> but both agree on principle of extracting monopoly rents.
Steam’s competitors like GoG also take 30% so maybe it’s a reasonable price for the service they provide? Only companies like MSFT or Epic can charge less since their stores are heavily subsidized.
Of course as long as games remain available on multiple storefronts it will remain a winner takes all market and Steam does have a significant moat (though not in any way comparable to Apple) due to it’s social features.
At the end the existence of Steam/(other centralized storefronts) seems to benefit both consumers and developers compared to any alternative option (less risk for consumers = higher long term revenues or developers)
Telling what? My point was that Newton was a brilliant idea yet the hardware wasn’t there yet and it didn’t have clear use cases. Both concerns apply for Vision Pro so at this point it’s still closer to the Newton than the iPad
> They didn't "just" streamline the smartphone
They did exactly that which is why it was so brilliant. You could do everything you could with an iPhone with other devices before it came out. It’s just that the experience was quite poor and all other devices were underdeveloped and had serious flaws in comparison (to be fair the first gen iPhone was a pretty lackluster device too).
You could browse the web, watch video content, send messages/emails, listens to music, play games, make video calls. Did Apple invent any of that? The iPhone was a just a device which could do it all with much nicer UX than anything on the market.
> Will we be able to "sideload", i.e. install things without papa apple's approval?
I’m sure we all know the answer to this.
> web engine that's not WebKit?
rofl
The AirPods, Pro Display XDR, even the iPhone were just improved and streamlined improvements of a established products with clear use cases. This is something completely different.. At this point this is just an expensive gimmick. That might change when people figure what they can do with it or it might not.
> it is a phone, laptop and massive display bundled
> The VR gaming market is microscopic compared to what Apple is likely aiming for here. They do not give a single flying fuck about this "established market", nor have they for any other market they've entered. The entire Apple ethos is to completely change the narrative for whatever product category they enter. They did this for phones, for bluetooth audio, for watches, and—whether or not they're ultimately successful—you can bet your ass this is their intent for wearable headsets.
Apple is also the company which released https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Newton back in the day… They turned out to be right at the end but still had to renter the market entirely from scratch after 10 years. So far Apple has been great in “perfecting” products that already exist by doing the right thing at the right time.
They weren’t the first or the second to release a smartphone, smart watch, tablet, BT earphones etc. all of those had established markets and somewhat clear use cases Apple “just” streamlined and turned them into something that normal people would actually want to use. It’s seems a bit to early to do that for VR yet. So in a certain way they are in somewhat uncharted territory.
I guess the question is whether this the Newton or the iPad. It might take another 5-10 years before actual uses cases get figured out and at that point it might be very different from what Apple is offering now or are envisioning for the next couple of generations.
Steam’s competitors like GoG also take 30% so maybe it’s a reasonable price for the service they provide? Only companies like MSFT or Epic can charge less since their stores are heavily subsidized.
Of course as long as games remain available on multiple storefronts it will remain a winner takes all market and Steam does have a significant moat (though not in any way comparable to Apple) due to it’s social features.
At the end the existence of Steam/(other centralized storefronts) seems to benefit both consumers and developers compared to any alternative option (less risk for consumers = higher long term revenues or developers)