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AR is the 'Next Big Thing', Says Apple CEO Tim Cook (siliconrepublic.com) 123

Apple chief executive Tim Cook believes augmented reality, or technology that overlays virtual objects onto the real world, is "the next big thing" that is poised to "pervade our entire lives." From a report: Shanahan asked Cook about major developments in tech he expects in the next five to 10 years. "I'm excited about AR," said the Big Tech CEO, citing augmented reality as an emerging tech space to watch. "My view is it's the next big thing, and it will pervade our entire lives." [...] Cook also sees applications for AR helping with hands-on tasks. "You may be under the car changing the oil, and you're not sure exactly how to do it. You can use AR," he said. Interestingly, the tech CEO sees benefits for AR and connecting people, more than other available technologies. "I think it's something that doesn't isolate people. We can use it to enhance our discussion, not substitute it for human connection, which I've always deeply worried about in some of the other technologies."
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AR is the 'Next Big Thing', Says Apple CEO Tim Cook

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  • Tim Cook said this a long time ago.

  • The next big thing (Score:4, Interesting)

    by t4eXanadu ( 143668 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @02:45PM (#59641774)

    Yes, just like VR.

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      AR will fail to go mainstream for the same reason as VR thus far has: bulky, expensive hardware is needed for a decent experience.

      • by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:34PM (#59641992)
        Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • How quickly the Newton has been forgotten!

        • by Tom ( 822 )

          This.

          We have had AR for over a decade now, and it's been used for exactly such purposes, except on a more professional level. In fact, in some specific purposes we've had it for two decades.

          But it was bulky, expensive and primitive. Apple doesn't do that. They enter the market when it's ready for mass consumption and then pretend they invented it. They used to bring a big pack of innovation that gave it the final push towards the mass market, as they did with multi-touch and the smartphone, though I'm not c

      • by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:37PM (#59642006)

        How are millions of PSVR units in people's hands not 'mainstream".

        It's not everyone but that is absolutely entering mainstream territory.

        Plus you have commercial outlines like The Void in various cities that are doing quite well.

        It is harder to make sales with existing systems being somewhat expensive and bulky as you said but all of that is reducing rapidly, year after year.

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          They sold millions of 3D TVs but it's basically dead at this point.

          • by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @04:48PM (#59642284) Homepage

            They sold millions of 3D TVs but it's basically dead at this point.

            If you're buying VR goggles it's for VR, many of those TVs were sold to people who didn't care about 3D in the first place so it's not really an apples to apples comparison. You can get a usable [anandtech.com] pair for $149 now, even if it's novelty/niche the price is getting down to a point that why not. It's fun in moderate doses, even if it's no replacement for ordinary gaming. It's not taking over but I don't really see why it would disappear either.

        • Even if you only think of the ps4 community that is only 1 in 100 users that have it. That is still well and truly in the niche/novelty realm. VR is still a long way off being mainstream.
      • Hardware is not the issue. Uselessness of the idea is the issue.

        The only thing both those ideas are supposed to bring is quite literally blocking one's field of vision with pointless crap.
        Which is marginally acceptable while sitting on a couch and playing a game... and that's about it.

        No, it's not good for movies, regular or porn for the same reason video games are not being made to be played on 6 or 4 wrap-around screens simultaneously, though something like that would be quite possible today.
        It's pointles

        • Oddly enough, they do make games for multi-monitor surround setups.
          Look at racing and flight sims. They're still the best use for VR.

        • by jythie ( 914043 )
          I already see people holding up their cell phones in order to get overlays on things like text for translation, or taking measurements. Take any task where you have to keep jumping between a screen and what you are doing, and having an overlay for hands free reference could be really useful. When I look around my project space I have bunches of sticky notes already doing pretty much things, putting little bits of instructions or notes in places where I can both see the thing I am interacting with and r
      • by Shotgun ( 30919 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @04:20PM (#59642176)

        AR doesn't get off that easy. VR shuts out the world, leaving the artist to create a VR experience from a blank slate. AR requires the artist to merge his vision with both what I'm seeing and what you're seeing, even though I'm in a cube and you're at a coffee shop. VR is hard to create content for. AR is a "whole 'nother level".

      • by jythie ( 914043 )
        I don't know, I already see people using AR features on cell phones pretty regularly. While not as flashy as what people picture with video-game like features, the class of AR that includes things like automatic translation or displaying information about an object is already picking up among non-techies.
      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • Natural hand movement based VR controllers like the Oculus Touch have been out for years now. There are definitely games that make extensive use of them, too. Even before them, the head tracking in real space has been used for some interesting effects. VR hasn't been merely "how you view a video game, without changing significantly how you interact with the objects within the game" since... 2015, at least?

          The handheld controllers keep getting better, and at some point people will come up with an economical

      • Oculus Quest costs $400, doesn't need a PC to run and is not bulky and does provide a decent experience.

        • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward
          On the other hand, it's Facebook spyware, so...
    • ...and 3D TVs

    • You mean that "VR" that only existed as "big iron" SGI hardware costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, and then ten years later as shitty "prosumer" glasses only supported by proprietary titles... and only twenty years after that is fnally becoming ubiquitous (not to mention actually viable??

      You do mean that VR, don't you?? (You dumb motherfucker.)

      • You do recall the people who said VR would be huge and tons of people would buy VR headsets like the Oculus Rift? You do know that that didn't quite happen, and it never took off as expected? I was speaking to the claim that AR would be PERVASIVE just as some claimed VR would be. VR is not pervasive, thus they were wrong. The AR acolytes pushing whatever they are selling are likely to be wrong, too. Why? Over-hyped products, corporate marketing-speak. You're little VR history lesson and ad hominem attack i

  • by RAHH ( 5900166 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @02:48PM (#59641786)
    Someone tell Tim that Bill is already beating them in this front.
    • It won't be the first time Apple had to license technology from Microsoft.

      • by MikeMo ( 521697 )
        Really? Which technology was that? I remember things exactly the opposite, but my memory is pretty bad these days.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • by brunes69 ( 86786 )

      Bill gates has had almost nothing at all to do with Microsoft for a long time now. The only connection he has is he sits on the board (along with a lot of other people).

  • Same fate as 3D TV? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by RitchCraft ( 6454710 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @02:53PM (#59641810)
    I predict AR will have the same fate as 3D television. Cool concept but bad experience in practice. I played around with AR a few years back. Pointing a small screen at something was too strange and got old quick. Having to wear glasses all the time would be cumbersome. Contact lenses with a screen built in... uh, no thanks.
    • I think it's a shoo-in for anyone already wearing glasses all the time, and an incredibly hard sell for anyone else. Automotive assemblers will wear them, but not most mechanics. It will be easy to sell them to dirt bikers, but not cyclists.

    • I predict AR will have the same fate as 3D television

      I predict that an average IQ plus a healthy dose of Dunning-Kruger Effect tends to yield predictions that are wrong before they're even uttered. ;)

      • The great thing about a prediction is that it takes time to pan out ... and it may be wrong. I could be completely wrong. However, I've been in the tech industry for 30+ years now and have seen many fads in tech come and go. Even with my average IQ I just *might* be right. :-)
        • Even with my average IQ...

          To be fair, I suppose "qualitative extrapolation of how societal and technologies dynamics intersect in the near to distant future" is a somewhat skillset. It might help to have grown up reading intelligent sci-fi, and understanding *why* they came to the conclusions they did.

          Or maybe it's just [technological] common sense...

    • I think there will be a lot of great business applications.

      How about AR infrared glasses that show nurses where to stick you with a needle to draw blood?

      Or a mechanic servicing a machine with parts highlighted to check/replace based upon diagnostic data.

      Or salespeople who have customer names floating above their heads.

      Or.... never mind you get the idea. Maybe not the next BIG thing, but certainly an important useful technology that will be around for a really long time.
      • I think there will be a lot of great business applications.

        Like harvesting the metadata of who and what you're looking at, combined with the gps and RF data your spy phone already provides.

        Because you're no longer a customer, you're a product: a data object, to be sold and traded among "trusted partners".

  • AR for everybody? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Arzaboa ( 2804779 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @02:57PM (#59641832)

    AR is great for Pokemon. AR is great if you're operating on someone on the other side of the planet. AR is great if you're on the battlefield. For the rest of the population it is a gimmick.

    People are already beginning to rebel against today's tech. AR has been just as available as VR in recent history. The verdict is in. Most people don't want to be plugged in 24/7.

    --
    When no one understands, that's usually a good sign that you're wrong. - Victoria Schwab

    • Most people don't want to be plugged in 24/7.

      That's it right there. Even my kids (17, 19, and 30) have said that being connected all the time is tiresome not to mention a time-suck.

    • When no one underderstands, which is usually the case, it is usually a sign that you are surrounded by ye "average" retards.

      Basically you are calling Joe Bauer (from Idiocracy) wrong.

      Also: Basic logic and reasoning, mate! Learn some. It would explain why your sig is idiotic, too.

      • Your argument why somebody is wrong is based on... a work of fiction, which is premised on an outright falsehood (that typical IQs are decreasing)? Look, I'm not defending the GP's post or sig, but your argument is fucking stupid. Fictional "evidence" isn't evidence at all, even when it's merely extrapolating from reality instead of abandoning it outright.

    • by Type44Q ( 1233630 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:36PM (#59642004)

      For the rest of the population it is a gimmick.

      And so was the Internet, in '93; you're obviously quite the imaginative one.

    • by ljw1004 ( 764174 )

      The verdict is in. Most people don't want to be plugged in 24/7.

      I agree with that, but I think it'll work out the reverse of what you say. Currently people stare into their phones all the time. I think AR is what will let them engage with the world more.

    • It's amazing for a teaching environment.
      Astronomy? Biology? Anatomy? Physics (see magnetic field lines, or fluid flow in 3d, for instance?)
      Architecture, history, plenty of others...

      If you think it has only a niche application, in addition to the fact that walking around the city ads/coupons/groupons/deals/reservations/reviews can pop up for restaurants as you walk around, then you might want to think about it a little more.

    • I don't play the game anymore, but Pokemon Go - AR actually made it way harder to toss pokeballs onto the pokemon themselves.

      It was a nifty feature that got turned off a couple hours into the game - I've never met anyone in person who used it.

  • Maybe offline, non-permanent-recording cameras (with overlays from somewhere else).

    But even then, how could you tell, as a recorded person?

    Also, this might fly in countries without a GDPR, but otherwise, not a chance in hell!
    Around where I live, they'd be banned quicker than you can say "Hail corporate".

  • Bad example (Score:4, Funny)

    by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:10PM (#59641886)

    "You may be under the car changing the oil, and you're not sure exactly how to do it. You can use AR,"

    Really? People using AR have or will have a Tesla, no oil change ever!

    • A few hobbyists will be changing the [plant-based] jojoba oil in their crankcases; every month (or even every Sunday, in "white supremacist-dominated" areas), you just might be able to run appropriately-modified IC-powered "antiques" on [plant-based] alcohol.
    • Worst than that, Tim (I would have to assume) has obviously never been under a car changing oil..

      There is no way in hell anyone will be wearing anything AR while doing that. It is a retarded example. For SO many reasons (including lighting, dirt, oil, space, etc).
      Also, a pretty simple 3-4 stage drawing is more than enough for such a simple procedure. AR is not going to add anything.
      And thats even assuming the people who dont current change oil would start, which also wont happen.

      There are really VERY few no

  • Wasn't everyone harping on AR 10 or 15 years ago? Or is the big difference now that Apple is saying it instead of Google?

    • by JaredOfEuropa ( 526365 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:41PM (#59642026) Journal
      Same as VR. The big difference is that things have vastly improved since the last generation, making for a much better experience and greater ease of use:
      - Better head tracking (VR and AR).
      - Better headsets (VR, coming very soon for AR)
      - Improved room mapping (AR), "improved" meaning that we have it this time.
      - Better displays and renderers (VR and AR)
      - Smaller computers (VR, and for AR they are wearable now).
      - Hand tracking (VR and AR).

      VR has made a pretty decent comeback and instead of disappearing as quickly as it appeared, this time it stuck and is still being developed. AR is almost there, just as hyped as it was 15 years ago but this time round it will actually be practical. And it will probably stick around as well.
    • Wasn't everyone harping on AR 10 or 15 years ago

      Rather doubtful as it didn't exist yet.

      • Wasn't everyone harping on AR 10 or 15 years ago

        Rather doubtful as it didn't exist yet.

        On the contrary, AR systems go back to the early 1990s. Just because Apple hadn't yet announced it, doesn't mean it wasn't real.

      • No, he's right.

        I definitely remember hearing about AR 15 years ago. That association is definitely strong in my mind for some reason.

  • Thing to go get super-hyped, have companies dumps lots of time and money into it, and end up in the bin alongside 3D TV, for similar reasons.

  • by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:19PM (#59641930) Homepage Journal

    Tim Apple is frequently wrong.

  • by bobstreo ( 1320787 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @03:20PM (#59641932)

    for watching television for a while.

    A nice popup interface with links to something like IMDB or TheMovieDatabase, with actor/director/series information would be handy. Otherwise I have to use another screen to look stuff up.

    I guess it will probably be available in porn first, not that there's anything wrong with that.

    • This is the type of thing we've been investigating for AR usage. The linking of extra information, not porn.

      You can link image recognition with AR to bring up extensive details or an animated presentation about an art piece and artist without having big signs or a TV distracting you from it. The same sort of thing could be done with music recognition. It can also be very useful for navigation in complex buildings, think floating arrows to guide when you lift up your phone camera to a hallway. In a environme

  • While recognizing that Mr. Cook is a smart and accomplished businessman (better than Jobs in running the business), he's not a visionary salesman like Steve Jobs was.

    I'm sure that if Mr. Jobs were still around he'd have a presentation/demo that talk about AR/VR from a perspective that nobody had thought of before. The presentation would be loaded onto Youtube and used to show MBA and sales students how to pitch a new idea - along with his presentations on the Mac, the iPod, the iPad and iPhone.

    • AR is for every day activities. VR will be for gaming or other immersive entertainment options. Both have their place.

  • If Mr Cook was planning a major new product and wanted to whet the world's appetite for this new experience, how would he do that? And when and where would he do that?

    OTOH if Apple had no plans for AR or they were significantly behind competitors in the field, would they be praising the technology?

    From TFA: "With healthcare and AR clearly on Cook's agenda for future developments, he also made reference to the emerging tech du jour while acknowledging its proliferation. "Of course I'm excited about AI too, b

  • then it's adoption will explode!!

  • Great so the future of humanity is people staring off into space while someone is trying to get their attention. The buzz will be about how you can do this or that with this amazing tech but most people will use it to scan their FB, Insta, Snap, etc. feed all while ignoring any real human interaction.

  • Thanks for the heads up Tim Cook, changing my work focus from Deep Learning to AR now!
  • by Shotgun ( 30919 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @04:13PM (#59642142)

    In order for the AR device to help me change the oil in my car, someone has to scan in the details of a 2014 Nissan Xterra and tell the system about that little cover plate you have to remove to get to the filter, and where the oil plug is. And God forbid they scan the six cylinder vs the 8 cylinder version, or the 2014 vs the 2014 with the mid-year change. Maybe this is just a sign that Tim Cook doesn't change his own oil, so he doesn't realize that if you can't recognize the oil plug or make a decision on which oil to use, you most likely shouldn't be doing that chore by yourself.

    But, that leads us into what the AR WILL be used for in the real world. There might be some fan donated content around historical sites. A few cars might even get an AR description from some attention deprived mechanics to help you do basic maintenance. But, do we really expect the big car companies to undercut their service departments by enabling you to change your own oil, when they're doing everything they can to make it next to impossible to change your own oil? What you'll see instead is an indicator of where on the dashboard the upgrade you can buy will be. If you download an update to the AR file, you'll get indicators of where a thingamazoo will be in the next year model of that car. Walking down the street, you'll see indicators of where the cheap, almost food, sandwich is on sale. That's right. Why pay for billboards, when you can target the advertising at the user most likely to eat the crap your peddling as she is walking by?

    AR might have applications in some targeted markets, like mechanics working on high-end equipment. There is a budget to create the AR data, and the companies sending out the repairmen have an interest in seeing that the job is done correctly and quickly. But, for general purpose use? Due to the specificity and difficulty of creating content, expect a lot of advertising and worse user-created content than what you find on Facebook.

    • by jythie ( 914043 )
      Even if the AR system can not do a fancy real time overlay of specific parts, being able to look at notes or the manual without having to stop what you are doing to go interact with another device could be helpful. I can recall last time I tried working on my car (I am not a car person, so knew very little) I was constantly having to set everything down to go look something up like the exact order to disassemble something.
    • by Lanthanide ( 4982283 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @04:48PM (#59642282)

      Ok, so old cars that pre-date AR content might be hit and miss.

      You've not considered that new cars post-AR may come with AR maintenance 'manuals'. Like how old cars didn't come with bluetooth but new ones do.

      In 10 years that will mean many cars have AR maintenance manuals, and in 20 years it will be 'most' cars and if an AR maintenance manual is something that is important to you, you won't have to pay any real price premium to get it because it will be so ubiquitous. Like bluetooth is now.

    • AR might have applications in some targeted markets, like mechanics working on high-end equipment. There is a budget to create the AR data, and the companies sending out the repairmen have an interest in seeing that the job is done correctly and quickly. But, for general purpose use? Due to the specificity and difficulty of creating content, expect a lot of advertising and worse user-created content than what you find on Facebook.

      If and when AR gear can reliably recognize enough things in the real world to float labels and status information in useful ways, content is definitely the remaining hurdle.

      As with any gold rush, it's the company selling shovels that will make the most. If I were in AR, I'd be trying to develop the Macromedia Flash of AR. The just-barely-scriptable hold-your-hand tool for an almost entirely non-technical audience to present their pretty pictures and animations. Font and color selection and rounded corner

    • There is plenty of content for AR.

      Facebook, Whatsapp, Youtube, all easily overlayed on top of your real world view and without having to hold your phone. At the very least, AR glasses will make smartwatches obsolete.

  • by Solandri ( 704621 ) on Tuesday January 21, 2020 @04:33PM (#59642230)
    Google's Tango [wikipedia.org] was started in 2014 (they had a tape measure app which could estimate lengths based on what your phone's camera saw), and eventually replaced by ARCore [wikipedia.org]. Third party instances of AR were around before then (first version I saw was an automatic sign translator for the iPhone). While these things are handy, they haven't really "taken off." I suspect AR is one of those things which is useful some of the time, but not most of the time. So either you keep it tucked away in the apps on your phone and pull it out once every few weeks, or you don't even bother because you don't need it that often so you just ignore the technology.

    The only place where I could see AR really being used all the time is on AR glasses. But the glasses need to have a camera for that to work, and people seem to be staunchly opposed [wikipedia.org] to the idea of other people walking around with a camera mounted on their glasses all the time. It seems kinda hypocritical to me for Cook to be advocating strict user privacy, while simultaneously prognosticating the inevitability of a technology which is dependent on the omnipresence of cameras everywhere, always on, always recording.
    • People I know who work on airframe mechanics and in assembly operations are ok with wearing glasses for VR if it tells them more info - like parts in supply, where they are, when they'll get there - but that's when they're in the space where they do that work.

      Not in their car on a road.

      The argument for VR in shop environments is reasonable, especially when tablet-enabled - but the argument that it should be in other places is not reasonable.

  • Tim Cook is definitely not the visionary leader to keep Apple in the top spot.
  • Come on, AR virtual anime catgirl waifus!

  • Come on, people. Most of you already wander around bumping into things because you have your eyes glued to a screen, or sit and stare at a screen all day every day, you hide from real people and fool yourselves that 'social media' is just as good if not better, that your 'Facebook friends' are real friends, and now you're going to walk around with dorky glasses on your face, literally putting a screen in front of your eyes over everything else in the real world, too?

    For fuck's sake, put the screens and e
  • The Game [youtube.com], augmented reality used to subvert and control people.

    Cook, boldly going where Google has gone before.

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