Wagner James Au / New World Notes

Where it started for Meta (last February):

Ray-Ban Stories let you capture video and photos, share your life’s moments and listen to music or take calls hands-free… We see smart glasses as a stepping stone to true AR glasses, and an important element of this is building something you’ll want to wear regularly for extended periods of time.

How it's going for Meta (according to the WSJ this week):

Less than 10% of the Ray-Ban Stories purchased since the product’s launch in September 2021 are used actively by purchasers, according to a company document from February reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. Meta sold a total of 300,000 of the wearable devices through February, but the company only had about 27,000 monthly active users.

Emphasis mine, because wow. Normally people make a concerted effort to get their money's worth from a relatively expensive piece of hardware ($299+) but that's not even happening here. 

This is notable, because "XR glasses that are the size of sunglasses" has been a constant goal among enthusiasts for decades — a topic I just chatted about with Magic Leap founder Rony Abovitz:

"AR headsets will catch on when they're packaged into a form factor that's as compact and cool as stylish sunglasses!"

Or…. not.https://t.co/4r3TSi0pDa

— Wagner James Au (@slhamlet) August 3, 2023

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He tweets that what's missing is with Ray-Ban Stories is: "Form x function x battery x ecosystem x culture".

But how do you grow an ecosystem when only 300,000 early adopters are motivated enough to pay the (quite affordable!) $299 purchase price, and how do you grow a culture when only 27,000 of those early adopters are still monthly active users?

Rony: "With that device – you can’t. It has the form factor but is missing all of the other key ingredients. Great XR needs many things working well at the same time. XR needs a set of key factors to all be good at the same time. It is like flight, or a medtech device. But awesome when you get it right. Some teams are getting close."

Maybe so.  It just seems like any time one XR challenge is addressed, others mysteriously appear. Many (most?) successful technologies — consumer PCs, smartphones, etc. — start out kludgey, pricey, and with limited content. But there, a killer app(s) steadily grows adoption. But if Meta can't even grow the market with a relatively affordable device that makes a very popular function (posting social media) easier, will it ever grow?

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