The Apple Glasses will be a major leap forward over current mobile technology, offering a vastly expanded perspective
Do you remember when Apple first took over the world? Before the iPhone, Apple took the world by storm with a pair of white headphones connected to a pocket-sized music player. The iPod changed everything. In retrospect, the iPod was tiny compared to the iPhone. When the Apple Glasses arrive, they will eclipse the iPhone, making it seem as tiny and limited as the iPod now feels.
The history of the iPod and the iPhone traces an exponential curve upward to the Apple Glasses. Even while the iPod was still a music player, Apple was thinking bigger. The iPod Classic added movie watching on the tiny display, as well as a cable to connect your iPod to a larger screen. The iPod wanted to get bigger. It wanted to show you more, on the biggest screen it could.
When the first iPhone was conceived, it wasn’t a phone at all. Apple lore says that Steve Jobs and his team started with a device the size of an iPad, then realized that they could shrink it down into a phone-sized product.
In other words, when Jobs envisioned the mobile Apple experience, he didn’t imagine it would be tiny and limited. He didn’t imagine Apple’s design and creativity distilled through a display that was less than four inches, as the original iPhone would be. He imagined the Apple experience in the palm of your hand, not hidden by it. Apple Glasses will be bigger than a phone screen
Apple Glasses will be much bigger than the best iPhone because the iPhone screen size is limited, and the limitation is pathetic compared to what Glasses will offer. An iPhone won’t reach beyond seven inches or so, ever, because then it would be an iPad. The best iPad is closer to the original vision, but it’s still too small.
The reason the iPad made sense is that it feels like a portal. You can hold the iPad and feel like you are peering into a different world. With the iPhone, you are staring down a hole. With the iPad, you are looking through a window.
With Apple Glasses, you will be through the window, into the world surrounding you. There will be no more window, no more limited display. The display will be limited by your space, and how much you can turn your head.
An iPhone or iPad display is only a tiny fraction of your entire field of view.
