BENGALURU: The Apple Vision Pro has caught the fancy of the internet. Dystopian videos have been circulating of people in cafes, moving their hands to close invisible windows. Scaremongers have begun to spell doom for humanity as we know it, lamenting the lack of social contact. I am not a ‘techie’. I start sweating when my PC begins to hang. But I am a perennial optimist (except when India is playing Australia in the finals). And so, I am all for the advent of virtual reality in our lives.
While the tech space was excited about the Vision Pro, I assume certain industries must be wringing their hands in despair. Like the fashion industry that constantly wants you to lose weight and look like a homeless European teenager. Or perhaps even the transportation industry. For, why would you be stuck in a traffic jam when you can be in your manager’s head directly? How can movie theatres sell you yesterday’s samosas at 2034 prices if you’re watching 3D movies on your couch?
Personally, I have felt that mobile phones have saturated as an industry. Look at any phone launch, and you’ll find creative ways to recycle the same features. A camera that can take pictures of Jupiter while it is having lunch in the house of Mars. A battery that will last you till the end of World War III. Some alphanumeric phrases about speed and computation – when we all know all we do is waste time on reels. At one point, a phone sparked joy in our lives. Now, it is a necessary baggage. There are entire books dedicated to phone addiction – which you can read on your phone!
Every mobile phone today looks the same – a giant rectangle that fits uncomfortably in your pocket. I miss old-world mobile phones that came in different shapes and sizes. And also their own unique problems. I once used a phone whose backspace had stopped working. Which made me Bheeshma Pitamaha, because there was no backtracking – every message I sent was the final word! And then there was the beautiful tradition of missed calls.
Sometimes, a missed call was a frantic plea to call back. On some days, a missed call was a request to recharge your phone. Or simply a gentle way of telling someone you were missing them. Today, a missed call is a dreadful reminder that you have to call back someone. A missed call appears like a red boil on your otherwise blue-green screen – causing anxiety and overthinking.
Which is why I cannot wait for VR headsets to take over the world. The headsets will finally blur the lines between business and pleasure. In our parents’ time, work belonged to the office. The pandemic brought work into our homes. In a few years, our offices will be in our heads. Bosses and nosy colleagues will not be able to peep into your screen to check on you. All those books on body language and confidence will be redundant – a veritable death of the extrovert. Travel influencers will become obsolete.
Humans will go on to have larger thumbs in a million years because of constantly swiping on stupid videos. While I am extremely receptive of such technological leaps, the truth is that it is still a (virtual) dream for me to afford them at the moment. So, like any self-respecting individual, all I have to do is wait for a Chinese company to come up with a cheap knock-off!
(The writer’s views are his own)