45 – AR/VR/MR – Inflection point or Sci-fi?

Augmented Reality, VR, XR… what is all this? Shouldn’t we all be using these devices by now? Is Apple going to change everything? Or is it Meta? In this episode, we go in into the arenas of AR, VR and MR, explain what these different technologies are, the developments thus far, whether (or not) we are an inflection point on devices, software, applications and content, as well as on what the (hopefully non sci-fi) future holds.Navigation:Intro (01:34)What is it and how does it work? (02:09)The last (lost?) decade (11:15)The inflection point for devices? (19:10)The inflection point for Software and Applications? Developer is king… (36:47)A non sci-fi future? (49:04)Conclusion (56:09) Our co-hosts:Bertrand Schmitt, Entrepreneur in Residence at Red River West, co-founder of App Annie / Data.ai, business angel, advisor to startups and VC funds, @bschmittNuno Goncalves Pedro, Investor, Managing Partner, Founder at Chamaeleon, @ngpedroOur show: Tech DECIPHERED brings you the Entrepreneur and Investor views on Big Tech, VC and Start-up news, opinion pieces and research. We decipher their meaning, and add inside knowledge and context. Being nerds, we also discuss the latest gadgets and pop culture news Subscribe To Our Podcast IntroBertrand SchmittHello. Welcome to episode 45 of Tech Deciphered. Today, we are going to talk about VR, AR, MR; mixed reality, in the context of the announcement of the Apple Vision Pro, their first spatial computer. Obviously, already talking about VR, AR, MR is old school, we should be talking about spatial computer. Apple has been very careful about not employing the world VR or AR. Maybe let's start about what is all of this and how do they work?Section 1 - What is it and how does it work?Nuno G. PedroLet's start with an easy one, which is extended reality. Extended reality is everything. Extended reality encompasses augmented reality, mixed reality, and virtual reality. When you see XR, that means extended reality. It's the encompassing word for all these forms that we're going to talk about today. Nuno G. PedroAugmented reality is probably the simplest form. It's a view of the real world with some pieces of digital. But normally the definition for augmented reality is it's a non interactive domain. We'll come back to that when we talked about mixed reality. It's you basically seeing things that are on a plane, for example, using your mobile phone, your iPhone, an android device, and looking around you and seeing things that appear that are digital, but they appear in the real world. That would be augmented reality. There's almost no interaction involved, etc, etc. Nuno G. PedroMixed reality brings in the element of interaction. You still see the real world, but you also see these digital objects and these virtual objects and you can interact and make them interact and you can interact with that world. To be very honest with you guys, I'm still an old-school guy. So for me, augmented reality and mixed reality are effectively the same. Nuno G. PedroI think at some point, someone decided to do this distinction, maybe because of the devices that are linked to it and to really separate in particular what was happening in mobile augmented reality, what was happening with mobile phones. But ultimately, for me, they're very similar. Obviously, for me they're almost indistinguishable anyway. The people out there, that like distinguishing them, that's the difference between AR and MR; mixed reality. Nuno G. PedroFinally, there's virtual reality, which is a fully immersive virtual world experience, the one that normally uses things like in the past look like helmets, things that basically take over most of your head because you want to be fully immersed. It can't be just full, a simple goggle experience. It needs to be a more immersive experience. That's basically what defines virtual reality or VR. Nuno G. PedroAgain, XR; extended reality, AR and MR, very similar. The distinguishable pieces, they're both using real-world and virtual-world elements. What normally makes the distinction between AR and MR is that MR is more interactive, AR is more static type of experiences. Finally, you have virtual reality VR, which is the fully immersive piece. Bertrand SchmittYes, Nuno. I think I'm a bit with you, I'm a bit old school in term of AR versus MR versus XR. I certainly make a big difference with Zeus and virtual reality in the context of for me virtuality is you don't see the rest of the world, you don't interact with it, you don't care, you are fully immersed. That for me is clear and I will say everything else is probably packed together in my mind. Bertrand SchmittI think it might have come originally from, as you say, some devices that were able to do just very basic AR, adding some stuff on your regular glasses and that was it. But I guess pretty early on people realized there was not a lot of use for that. On top of this, a few distinctions we can make between a lot of these devices. Some of them require a PC to work or sometimes a smartphone and some others are fully independent, wireless typically as well and basically don't require anything else to work. Bertrand SchmittObviously, that create typically some issues because a PC can be made very powerful if we want. But if you have to wear this device on your head and it includes CPU, GPU and the like, it won't have the same ability in term of graphics. I guess you can argue that's where Apple's magic to reuse the CPU and the Vision Pro might make a difference. Bertrand SchmittBut typically, there is a big difference in terms of computing power in all this independent headset and that has been well exemplified. We'll talk more about it with the Quest from Facebook that has cute graphics but definitely not too advanced graphics. Nuno G. PedroBefore we move further into this realm of AR, VR, MR, XR, etc. Maybe just a quick reminder, why does it matter? It matters because this is part of the domain of input and output. The domain of input and output, some people might have heard of it as I/O. Many will know because of Windows errors, right? Nuno G. PedroI remember there were I/O device errors all the time on Windows in the good old days that we would see in those beautiful green screens and before that on DOS and all that stuff. I/O is, as the name indicates, input and output. Output is what you see. So it's like your screen, it's a manifestation, it could be your goggles. It's something that you see basically that you are observing. It's an output of what's happening. Nuno G. PedroA printer is also output because it prints, there's something coming out of it that then you can actually observe or take a look at or do whatever you want with it. That's the output side and then the input side are things like your keyboard, like your mouse, like a trackpad, etc. The reason why AR, VR mixed reality matter dramatically is that they are leading or they will eventually lead when they have a lot of adoption. They will lead to a fundamental shift on how input and output is done. Nuno G. PedroInput and output today is done on the move. In particular, it's done through your smartphone. The input is done on the screen of your smartphone, it's done through voice, it's done through other mechanisms and then the output is what shows on your screen and a variety of other things that you can link to that screen. Nuno G. PedroThe limitation today is you have these devices that sometimes look maybe way too big, but the limitation is still on the device. Actually, if you look, for example, at battery consumption on smartphones today, most of that battery consumption is on the screen, on the screen usage. So wouldn't it be wonderful if we didn't have that limitation defined like that? Nuno G. PedroWouldn't it be wonderful if people like myself and others that basically use glasses so Bertom myself, for example, would fit into that, could do something with our glasses that is not just see through them so that we see better the world, but could we add other things to it? Could the output be more interesting? Nuno G. PedroThe reason why this fundamentally is important is if AR, VR, mixed reality takes off and before we talk about it taking off in terms of content, it needs to take off in terms of devices. If those devices take off, the world changes. The way we interact changes as it did when smartphones took off. That's why this is interesting, that's why this is super exciting. Bertrand SchmittYeah, the world changes or we create a new world, a separate world. Some will call it the metaverse. Going back in a way to input output, in term of devices, we talk about the difference where you have independent device headset or you need a PC. There is also the big question of outside-in tracking or not. Outside-in tracking means like you track it from the outside world. Bertrand SchmittTypically early on, as it was used, there were base stations that were required in order to find where you are in the virtual world in your room, trying to position you in the virtual world and step by step, starting with the Oculus Quest, I guess, to have the first inside out tracking. So tracking done from your headset itself, so your headset having its own cameras and from these cameras trying to create a picture of the world and a position in that world. Bertrand SchmittSo that has been the approach used by basically most independent from the PC headsets and the Apple Vision Pro will be also an example of that. So the benefit of this approach, obviously, is that you don't need to set up your room. Having done that, I must say it's a hassle. When you have to start installing stuff either on your desk or in your room, you start to run wires, you have to have additional stuff you probably already kill how it's going to spread as a device, pretty big time. The more cables and stuff you need. Nuno G. PedroYes....