The gist of it: the iPhone’s triumph wasn’t just in its display or its sleek design. It was in the transformative user experience it provided, which upended our previous understanding of what a phone should be. As we look towards the unveiling of the Reality Pro, let’s set our sights not just on the hardware specs, but on the potential for a new “iPhone moment” in user interfaces. If Apple can’t deliver that moment then, it can’t do a lot of other things with the Reality Pro.
The Speculative Apple Reality Pro Feature Set
Now is the time to put money down on how the Apple MR (Mixed Reality) headset, maybe named Reality Pro, is going to do on displays, user interface, and performance. First, you can bet on whether it will actually be called Reality Pro. A lot of people are going to be disappointed if it isn’t. Then, can we be sure that the it will us a pancake lens solution, which is pretty mainstream for headsets, or does Apple have something non-mainstream, impossible to predict in its sights?
How much money are you going to put down that it has Micro OLED screens supplied by Sony, and the technology and that they will achieve an amazing 4,000 ppi and be 1.41-inches each?
Apple’s MR headset is expected to be powered by an M2 series chip? You want to put double down on that or will Apple shock everyone by unleashing the M3 for the first time?
But, all that is fine and dandy, and maybe all the leaks and conjecture will end up deflating the Apple presentation at its worldwide developer conference (WWDC 2023) next week. I am going to assume that the user interface will be a combination of eye-tracking technology and gesture control and the rumored external multi-camera set-up not only helps in mapping the real world environment for the user, but also adds something to the human-computer interface. By that I mean, what if the real benefit of the Reality Pro is that it will help shape a new user interface, a change in the way people interact with their computers.
What if, the Reality Pro is more of an experiment in input devices than a competitor to Meta’s Quest? I have some money down on that because, something about the Reality Pro has to jump out, and while the MicroLED display specs sound very cool, it’s not enough. Apple needs the proverbial “iPhone moment” at this launch. We know enough about how the Apple Watch morphed from a wrist-phone into a health monitoring device to believe that Reality Pro could morph into something other than another headset, no matter how great the tech turns out to be. We have been pointing and clicking for decades now, and have the carpal tunnel syndrome to show for it. Existing smartphones have actually dragged us back in development terms, convenient as it is to take your greasy, ketchup-stained fingers and swipe them left and right.
If Apple wants an iPhone moment, which kind of was the beginning of the ascendency of touch, it probably needs a new means of interaction, one that is transformative. So, line up those shot glasses, filled, and be ready to take a drink every time someone on the WWDC podium says, immersive but even though I find the whole Apple fanboy stuff tedious, I will sincerely hope that there is something that comes out of it that shifts, if not moves, the user interface. It’s about time.
