree with The Times about how Facebook and other social media platforms must somehow use technology to combat humanity’s most wretched behaviors. They do need to figure out a way to reign in the monster they’ve unleashed.

However, I disagree with their view that Apple must relax its tight control over the App Store, because I want a company that has been the most socially responsible in this age of Big Tech to curate over two million apps in the App Store and prevent me from downloading an app that could brick my phone or expose my private data.

The press plays an important role in our society—to hold powerful entities and individuals to account. However, before lobbing any accusations, before sparking any debate, it really should get its facts straight and understand the material first.

[1] Most retailers mark up the products they sell by 50%. Example: They buy a tube of toothpaste for $2 and sell it to you for $4.

[2] By the way, here are the sellers’ fees for each of these marketplaces:

• Airbnb: 20%, https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/1857/what-is-the-airbnb-service-fee
• Uber: 25%, https://www.ridester.com/uber-fees/
• Upwork: 20%, https://www.upwork.com/i/how-it-works/freelancer/

From an advertising standpoint, I believe Apple has been on fire recently. (Disclaimer: I have been an Apple fanboy since 1985 and used to work there many years ago.) Beginning with the “What will your verse be?” iPad ad that debuted in mid-January, they’ve continued with the “You’re more powerful than you think” iPhone 5S that began airing recently.

When I first saw “Your Verse” on TV it stopped me in my tracks. Using audio of Robin Williams speaking to his class in Dead Poets Society, it features footage of people using the iPad around the world for making music, photography, tracking tornadoes, playing professional hockey, and more. The haunting melody combined with the breathtaking images and Robin Williams’ voice really struck a chord with me. It evoked a deep sense of wonder and faith in humanity. These were real people doing extraordinary things with this product. In the mere three years that iPad has been available* it has created a whole new category of devices and enabled millions of people to do ordinary and extraordinary things.

Here’s the text from the speech:

We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering. These are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love. These are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman: “O me, O life of the question of these recurring, of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities filled with the foolish. What good amid these? O me, O life.” Answer: That you are here. That life exists, and identity. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. …That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.” What will your verse be?

It ends with a challenge, raising the question for the viewer, “How will you make your dent in the universe?”

And just this week, Apple debuted a similar people-do-awesome-things-with-Apple-products video called “Powerful.” It features people using the iPhone to make music, perform art, video their kids, and more. It’s set against a youthful cover of the Pixies’ “Gigantic.” The film is an anthem much like the iPad ad that preceded it, and about how Apple products have empowered millions of people to do some pretty cool things.

(As an aside, I think “Powerful” is better executed than “Your Verse.” My issue with the first ad is that it had too many cuts in it. And the voiceover did not lend itself to a 30-second or even 60-second ad. Only the 90-second version works. Whereas all the cuts of “Powerful” are just as effective. And additionally interesting, my sources have told me that “Your Verse” was done internally at Apple. I would suspect that “Powerful” was also executed in-house.

As a second aside, this is one of the rarer moments when Apple’s campaigns are integrated, with a strong digital presence. See for yourself: Your Verse, Powerful.)

So what’s the takeaway?

These ads are not meant to convince the non-believers to buy Apple products. Instead, they’re both calls-to-arms for the Apple faithful. It’s their CRM strategy if you will. These ads are meant to inspire “the rest of us” and reinforce that we made the right choice in terms of the iOS platform and devices. These epic films depict a world made better by Apple products which makes us feel good. With Samsung and other Android devices eroding at Apple’s historic lead, this is exactly what they need.

These ads are reminiscent of Apple’s classic comeback “Think Different” campaign. Here is the text of the commercial that launched it:

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. But the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

As documented in Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs, Apple needed to make a statement that they were still a viable company able to make world-changing products. Isaacson writes, “It was designed to celebrate not what the computers could do, but what creative people could do with the computers.” And he goes on to say that this ad wasn’t only directed at the general public, but also to Apple employees who had forgotten what Apple stood for.

And I believe rallying the base is exactly what Apple is doing again.

• iPad was announced January 27, 2010, at MacWorld in San Francisco and began shipping April 3, 2010.

This post was originally published on Bow & Arrow from PJA (my employer) on February 3, 2011.

The New York Times recently published an article about how apps and web services are enabling consumers to customize how they read their online content. From apps like Flipboard and Pulse to services like Readability and Instapaper, users are increasingly demanding to consume content whenever, wherever and however they want.

When Apple introduced the iPad a year ago, many print publishers saw it as a panacea for their dwindling readership. By creating digital editions, they hoped to recapture some of the eyeballs lost to aggregators and RSS feeds. One of the pioneering publication apps was the WIRED Magazine iPad app. Because of its novelty, its debut issue sold 73,000 digital copies in nine days, almost as much as on newsstands. There is a clear desire from users to read magazines on their tablets.

What that first generation of attempts miss though, is they are trying to replicate 20th century print experience on a 21st century device. The magazine apps feel very one way. But the iPad is an Internet-connected device and users on the Internet demand more interactive experiences. They want to copy and paste passages to put on their blogs. They want to share articles via Facebook and Twitter. Using Adobe’s Digital Magazine Solution, Condé Nast is starting to address some of these issues.

Meanwhile apps such as Flipboard are aggregating content and repackaging it for their users. Flipboard presents news items according to a user’s social graph, creating a personalized and highly relevant news stream. Additionally, the app presents this content in a unique way: as a paper magazine. The visual is striking, yet it still holds familiarity with users since it loosely mimics the experience of reading a real-world magazine, with the benefits of interactivity. And so far it has been a hit with users, even earning an [App of the Year](http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-calls-flipboard-ipad-app-of-the-year-2010-12 “Apple Calls Flipboard “iPad App Of The Year"") award from Apple.

Different kinds of content demand different kinds of packages. For example as a designer, I—along with most designers and art directors—flip through magazines such as Communication Arts and Print, and peruse blogs and websites like LovelyPackage.com and SmashingMagazine.com. Seeing something cool usually sparks an idea for whatever we’re currently working on.

To get through the hundreds of design-related sites out there, I use RSS feeds to aggregate this content for myself in Google Reader. Unfortunately, because I am so busy, I am not able to keep up with all my feeds. I may manage to check it only every few days. And I dread seeing that “1000+†number next to my unread items.

So last year, when the iPad was introduced, I decided to find a solution as an independent side project. I knew that an app on this large dedicated canvas could be created to serve this need of efficiently consuming visual inspiration. I teamed up with a developer friend and we started work on DesignScene.

We set out to create something that designers would enjoy using and become part of their daily ritual. We had two primary objectives:

• The UI must serve the content and the audience. It has to be beautiful and show off visuals well.
• The content must be relevant. There’s a glut of design-related websites and blogs on the Internet. Let’s help designers navigate through them.

The UI we designed is sparse—a simple grid that takes advantage of the screen real estate afforded by the tablet. Users flick through the various grid cells to see an assortment of images. They can enlarge the images to fill the screen or read the accompanying text from the original source via the built-in web browser. DesignScene surfaces up the latest inspirational images of not only design, but also architecture, photography, art and so on. The content is a curated list of sources and—as a whole—has an editorial point of view to enhance discovery.

It’s been two weeks since DesignScene launched. [This was originally posted three weeks ago on the PJA blog.] So far we’ve had great response from users and media. We built social sharing into the app and we can already see hundreds of discoveries being shared on Twitter. Our users are interacting with content in a way that was not possible just a year ago.