In 2013, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Say The gadgets we wear on our wrists “could be a deeply technical realm.”
no. Maybe you own a Fitbit or an Apple Watch, but those kinds of digital devices aren’t as important as Cook and many other tech optimists would like.
Five years ago, Pokémon Go persuaded people to roam their neighborhoods in pursuit of animated characters they could see by pointing their smartphone cameras at their surroundings. Company executives such as Cook say the game could be the beginning of a transformative fusion of digital and real life, sometimes called augmented reality or AR
“I think AR can be huge,” Cook told Apple investors in 2016.
no. Augmented reality, virtual reality, and similar technologies are still promising, and sometimes useful, but they’re not yet very large.
Today, Cook and countless others are betting that the combination of these two technologies will be the next major phase of the internet. Apple, Meta, Microsoft and Snap are moving towards a future where we will wear computers on our heads for interactions that blend physical and digital lives. (You and Mark Zuckerberg could call it a metaverse. I wouldn’t.)
Given the mixed record of technologists predicting the digital revolution, it’s worth examining why their claims haven’t materialized — and if this time, they’re right.
There are two ways to look at forecasts for wearable computing and the immersive digital world over the past decade. The first is that all past inventions are necessary steps on the road to greatness.
people laugh at Google Glass comes after the company released a beta version of its computer headset in 2013, but glasses could be a building block. Computer chips, software, cameras and microphones have improved so much since then that digital helmets may soon become less obtrusive and more useful.
Likewise, Pokémon Go, virtual reality video games, and apps for checking out new lipsticks through augmented reality may not be for everyone, but they help techies refine their ideas and get some excited about the possibilities of more engaging digital experiences .
My colleagues report that next year Apple may launch a ski goggle-like computer headset designed to provide virtual and augmented reality experiences. Apple only hinted at the work at its iPhone software tweak event on Monday, but the company has been laying the groundwork for these technologies to become its potential next big product category.
The second possibility is that techies may be wrong again about the potential for the next iteration of Google Glass and Pokémon Go. Perhaps more refined features, longer battery life, less clunky glasses and doing more fun things on the face computer aren’t the most important ingredients for the next big tech thing.
One problem is that technologists haven’t given us a good reason why we want to live in the digital-plus-real world they imagine for us.
I’ve written before that any new technology will inevitably compete with the smartphone, which is at the center of our digital lives. Everything that follows has to answer the question: Is there anything my phone can’t do with this thing?
This challenge does not mean the technology is frozen in where it is today. The workout that excites me makes me feel as if the instructor is guiding me on a virtual alpine lake, and I can imagine new ways to connect with people from afar that are more intimate than Zoom. Apple, in particular, has a proven track record of taking existing technology concepts like smartphones and streaming music and making them appealing to the masses.
But the richer our current digital lives are, the harder it is for us to embrace new things. This is something that past and present predictions of a more immersive computing future don’t really take into account.
Before we go…
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Just one of the cruel and formulaic pranks that follow a violent tragedy: Online posts often claim Jody Jordan was one of the victims after a mass shooting or other fatal incident. My colleague Tiffany Hsu explains the reasons behind this repeated false propaganda and others like it.
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Is this an excuse to get out of a bad deal? After the recent drop in the stock prices of many tech companies, it now appears that Elon Musk paid too much to buy Twitter. As my colleagues Lauren Hirsch and Mike Isaac reported on Monday, Musk’s lawyers complained that the company refused to provide him with data on automated Twitter accounts and threatened (again) to pull out of the deal, providing useful context. (DealBook has more on this.)
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Our shopping habits are changing the American workforce: Employment in the transportation and warehousing industry – jobs like truck drivers, Amazon warehouse workers and couriers – reaches largest share of labor force since records began, Axios report. This is a decade-long employment change that has been exacerbated by our willingness to spend more money on things than services during the pandemic.
related: “The jobs that are in demand right now—restaurants, warehousing—these are not going to last forever,” San Francisco Fed President Mary C. Daly told my colleague Jeanna Smialek.
hug this
David Scott created Rube Goldberg-style pieces with the help of computers, including this one marbles concert on a xylophone bar. (My colleague Maya Salam recommended the video of Scott, who goes by the name Enbiggen on social media.)
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