After a year of anticipation, the Vision Pro is finally out.
“Welcome to the era of spatial computing,” proclaimed Apple, before passing the baton to its YouTubers and TikTokers. “It feels like magic,” said one of them. “I feel like a god,” said another, as they petted dinosaurs and walked on the moon with gusto.
“Spatial computing? Moonwalking? What is going on?”
You can blame Apple for many things, but frivolity is not one of them. The Cupertino company only makes two or three product announcements each year and they painstakingly wordsmith their message down to the last punctuation mark. So what does it mean when Apple welcomes their customers to a new “era”?
Worry not, gentle reader, I am here to tell you exactly what. So grab your beverage of choice and let’s get started.
Today, the Vision Pro sits where the first iPhone sat in 2007: at the precipice of a new “era” for humanity.
As we all know, the iPhone paved the way to the so-called mobile computing era. But the implications of that device went far beyond computing. According to National Geographic, smartphones “changed the geography of our minds”; and they are “changing the human race in surprising ways,” according to NBC News.
In 2007, the iPhone was an iconic and aspirational object that felt more like a fashion item than an everyday necessity. Fast forward seventeen years, however, and living without a smartphone is a practical impossibility.
Such is the consequence of words like “era”.
Can you survive without a smartphone in 2024? Can you get a job, socialize, navigate, pay, or do anything? Do you even have a choice?
But you haven’t seen anything yet.
Until recently, Apple’s products were named after tools they replaced. The iPhone replaced push-button telephones, the MacBook replaced paper notebooks, and the Apple Watch replaced portable timepieces.
Vision Pro, however, is not named after a tool.
“Why?”
Because it is not replacing a tool.
“What is it replacing then?”
Let’s look at the word. Vision classifies as a sensory function. Humans don’t use their senses; our senses are an intricate part of our physiology. Which leads us to the following realization:
Apple doesn’t want us to use this product; they want us to fuse with it.
“Fuse? What do you mean?”
Imagine wearing VR goggles for some time. You wear them for business meetings, immersive 3D movies, TV shows, games, and FaceTime calls. Now, imagine removing your headset. Try to contemplate how dim, unexciting, and unyielding the natural world becomes when you cannot visually tap and edit your surroundings at will.
Give it a couple of years and the physical world will turn into an impenetrable, unforgiving place mired by fixed limits, frustrations, and dangers. Step into augmented reality, however, and everything is, once again, malleable, safe, and under your control.
There is no undo button at that point. Synthetic vision will have become part of being human.
If you are surprised, you shouldn’t be. The Iron Man movie told us in 2008. In fact, Hollywood has been telling us for decades. Compare this clip from 1988’s Robocop movie, to this clip from Apple.
“How did Hollywood know?” you might ask.
It’s their job to know.
You see, Hollywood’s mandate is not about entertainment. As Orwell wrote, “if one is to rule, and to continue ruling, one must be able to dislocate the sense of reality.” Last year, I wrote:
What the architects ”our democracy” ultimately want is to replace reality (and natural law) with their own synthetic world that is entirely under their control.
Here is their playbook:
Design: Give billions to DARPA subcontractors, three-letter-agencies and others, to experiment with technologies that compromise the foundations of the reality inhabited by the masses.
Inception: Hollywood spends decades planting those technologies into the minds of audiences — from Soylent Green in the seventies to Black Mirror in the present, the list of forewarnings is endless.
[For the rest of the playbook, check out the article.]
What does Hollywood, DARPA, and the consumer tech industry have in common?
Everything. They are one and the same. The complementary nature and affinity of what they do should be evident by now:
A 2018 science fiction film called Ready Player One foretells of a near future of chaos and collapse where people seek to find salvation in fake virtual realities.
After telegraphing humanity’s future into our collective subconscious, Hollywood passes the baton to the consumer tech industry.
Announced last week, Sora is an AI tool that generates high-definition worlds based on simple text prompts. Type whatever it is that you want in plain English and AI will visualize it for you — instantly. In other words, AI can now create immersive worlds with a click of a button.
How did Hollywood know about virtual reality a decade before Vision Pro? How did they know about robotic intelligence a decade before Optimus robots? How did they know about personal AI assistants decades before ChatGPT? And while we are at it, how did they know about global p4ndemics decades before c0vid?
As Abraham Lincoln said, the best way to predict the future is to create it. Hollywood and the tech industry are offshoots of an entity that knows the future. Why? Because they work tirelessly to create it.
Now, let me ask you this: Why would a young person choose to face the difficulties of the real world when they can spend their days inside fake fantasy worlds?
Do you see it now? It’s a two-step trap:
Make reality insufferable by means of manufactured poverty, contrived disease, l0ckdowns, and so on.
Make illusion compelling by means of disposable VR headsets, infinite AI universes, mind-meds, and so on.
Last year, I wrote:
Give it 5 years, however, and the world will be saturated with inexpensive virtual reality goggles. It will start with employees, it will then spread to students, the elderly, and before you know it, the masses will be trotting around with reality-blinkers over their eyes.
“Wait a minute . . . how do we go from $3500 Vision Pro headsets, to disposable body enhancements in less than 5 years?”
Well, you can pretty much ignore the price tag.
Apple won’t expect you to pay for their headsets; they will want you to subscribe to them. Vision Pro (and cheaper alternatives) will come bundled with your cellular service, your employer will give you one, and eventually governments will dole them out for free — just as they did with smartphones.
But please understand:
The Vision Pro is not a gadget.
The Vision Pro is not an accessory. It does not pair to your iPhone, like AirPods and Apple Watches do. No, the Vision Pro replaces your gadgets — iPad, first, then MacBook, and eventually, as size permits, your iPhone, your TV, and pretty much everything else.
But the Vision Pro is not a gadget. It is a first-of-a-kind body prosthesis. By taking over your sensory inputs, Vision Pro, AirPods, and very soon, Neuralink, will take over the reality that you inhabit. Eventually, the masses will no longer own their reality; instead, they will subscribe to it.
Let’s take a moment to unpack this.
From software-as-a-service (SAAS) to life-as-a-service
Most people are already accustomed to monthly subscriptions: Netflix, Spotify, Disney+, ChatGPT — even our doorbells come with a subscription these days.
Then you have big ticket items: health, education, transportation, accommodation, utility bills — everything in modern life has become a subscription.
Now wait until synthetic vision and brain implant interfaces become a monthly subscription. Wait until having a functioning body becomes provisional. Wait until humans are unable to function without their tech overlords keeping their bodies and realities operational.
We haven’t seen such levels of slavery in human history.
In the 2009 Daybreakers movie, a near-future plague eliminates most of humanity. Those who remain are captured and harvested in laboratory farms, the optics of which are strikingly similar to the ones depicted in the Matrix movie.
Hollywood is obsessed with this.
They are obsessed with a world where humans are plugged-in like disposable appliances and chained like industrial farm animals.
Take a look around you. Consider the optics of gen Z moderners who spend all day scrolling down brain-dead TikTok game-reels. Now, extrapolate to disposable VR headsets and tell me exactly how far we are from a Daybreakers hellscape.
“Enough already. How do we opt out of this nightmare?”
What we need to do is, unsubscribe.
Unsubscribe from life-as-a-service before it is too late and while we still can. Smartphones, Netflix, smart home appliances, AI helpers, and virtual reality goggles did not exist twenty years ago and humans survived just fine.
You do not need those gimmicks.
“But how can I stay employed without a smartphone? How can I compete at work without ChatGPT? And if I don’t have a job, how do I pay the bills?”
Can you spot the fallacy? “I cannot pay for my subscriptions without signing up for even more subscriptions.” It’s absurd.
We need to break out of this cycle.
Are you over-subscribed?
The subscription mindset is a way of life; a life without ownership and without freedom. Here is a rough list of of modern day subscriptions, followed by how much you can save by unsubscribing (monthly figures):
Cancel cable TV and subscription streaming: Netflix, Disney+, Hulu, HBO, Apple TV, Spotify, Apple Music: >$75 savings
Stop spending on gadgets: iPhones, AirPods, iPads, smartwatches, smart appliances: >$100 savings
Discontinue snacks, microwave meals, cornflakes, ice cream, chocolate bars, packaged desserts, and anything with a barcode: >$150 savings
Avoid toiletries and beauty products: Replace them with natural alternatives. Coconut oil, apple cider vinegar, and baking soda is pretty much all you need to make your own toiletries: toothpaste, aftershave, deodorant, and everything else: >$100 savings
Clothing: Don’t buy disposable fashion. Don’t buy polyester / synthetic junk fabrics. Look for garments made out of leather, wool, linen, and silk. Invest in real garments, and you won’t have to spend on clothing again for decades. I still own leather shoes from twenty years ago: >$150 savings
Stop being a tourist: Tourism is akin to fast-food; it is wasteful, superficial, and harmful to local economies. Instead, explore your local terrain, support your local businesses and save a fortune in plane tickets, ski jackets, bus tours, beer bikes, gum walls, London Eyes, and giant ferris wheels: >$200 savings
Replace one meal a day with fruits: >$300 savings
I can go on and on. The above list doesn’t even include big ticket items like healthcare and education. Even so, if you add those up for a family of four, the savings start from $40,000 per year.
Now, here is where it gets interesting. Most humans earn below that figure. They work all year to earn this money, and for what? Where does this money go? Our modern, fallen world has convinced us that our survival relies on the goodwill of service providers. Does that remind you of something?
That’s right: slavery.
By unsubscribing from the monthly costs (and hand-cuffs) of modernity, we can start to reclaim our freedom. It will then dawn on us that we don’t need a smartphone, VR goggles, and AI helpers to survive.
Let me close with this.
Products like AirPods and Vision Pro magnify our focus and attachment to our physical senses. The more we lose ourselves in material sensations the less bandwidth we have for the finer aspects of being human.
Those Black Mirror displays are cheap counterfeits to our intrinsic and deep connection to the Divine. The most profound goal of Vision Pro—and every smart device that came before it—is to rob us from our natural connection, fulfillment, and faith in God.
Let’s not let that happen.
If you enjoy my work feel free to send me some sats or buy me a coffee. If you want to make a Bitcoin donation, instructions are here.
It is heart-warming to read the comments below. I have forwarded the article to practically everyone I could possibly think of, especially ready preys to technology or people with youngsters who could be in that category. It is possible that most of the people I know cannot hear the urgency of it. I can only pray that more people will wake up to realize the system we are in and choose to take a committed step toward transforming it. 🤩🍀🌈
Thank you for writing about the dangers of this immersive technology. Every point you made about where humanity will be heading as a result of embracing it is correct. Those of us who see through the technocratic agenda(s) know that what you describe is what is coming for us, unless we manage to break free.
Your advice re unsubscribing from everything is 👌🏾!
I barely have any paid subscriptions to large tech companies (not counting some good writers on Substack); have gradually been weaning myself off them the last 5-6 years. Amazon Prime, Netflix (have sometimes been given access to a kind friend’s account though), Spotify. Not had a TV in decades, so I’ve never paid cable charges (bonus: I was not brainwashed in 2020).
However, recently I’ve found myself considering whether I should get a YouTube subscription as I crave listening to my favourite albums in their entirety and I can also get podcasts. I particularly cannot abide the constant interruptions to the music flow by the obnoxiously chirpy ads. I’m a musician and I’ve been telling myself this last month that I could perhaps allow myself to have this luxury, just the one. However not only do I detest the thought of making YouTube — one of many big tech companies that have zero qualms about abusing the 1st Amendment — richer by $18.99 a month but I also own most of these albums on CD and could, in theory, listen to the digital versions. Except I can’t easily do that as I cannot save the tracks on to my smartphone.
Even though it’s going to take a while to figure out (hopefully they still make MP3 players?) and will require me to buy the albums I don’t possess (which is fine as I want to support the artists, something we all used to in the old days, about 10 years ago), I’m going to strive to do it the less convenient way.
I currently pay for an annual Adobe Premiere subscription as I’m a filmmaker too. Actually, I pay for the whole Creative Suite since I use Photoshop and many of the other apps frequently. I think it used to cost about $300 to buy Premiere, but after Adobe switched to the subscription model, I’ve probably given them thousands of dollars over the last decade). As of this year, I'm learning DaVinci Resolve, which, if you buy the Studio (aka pro) version, you only pay once (again, as was the case in the old days when you could pay for something and it was yours, for life; you even got a certificate of ownership), so that I can eventually leave that company behind too.
It’s never going to feel convenient, but one by one, slowly, over time, each of us should strive to let go of all these corporate subscriptions and realize how much better life is not being a slave to these companies and their rental products.
We will own whatever the hell we like, not give them our money and, for sure, ultimately, we will be happier.