When Facetime launched in 2010 with the iPhone 4, our options for interpersonal communications changed. With the 2024 launch of the Apple
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Vision Pro (AVP), how we communicate—and how media participates in our communications—has changed again. While Meta and Snapchat have already shown us their hands, the AVP is Apple’s answer to the question of VR-headset-or-AR
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-glasses. Regardless of which permutation of reality you opt to see through its lenses, you will be introduced to new realities of interpersonal communication and conversation.
Some say the AVP is the first piece of hardware to unite the physical and digital worlds in ways both entertaining and practical—one can use it to capture real-world memories in 3D and also to have an immersive Facetime chat. The impact on how we communicate with each other that the AVP—and other similar devices—will be profound. They give us the ability to enjoy 3D video calls, playback real-life “memories” and share immersive experiences.
Join Me
Much like Apple’s other devices on which we stream our entertainment, the AVP supports FaceTime. As the user, you see a clear video of the person you’re calling on a screen in front of you. And they see a 3D-rendered version of you (called a digital Persona) that’s meant to be you if you didn’t have the AVP covering your eyes. This is the beginning of the future.
The creation of this realistic-looking avatar is one of the less scary, humanity-uniting applications of AI. And, giving people the opportunity to feel present with each other, even when not in the same place, will revolutionize how we communicate.
While CNBC’s Todd Haselton reports that, “You can hold a real meeting if necessary, in your pajamas while your Persona is in work attire,” casual clothes are hardly the most we can look forward to with the rise of 3D avatars. One element that’s exclusive to virtual avatars is the potential sense of play. Whether it represents a real person or a character, audiences get excited to see a virtual character exist and interact in their reality. Think about it: eventually, this will mean that characters from a TV show will pop out of the screen into our world. The sense of play this provides brings audiences even closer to colleagues, friends and especially characters and creators.
Deja You
The AVP’s cameras also allow users to capture moments in a way that creates 3D photos and videos. This means the user can do more than see these moments again; they can experience them. Users can also share these captured 3D moments with others who, in turn, can experience them on their devices.
Raymond Wong, tech writer for Inverse, describes his experience capturing real memories on the AVP: “In one spatial video, my mom and I were having dim sum at a restaurant…It was recorded last weekend, so the memory was fresh in my mind. Rewatching the video inside of the Vision Pro, it was as if we were transported back to the restaurant, sitting across from each other over a table of dishes. I kept tilting my head a lot, almost in disbelief at how surreal it was to see my mom talking, laughing, and eating in spatial video.”
If Wong was in disbelief rewatching his adult mother, imagine what it might be like to spend time in XR with a toddler who, in real life, is already grown up. Imagine the kinds of relationships this technology might allow when it comes to “communicating” with those who are no longer with us. AVP memories present the photoreal version, but the aforementioned Persona indicates that there will soon be room for editing appearances in memories. Kathleen Cohen, digital likeness & legacy consultant and AR VR strategist says we have to decide now what our digital twins will look like while a person is alive and what they will look like after a person dies. And once we decide what they look like, we’ll have to figure out who decides what someone’s digital twin can and can’t do after the real version is gone.
We Hang
Beyond communication and memories, AVP also facilitates shared experiences through its SharePlay feature. SharePlay helps multiple people share activities — like viewing a movie, listening to music, playing a game, or sketching ideas on a whiteboard — while they’re in a FaceTime call or message conversation. These functionalities are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to next-generation remote collaboration.
Companies like Hopscotch Interactive and Agile Lens are already using XR to do real estate tours and architectural walkthroughs, respectively. The increased functionality of shared spaces will allow people to walk through these virtual spaces together, and it will allow architecture teams to not only look at the same model of a yet-to-be-built building simultaneously—even from different parts of the country—but to walk through it at scale, point to things that the others can see, and even change things in realtime. Moreover, Agile Lens is pioneering entertainment from the angle of virtual theater spaces, including a project that allows you to jump in and perform scenes from plays and musicals in VR with your friends or interactive recordings of actors. This promises to open a whole new arena of entertainment options, especially when combined with experiential marketing. Already, pioneering XR shows are demonstrating a new approach to story-organic immersive marketing. For example, encountering a product in The BizNest VR sitcom isn’t like seeing a commercial; it’s like noticing a product at your friend’s house when you’re visiting.
Science + Fiction
The Apple Vision Pro isn’t going to replace traditional forms of communication and, if it does, it won’t happen right away. After all, even with Zoom calls, we still make phone calls, and even with e-mail, we still use the Post Office. That being said, the AVP’s ground-breaking technology allows us to communicate in a variety of ways within a single device. It elevates what we already do through social media, allowing for communication, documentation and collaboration. And going forward, it—along with improved devices from its competitors, like Oculus, HP
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and Pico—are going to offer new combinations of communication and entertainment. Imagine, for example, enjoying a virtual karaoke night with your family and friends, or all of you meeting up inside your favorite TV comedy. While this content isn’t there yet in the initial release of AVP, the technology that makes it possible is. It’s just a matter of time until it elevates how all of us communicate through media.
