This is such a wild product unveiling. The dystopian scenes of a dad photographing his playing children through the mask that separates him from those same children; the FaceTime with an avatar that looks merely okay, making the idea of FaceTiming with an avatar on both ends of the call seem oddly pointless; the high cost; ... and then the fact that it does look like an incredible piece of technology. The subtle hand gestures, the almost trope-y at this point potential to have a giant screen wherever you are, the reality dial, etc. all looked amazing. But then again, the size, intrusiveness, battery life, etc. It was an unveiling with incredible downsides to go with seemingly every bit of appeal.
I like that it has those highs and lows. Maybe it's not for me, but it's a real swing at something.
Dystopian is an apt description. It does look like something straight out of a black mirror episode. A lot of recent technology is really embracing the uncanny valley feeling.
It only strong black mirror vibes, but like meta level black mirror vibes, where you know Apple know that this has strong black mirror vibes and were like fuck it, let’s power through and engineer the shit out of this, which only gets us closer to black mirror, which is exactly what the show was about (the black mirror of an iPhone screen and the inevitable futures we can’t resist).
I’m hoping that Apple are hoping that the product will find some niches and that not everything they have thought of will work but that’s ok for them.