“Apple’s Vision Pro Is a $3,500 Ticket to Nowhere, Janus Rose’s latest article for Vice is headlined, with the sub-headline, “A decade after Facebook bought Oculus, VR still has no appeal except as an expensive novelty toy.” Apple Vision Pro is designed to sustain high-performance workloads and is capable of running for two hours on a single charge. Janus Rose for Vice: As a rule of thumb, the tech from dystopian cyberpunk novels in the 80s and 90s manifests in our reality in one of two ways: either as horrifying weapons of police state oppression, or expensive novelty bullshit for rich people. After more than a decade, it seems clear that virtual reality is one of the latter cases. What…

At this year’s WWDC, the focus was squarely on Apple’s new Vision Pro headset. | Photo by Justin Sullivan / Getty Images Five minutes into Google’s I/O conference in May, Verge staffers started taking bets on how many times “AI” would be mentioned onstage. It seemed like every presenter had to say it at least once or get stuck with a cattle prod by Sundar Pichai. (In the end, we stopped betting and made a supercut.) Watching WWDC, though, the book ran in the opposite direction: would anyone from Apple mention “AI” at all? It turns out, no, not even once. The technology was referred to, of course, but always in the form of “machine learning” — a more sedate…

Apple turned the iPod into a status symbol. A headset might be a taller order. | Photo by Justin Sullivan / Getty Images ‘This is the single greatest thing that could happen to this industry.’ As Apple prepares its long-rumored jump into augmented reality on Monday, doubts have shadowed every step of the way. There are reports of frequent changes in direction and skepticism inside Apple’s ranks. The device has allegedly been hard to manufacture and required numerous compromises. The process has taken years longer than Apple expected. And at a rumored $3,000, even Apple reportedly expects slow short-term sales. But among AR professionals, the mood is jubilant. “This is the single greatest thing that could happen to this industry,”…

Apple’s augmented reality (AR) / virtual reality (VR) / mixed reality (MR) headset is finally expected to be revealed on Monday, June 5th at 10am PDT / 1pm EDT after years in development. This is a huge moment for not only the company, but the European extended reality (XR) sector as a whole. Designer Marcus Kane’s conception Apple’s mixed reality headset (via Yanko Design) Callum Booth for TNW: With its VR/AR headset, the Cupertino giant is on the brink of jumping into an entirely new industry, one that could either reinforce or destroy its reputation as a sector definer. And for European XR companies? Apple’s hardware has the potential to do miraculous things… “The magnitude of the opportunity is enormous,…

Apple is some 72 hours away from its first major new product launch in eight years. The company is expected to show off a mixed-reality (XR) headset at next week’s WWDC developer event, which would mark its first new product introduction since the Apple Watch remade the smartwatch and wrist watch markets in 2015. Emily Bary for MarketWatch: The company would be wading into a headset market that has failed to gain meaningful user traction, even as market leader Meta Platforms Inc. META, -0.37% changed its name in late 2021 to convey more of a focus on virtual worlds. Mixed-reality headsets combine virtual reality, which is immersive, and augmented reality, which lets people engage virtually with real-life surroundings. Apple’s device,…

Illustration: The Verge Just when the metaverse had mostly faded from the headlines, a heavily rumored new product launch appears poised to bring it roaring back. Today let’s talk about what’s happened in the world of virtual and mixed reality since last we left it and whether Apple can find mainstream uses for headsets that go beyond the games that have defined it so far. Monday marks the start of Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference. Unlike most years, when coming software updates dominate the keynote, this year hardware is expected to take center stage. After more than seven years of development, Apple is reportedly set to unveil the Reality Pro, a roughly $3,000 headset that aims to serve a variety of…