While the rumor mill is spinning like crazy about Apple AR, VR, or XR glasses that are supposedly soon-to-be-announced, it's worth remembering that no one knows anything about this launch. Or even if there will be a launch. Apple secrecy makes it so that tech journalists – and when I write journalists, you should read "journalists" – are just running with every tidbit of information and creating an epic saga around each one of them.

Bloomberg's Mark Gurman is certainly up there as he just wrote the full internal story of how Apple Glasses would work, who internally was pushing for or against them, how Tim Cook feels about them, and more!

Apple’s New Headset Meets Reality
The device has strayed from Tim Cook’s original vision, but it will still define the field.

Imagine you saw a pigeon, mistake it for a dragon, and write Game of Thrones about it. Oh, my.

Can you think of any other company that generates hype before even launching a product, or worse, pretty much denying they'd be launching the product? Me neither.

In any case, we'll see if Apple brings such a device to the market. If so, it would probably be the worst timing possible in the company's whole history, as the metaverse had become anything but a joke, and the company's efforts on AI have been less than stellar (as in: Siri is still dumb as a rock).

Meanwhile, the always astute John Gruber maps out what always happens when Apple launches a new product's category:

"The pattern for Apple’s entries into new product categories generally goes like this:

  • Apple releases the first version. It’s expensive. It’s missing a few obvious features. It has a few obvious limitations. But it’s a breakthrough.
  • Early adopters wait in line outside Apple Stores overnight to buy it. Online sales are backordered by weeks or even months soon after they launch.
  • That early fervor aside, it’s an early adopter product, and sales are less than those of Apple’s established products.
  • After a few months or maybe a year, the immediate-gratification-obsessed business press runs articles declaring the product a dud.
  • Apple releases a second-gen version that’s better. Sales go up. Word continues to spread.
  • With each successive year, Apple releases improved models. Those obvious missing features are added. The obvious limitations are removed. Older models stay on sale at lower price points. It becomes a hit product.
  • Years later, when Apple is poised to release another altogether new product, the last one — the one written off as a dud after its first year — is held up as a product that was universally hailed as a sensation and smash hit from day one."

Me? I still see zero use cases for such products. Worse, I see zero content or ecosystem to sustain it, nor any platform logic or services growth for Apple in this adventure. No systemic value, no product?

We'll see...

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