Apple Vision Pro, Apple’s AR/VR device (or spatial computing device if you want to sound fancy), will be released on 2 February. There is no doubt that people will try to use it in all sorts of circumstances, as people have already done using the Meta’s Quest 3 which has similar capabilities. It’s only a matter of time, though, before we see the first fatality involving someone using Apple Vision Pro while driving a car.
But Why is There Bound to be a Fatal Driving Accident With The Apple Vision Pro?
First of all it has to do with the number of units out in the public. Meta sold just shy of 70 thousand units of the Quest 3 in its first month on the market. Apple on the other hand is estimated to have sold over 150 thousand devices in a couple of days of pre-ordering. This is despite the fact that the Vision Pro’s $3599 price tag is more than 7 times higher than the Quest 3’s measly $499.
Because the demand for Apple’s product is so much higher, there is a huge incentive for Content Creators/YouTubers/TikTokers or what have you, to push things to the extreme, so that they can capitalize on it. There will be hundreds of people driving around with an Apple Vision Pro, filming their experience, each one trying to outdo the other. All this so they can get more views, clout, adrenaline, or whatever people are chasing nowadays. I can already see the titles: “Driving with Apple Vision Pro”, “Driving on the Highway with Apple Vision Pro”, “On a roadtrip with my Apple Vision Pro”, “Going over the speed limit with Apple Vision Pro”, “Having a race with the Apple Vision Pro”, and so on.
But this won’t just be an “influencer” problem. People are already abusing technology while driving. People scrolling on their phones while driving is an everyday occurrence. Sleeping on a Tesla while Autopilot is On, is a thing. And the more people with Apple Vision Pros out there, the higher the chance that some of them are going to use them while driving. And the higher the chance that some of them will be distracted in the wrong place at the wrong time.
It’s not like Apple hasn’t thought of that already.
Internal visionOS code seen by 9to5Mac suggests that the Apple Vision Pro will limit its functionality or even stop working entirely when the user is moving too fast. The system has alerts that tell the person wearing the headset that they’re “Moving at Unsafe Speed.”
However, because of the incentive we mentioned earlier, people will do their best to get around this alert (e.g. entering Airplane Mode could be a possible workaround). And once the cat is out of the bag, it won’t go back inside without a fight.