Traveling with Apple Vision Pro

> That may or may not be true in general, but air travel is one of the most oppressive environments people regularly find themselves in.

Most people don't regularly travel by plane. This is a very "1%" (as shorthand for a privileged minority of people globally, not literally exactly 1% of the population) problem.

> Most people don't regularly travel by plane. This is a very "1%" problem.

Except, they do in a country like the US that has massive distances between cities.

They didn't say most, they said people.

1% of 300 million is still a 3 mill market size in the US alone.

I don't think it's a 1% problem, but it's a 40% problem:

https://www.airlines.org/new-survey-nearly-90-percent-of-ame...

44% of Americans flew commercially in 2022.

Even in the US, most people (50+% of the population) certainly doesn't regularly (say, more than once a decade) travel by plane.

There's a whole world outside of the USA.

I think that's supposed to be

> Except, they do in a country like the US that don't have any other suitable alternatives

Sure, but 11% of the global population fly in a year

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095937802...

Google’s AI tool says that 20-25% of the world’s population flies at least three times a year. Not a good source, but at least a surprising statistic if true.

Some hard data says that 12% of US flyers take 66% of flights [1]. Those are all likely very frequent fliers, and is much more than 1%.

1. https://www.businesstraveller.com/business-travel/2021/03/31...

80% of those people are flying economy class and already get along fine with earbuds and their phone. The remaining 20% that can afford something like Vision Pro almost certainly will choose not to.

>The most recent such poll was conducted online between January 9-31, 2023, in which Ipsos interviewed roughly 11,000 adults age 18+ from the continental U.S., Alaska, and Hawaii.

Same poll can result with statement "100% of Americans use internet."

49% in the last year according to this https://www.airlines.org/dataset/air-travelers-in-america-an...

Statista survey pre-pandemic says majority fly every year https://www.statista.com/statistics/316365/air-travel-freque...

Americans fly quite often.

Yeah, but “Rest of World cannot afford luxury travel” is not a notable fact. The US is rich. Americans are rich. For many things, the US is the only market where it’s feasible. A self-driving car is useless in India (1/6 of all people), for instance. Labour costs are too low.

It’s clear the Vision Pro didn’t find its market but I don’t think it’s an air travel thing.

People used to get along fine with a magazine or book; that doesn't mean they weren't ready for something better.

If those uncertain people decide they want to distract themselves with VR, do you think they'll buy the $350 headset or the $3,500 one?

I just don't see the market Apple envisions materializing. I'd expect 20 people to be using a Quest in economy before you see 2 people using a Vision Pro in business.

Families tend to get spread out and vacations tend to be very short. There is a strong encouragement to meet for recognized holidays, so these are by far the busiest times at airports.

Last year, the prediction was 4.7 million people in the US traveling by plane over the thanksgiving holiday, which demolishes the 1% comment immediately.

Well, about 94% of the American population use the internet so it's a good base by which to conduct reliable surveys.

And how many of those are regular vs. irregular trips?

Probably not enough to make the statement that flying is a situation people find themselves in regularly.

4.7m is ~0.05% of ~8bn

The author specifically says he believes people will be using the 4th or 5th iteration of the Vision Pro for this purpose. Why are you comparing prices of devices that won't exist for another 5+ years?

If you look at everything in the larger group of world population you’ll end up with a lot of useless info.

Because you and I both know Apple will never be price-competitive with the commodity segment. They are a luxury brand that relies on luxury margins, so I want to know why their business model will succeed.

If plane seating is anything to go by, most people don't want a luxury experience but a practical and cheap one instead. Most seats aren't reserved for premium passengers because they are a minority, maybe a profitable audience but not at all the primary one.

You are greatly underestimating how common it is for Americans to travel by plane. Almost half of Americans fly at least once a year. It is sufficiently inexpensive that almost everyone can readily afford to.

And a lot of those probably flew once to visit family at the holidays.

Oh wow, I didn't imagine it's this many people. I stand corrected, thank you for looking up the numbers.

A little bit of both, and they are related. Trains are a tough sell because they aren't competitive for most travel. Even at 300kph, they're only good for local-ish travel (by that, I mean up to perhaps as much as 1000km). Would be great for Portland to Seattle, or Portland to LA, but if you're going out of region (which is extremely common), an airplane will be way faster and almost certainly cheaper too.

I'd love a moderately fast train, say 200kph, between cities like Portland and Seattle. That's a great use case.

But as a nationwide network, there won't ever be a suitable rail alternative, unless it gets subsidized. Amtrak is already stupidly expensive for what you get.

> Because you and I both know Apple will never be price-competitive with the commodity segment.

OG iPhone: $799

iPhone 3G: $199

> They are a luxury brand that relies on luxury margins, so I want to know why their business model will succeed.

Apple has shown many times over they don't need to be price competitive with the commodity segment. If you want to know why their business model will succeed, why not just look at their current business model which has been massively successful? Arguably the most successful business model in the history of consumer hardware.