Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, and also produces AR/VR headsets, recently held an event at which Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO, announced three things. These three things were (1) an updated AR/VR headset, (2) AI personalities that they have been creating which are represented by real people, and (3) a new version of smart glasses that they have designed with Ray-Ban.
When I was watching this keynote, I was reminded of Steve Jobs’ keynotes and thinking during his leadership of Apple after returning to the company. Much like Apple under Steve’s leadership, Mark’s presentation seemed to touch on a few important aspects that helped Apple connect to so many people.
Mark emphasized how the products they’re working on should incorporate into the world we live in and help improve and enhance it. In that sense, it reminds me of what Steve Jobs said—how Apple’s goal was to be at the intersection of technology and the humanities.
Another thing that reminded me of Apple and Steve Jobs’ view was when Mark made this statement: “Our goal is to continue to lead in the developing state of the art on this, and also to continue leading on bringing the best devices to everyone.”
As recored in Walter Isaacson’s biography, Steve Jobs expressed this sentiment: “I love it when you can bring really great design and simple capability to something that doesn’t cost much. It was the original vision for Apple. That’s what we tried to do with the first Mac. That’s what we did with the iPod.”
Steve Jobs was all about getting great products into as many hands as possible, going for market share. And that’s what they did. In fact, at one point before his return to Apple Steve Jobs commented on why Apple was doing so poorly. He said that the leadership had gotten greedy and had begun pricing products outrageously. He said that they got away with it for a while, but eventually it caught up.
Steve said that the focus had switched from making money to make great products to making products to make money. He said that it’s a very subtle shift in thinking, but it makes all the difference.
Meta’s efforts to make great products with the latest innovations and make them accessible to a large audience is admirable. I think it’s one that Apple should be taking. Apple’s prices have been increasing, and their flagship product in the AR/VR headset space is priced at a hard-to-reach spot for most people.
Meta is not Apple. One could argue that Meta does not have the same quality as Apple in terms of the refinement of their product. But there’s something they’re doing right here. That is making an effort to put great technology into as many hands as possible—not just wealthy hands.
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