One Month Until WWDC 2023: Here's What's Coming

[Realityck]

There's no doubt the board values Cook. Shareholders, too. Cook won't be forced out, but I do believe he will step down. I think he's placing his mark on the AR/VR headset as his product -- something he can truly call his own -- before he steps down. I think the fact that this new product release will be a boondoggle will hasten his exit.

As @TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️ and others pointed out, no one excels at money (and share value) more than Cook. Unfortunately in today's corporate world, that matters more than long-term health and innovation. Companies like Apple, however, are in a different category. They depend on radical innovation to survive. Otherwise, they are just another computer company. Image isn't enough. Apple desperately needs a visionary. Yes, they're like Unicorns, but if Apple is to continue to be special, the board will need to find one. Cook ain't it.

I'll be watching this headset rollout closely, but I'm sticking to my '24 prediction. Call me out late next year. I'll eat any crow slung my way...

The group consensus here doesn't really place any value with AR/VR as a major effort, more like it is exploratory with the purchase of Akonia Holographic. But one had bothered to investigate that further it's operating independently to author patents that might apply to future products as an exploratory effort. The press is the one that ignored this 2018 purchase and now 5 years later Apple is only rumored to come out with a so called multi-usage headset because the rest of the industry fumbled on betting on a products that really didn't have consumer backing.

As for the routine Tim Cook is no visionary in comparison to Steve Jobs argument, I wish you luck using that as a pretense to judge Tim using AR/VR as a swan song. He is just 62 now, he is very much the person that maintains a unique coolness to Apple not reacting or divulging their plans year around, and certainly not close to retirement.

 

[Realityck]

Yep, Apple’s AR system will be a flawed product released years early. Very limited in capability. And WAY too expensive. Bought only by tech nerds.

Also the $3000 is just another press related tidbit that people went with that is unsubstantiated. Possibly this might be the first show that the keynote starts to demonstrate what developers can do with AR as a topic. Is it centered around a product, who knows. Hopefully we get to see https://developer.apple.com/augmented-reality/ show off some more advances.

 

[erikkfi]

This is the part where you should have realised you were wrong.

Well, the list of such games that you provided is evidence I can't ignore.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

Well, more so it is thinner. I also want a Midnight color, Mac. The existing colors (Silver & Space Gray) on MacBook Pro are getting boring. It's not just the weight there are other things too such as the color (mentioned above) the size, how thin it is, compatibility, and so on. I just hope the new MBA comes with a 120 HZ Pro-Motion display.

Sorry you are getting bored, but the issue is that the color surrounding an image affects the color perception of the image. The point of silver and space gray on pro-level MBPs is that they lack color and hence intentionally minimize disruptive impact on color perception. Midnight is indeed perhaps a good third non-color option to add to the mix.

At the low end and for K-12 cutesy laptop colors can benefit sales, but at the cost of increasing inventory costs.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

M3 chips not expected in 15in. MacBook Air…but it would be a helluva surprise if it was.

It would be a very, very dumb surprise because it would add cost and negligible value add to lowest-end MBA but would set users looking at higher-end products (which is almost every product) that actually will get substantive value add from M3 to waiting for M3 before buying.

Edit: Note that I personally succumbed to exactly that phenomena. After M2 was announced on lower-end Macs in June 2022 I set M2 as a prerequisite for (overdue) purchase of a new MBP and/or Studio, and consequently did not buy until 2023 release of high-end M2 MBPs. I bought an M2 MBP Max but still have not bought a Studio because Apple never released M2. At this point I will probably wait for an M3 Studio Max.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

...The main thing is, can they sell the headset’s usecase as a want-to-have device, while people have been so lukewarm on the PlayStation VR 2?

PlayStation VR mostly is a toy and is marketed as such. AR in Apple's coming headset is v1 of a very long-term new tool. Very different use cases.

Apple does have a huge marketing problem in that today the world perceives headsets to be what we knew circa 2022 as "VR." Just read posts in these fora, where a preponderance of posters think VR is gaming and AR is just for Ikea furniture. Users' preconceptions may hamstring the headset similarly to the way they hamstrung the (actually excellent) original HomePod.

 

[MrTemple]

Well, the list of such games that you provided is evidence I can't ignore.

Excuse me Mr. NeverWrong, but why did you suggest that guy can’t list any games that you say don’t exist right after you ignored my post where I gave an example of a game in AppleArcade that ignores the rocker switch after you EXPLICITLY said such a game did not exist?

Suggested even that it COULD not exist in the AppleArcade, due to some sort of imaginary Apple enforcement of how devs choose to use the built-in option for sound-behavior. 🤦‍♂️

Forget about doubling-down on an objectively false statement, you’re like into octupling-down territory. 🤣

 

[MrTemple]

PlayStation VR mostly is a toy. AR in Apple's coming headset is v1 of a very long-term new tool. Very different use cases

People truly don’t understand how insanely more useful and ubiquitous (even invasive) AR will be compared to VR. 🤷‍♂️

 

[Realityck]

People truly don’t understand how insanely more useful and ubiquitous (even invasive) AR will be compared to VR. 🤷‍♂️

Its has the potential for sure, it just badly lacks the depth of freely accessible media to take off. Kinda reminds one of how hypercard was before hypertext was used to navigate the world wide web. It needs the right environment to thrive. Apple was pitching AR as a means to more accurately portray subject matter you could interact with such as demos or learning examples. It's way further out to consider it ready for online commerce which could be the basis if it really talking off.

 

[Warped9]

It would be a very, very dumb surprise because it would add cost and negligible value add to lowest-end MBA but would set users looking at higher-end products (which is every product) that actually will get substantive value add from M3 to waiting for M3 before buying.

Did I miss something? Two years ago they added M1 to MBA and the price stayed the same. For years Apple has upgraded certain items without raising price. Whether M2 or M3 I don’t see the device‘s price changing much if at all.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

There's no doubt the board values Cook. Shareholders, too. Cook won't be forced out, but I do believe he will step down. I think he's placing his mark on the AR/VR headset as his product -- something he can truly call his own -- before he steps down. I think the fact that this new product release will be a boondoggle will hasten his exit.

As @TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️ and others pointed out, no one excels at money (and share value) more than Cook. Unfortunately in today's corporate world, that matters more than long-term health and innovation. Companies like Apple, however, are in a different category. They depend on radical innovation to survive. Otherwise, they are just another computer company. Image isn't enough. Apple desperately needs a visionary. Yes, they're like Unicorns, but if Apple is to continue to be special, the board will need to find one. Cook ain't it.

I'll be watching this headset rollout closely, but I'm sticking to my '24 prediction. Call me out late next year. I'll eat any crow slung my way...

Portending the goggles to be a boondoggle simply describes your limited vision IMO. Even if the goggles initially look like a boondoggle to short-term thinkers, long term the project will have huge positive impact on Apple - - similar to what happened with the Newton.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

Did I miss something? Two years ago they added M1 to MBA and the price stayed the same. For years Apple has upgraded certain items without raising price. Whether M2 or M3 I don’t see the device‘s price changing much if at all.

Yes, you missed the fact that I said cost not price. Lower initial yields make H1 2023 M3 more costly than well-established M2. I agree with you that Apple generally does not increase sticker price, but if chips are costing them more they would likely need to cut somewhere else (even lesser speakers, even lesser displays, even slower base SSDs, etc.) to maintain margins if they chose not to raise sticker prices.

This debate was about M3 in 15" MBAs being produced right now. M3 yields should be constantly improving and we do not know the highly secret details of M2/M3 chip production or of product sales, so what products become cost-effective at what points will remain a mystery.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

The Watch OS seems outdated now and it’s been the same OS designs that we have been using for a long time now. So it definitely needs a new overall and revamped UI.

The iOS 16 has not been my favorite. At times I find it draining the battery life, sluggish, and filled with silly bugs. Check out the recent bug I encountered.

View attachment 2198225

To me the descriptor "outdated" does not diss an OS; exactly the opposite. An OS to a mature device should evolve, not get changed with the seasons like a fad clothing style. Breaking ujsers' existing UI behavior is not per se a desirable thing and should be avoided unless very substantial value add justifies the change.

 

[jjudson]

Its has the potential for sure, it just badly lacks the depth of freely accessible media to take off. Kinda reminds one of how hypercard was before hypertext was used to navigate the world wide web. It needs the right environment to thrive. Apple was pitching AR as a means to more accurately portray subject matter you could interact with such as demos or learning examples. It's way further out to consider it ready for online commerce which could be the basis if it really talking off.

I have a little background to draw from on this topic, having participated in a number of proof-of-concept projects with several major Silicon Valley tech companies in conjunction with a handful of large legacy computing, networking, and software companies. Based on these studies, I am confident in saying that the real value here is on the AR side. Not VR. VR has been tried and generally rejected by the consumer sector, even in gaming where the true potential originally laid.

The potential market for AR is enormous, particularly in industrial usage as well as research. The challenge for Apple is that they are not known as an industrial supplier, and if the many years of the PC versus Mac wars have shown, they won’t be a big player there any time soon. And of course, on the VR side, they have no footprint in the high-graphics gaming world and aren’t likely to gain any foothold in the coming years (aside from the fact that gamers have shelved their existing units already).

This headset is a product in search of a market that doesn’t exist — for Apple. It is, as I’ve said, a boondoggle, and one that will go down as one of Apple’s biggest mistakes (and they’ve had a few, even in the Jobs years). This is a Cook vanity project, and one he desperately wants to leave his stamp on before heading (deservedly) into the sunset…

…in ‘24. 😂

 

[Picklefoot]

Can you imagine that only a single Metal 3 game was released since WWDC 2022?

 

[MrTemple]

People truly don’t understand how insanely more useful and ubiquitous (even invasive) AR will be compared to VR. 🤷‍♂️

You make my argument for me with your replies. 👇

Its has the potential for sure, it just badly lacks the depth of freely accessible media to take off.

Media has almost nothing to do with AR’s potential (opposite of VR).

Kinda reminds one of how hypercard was before hypertext was used to navigate the world wide web. It needs the right environment to thrive.

A much better analogy is the iPhone in 2007. I’m not sure if you can remember.

There was really zero market for a computer in your pocket. There wasn’t even a way to install apps on it in 2007. It wasn’t for a couple years before developers could release their own native apps.

The interface to the world and technical capability through a piece of glass in the hand proved fairly popular, btw.

In 2006 nobody saw a market. There was no ‘environment for it to thrive’.

Apple was pitching AR as a means to more accurately portray subject matter you could interact with such as demos or learning examples.

Sophistry. Your idea of what Apple may or may not have “pitched” at one point is irrelevant to what a HUD between you and the real world can do.

It's way further out to consider it ready for online commerce which could be the basis if it really talking off.

Your imagination looks like it can hide under the period in that sentence.

It’s all going to be apps.

If you can’t imagine the million and one things somebody might add to their own personal HUD to the world, rest assured plenty of devs can!

And they are salivating at a brand new multi-billion dollar app industry.

 

[poematik13]

Oh hoping for just a sliver of more pre-Yosimete UI. Less flat, less minimalist, more intuitive, more It Just Works (and It’s just Stable.”)

Never happening lol

 

[redbeard331]

Unless we disagree with you of course.

Nobody wants a splinter in their eye.

 

[redbeard331]

How about the other way (that offers revenue & profit maximization for Apple too, which means it could be much more likely)?

Imagine bottom half of an existing MB... a "no-lid" MB... like a modern cut at the old Commodore 64-type computer. Since the bottom half of all MBs already hold an M SOC, RAM, SSD, etc (aka "the whole computer"), this doesn't even seem to be a big stretch. There's even some YouTube videos showing some guys who have purchased MBs with broken/damaged lids, removed the lids, and linking the remaining, functional half to ANY monitor, to have a working Mac again. Long story short: it works! Here's a pic of one...

View attachment 2197939​

Now, what else is rumored for this event? Goggles... apparently capable of displaying a virtual reality that looks like reality. It seems to me that the simplest (most fundamental) application of Goggles would be to display a screen, so one could watch a movie while wearing Goggles.

What if Goggles also make it possible to display a computer screen(s)? Now bring those 2 concepts together. 🤯 To me, this is a potential new form-factor "laptop" with the bottom half of a MB almost "as is" with the lid portion now available inside of Goggles.

If that can work, a monitor in VR would not be limited to any fixed size... unlike choosing either a laptop or desktop monitor now (or tablet or phone too). So maybe this lid-less MB + Goggles combo can present ANY size monitor to use with that "half" of a MB.

Someone needs a desktop-sized screen or maybe an ultra-wide because that is the best size to get something done? Goggles delivers it anywhere they are. Someone wants to do some computing on an iPhone-sized screen? Goggles could conceptually present that too. And everything in between. Or 2 screens. Or 4 screens. Etc.

Right now, all across the competitive landscape, players are trying to innovate folding screens & rolling screens to find some way to deliver a BIGGER screen device that is still in a portable package. This is not only happening in phones but also in larger screen devices like laptops...

View attachment 2197937

What if Apple's cut at that same objective is by virtualizing the screen vs. adding all that weight beyond about a 16" form factor now? Besides keeping the overall package small and mobile, virtualized screens could be designed and "manufactured" in Cupertino cutting those costs of new physical screen types out of the supply chain entirely (potentially yielding lower prices for us... OR more profit for Apple: hard to imagine which way THAT would go ).

Modify your idea just a bit and this seems to deliver it... in a way that may motivate some to pay for that new kind of MB (base) + Goggles, which Apple is wanting people to buy anyway. And unlike your idea which would likely be much more affordable at the expense of Apple profitability (already getting you pushback from others because Apple won't create something to cut their revenue & profit), here's a variation of the same idea that maximizes revenue & profit for Apple too.

Is this for everyone? Of course not. Nothing is for everyone. But it SEEMS to be a way to scratch a LOT of "bigger" screen product itches while clinging to a smallish, mobile tech package. ONE new heavily-rumored, portable product could possibly deliver on iMac 27", iMac 30", iMac 32", iMac Ultra Wide, MBpro 17", MBpro 18", MBpro 20", MB Ultra Wide, even bigger screen iPhone, bigger screen iPads, etc.

I see what you’re saying, but I want something small, portable, that can also fit in my pocket. I don’t see any reason Apple couldn’t make something like that and still be profitable. Take an iPad mini, remove the battery, screen, cameras, speakers, slim it down a bit, and add some ports. I think their profit margin would be greater than it is on a iPad mini as it removes a lot, and would only be adding some ports.

 

[Realityck]

It’s all going to be apps.

If you can’t imagine the million and one things somebody might add to their own personal HUD to the world, rest assured plenty of devs can!

And they are salivating at a brand new multi-billion dollar app industry.

We shall see if the keynote makes your case or not. I have argued for AR but there needs to be something that stimulates the marketplace and its not going to be just an Apple solution that does it, it has to be broader.

 

[MrTemple]

The potential market for AR is enormous, particularly in industrial usage as well as research. The challenge for Apple is that they are not known as an industrial supplier, and if the many years of the PC versus Mac wars have shown, they won’t be a big player there any time soon.

It is absolutely absurd to think AR’s primary use cases are merely games or industrial use.

I really think you have ZERO idea of what this is going to be.

Think you’re imagining current AR-kit apps. 3D novelties that appear when you place your phone between your eyes and the world.

You have COMPLETELY missed AR’s potential for when developers can offer info/services/experiences floating in a HUD (or embedded on surfaces) ALL THE TIME. No hand holding a device up to check something out.

That passive state of AR is EVERYTHING. And you don’t see that.

There are literally dozens of grocery list apps that make millions of dollars because people find it convenient when shopping. And let me tell you the first dev to let you overlay your list in-store is gonna make a mint.

Then there’s the app that will put a glowing arrow leading you to the aisle the next item is, complete with a dialog pointer floating in the aisle pointing at the product on the shelf.

Remember looking up at the end-of-aisle signs to see where the dill pickles might be? Remember when you used to have to phone and listen to your voicemail?

Serious money will also be made by the app that auto-recognizes a product you select, brings up top-rated recipes for it, cheaper alternatives in-store, or current best price available next-day shipped if you want to save a buck.

While we’re in the grocery store, what about the app that saw into your fridge the last time you opened it, or when you recycled your sixth can of Schlitz and auto-highlights that product on the shelf when the inventory is low?

Or the app that highlights which products are ‘free from’ your specified avoidances?

—

Okay, this is 30s of noodling what could be possible in a grocery store, BEFORE THIS EXPERIENCE EVER EXISTS.

Do you know how many great apps were never imagined, COULD never be imagined before smartphones existed? That’s smart-phone prehistory.

We are currently in AR prehistory and you are one of the many who can’t see that we are.

Now do the same ‘AR prehistoric’ imagining about the AR potentials for when you’re:

- walking in a new city
- redecorating your house
- watching a live sporting event
- playing golf
- tending to your garden/lawn
- hiking/skiing/cycling
- etc, etc, etc

Industrial and game uses. 🙄

Having a ‘dumb’ app, let alone an AI that sees what you sees and gives you relevant and helpful overlays onto the world will literally be more revolutionary than the smart phone.

By a LARGE margin.

 

[MrTemple]

We shall see if the keynote makes your case or not. I have argued for AR but there needs to be something that stimulates the marketplace and its not going to be just an Apple solution that does it, it has to be broader.

Are you not understanding that the keynote will be absolutely underwhelming?

And the first version will be years too early to really take off wildly? But that it HAS to release years early before it can be the matured, evolved product that takes off?

Honest question…

Were you an adult before 2007?

Because you seem not to understand that there was even less need/use/marketplace before the iPhone.

Rumour sites like this didn’t come within 100 MILES of guessing what the iPhone would be. We all thought it was going to be a cross between a Nokia candybar and an iPod. Fancy way to dial calls and send short SMS (highly unlikely to even have a qwerty interface).

I truly don’t think you understand the quantum leap in CAPABILITY that a smartphone was.

Before it, nobody in the general populace had the capability. So it was never even on the radar of what could be possible.

And iPhone v1 absolutely did NOT change that (for many) after the keynote. The product was basically a tech demo for something that ultimately was still a dumb-phone, but maybe a couple PDA features built in (do you remember PDAs?).

It couldn’t even run developer apps for 2y!

AR v1 keynote will absolutely be an iPhone v1 keynote from 2007.

That doesn’t mean everything doesn’t change.

You now are the 98% of people in 2007 that had absolutely no way of knowing even what the potential of a smart-phone could be. You were thinking only in terms of what a phone could be. (And if you don’t remember back then, “phone” means basically a Nokia candybar or Motorola Razer.)

But we have a leg up at seeing the future now.

We have watched so many sci-fi movies with robots/helmets featuring HUDs, we’ve played so many video games where augmenting the world with a HUD is the norm, we have a huge leg up in imagining, which we didn’t really have in 2007.

But none of us can yet imagine where AR/smart-glasses will have us in another 15 years.

It’ll be an even bigger change to our world than the last 15y since the adven of smartphones.

The internet landing in your pocket was HUGE.

The internet (especially now with AI access) escaping your pocket and meshing with everything in the world will change literally every sector.

 

[teejaysplace24]

Ventura was the single worst release of MacOS in the post-Classic era. Buggy as heck and the new system interfaces are an abomination of GUI design. Though, I suppose we shouldn't complain about them or Apple will just force us to use them in even more places...

 

[teejaysplace24]

Is that with more or less bugs than what Ventura gave us?

There are STILL bugs in Ventura, so I don't have high hopes. They're not bothering to refine the OS anymore — just adding more bloatware to keep up with their 12 month release/marketing schedule.

 

[teejaysplace24]

Sounds like you may need some better automated testing tools?

Sounds like you should work for Apple. Our products don't work correctly? You, a professional, must be using them wrong.