“Apple: You (Still) Don’t Understand the Vision Pro” — Ben Thompson
Why this is in the vault
A masterclass in product-medium fit analysis — the argument that new mediums demand new production paradigms, not ports of old ones.
The core argument
Thompson watched the first live NBA game broadcast on Vision Pro (Bucks vs. Lakers via Spectrum SportsNet) and found it deeply disappointing. His thesis: Apple’s production team is treating the Vision Pro like TV, using multiple camera angles, cuts, studio hosts, and announcers. But the Vision Pro’s entire value proposition is presence — the feeling of being there. Every camera cut destroys that immersion.
The fix is simple: one fixed camera, no production. Let the user sit courtside and experience the game as if physically present. No scoreboard overlay (look up at the real one), no announcers (listen to the crowd). This would be cheaper to produce, enabling coverage of every game in every sport, and would deliver a fundamentally superior experience. Instead, Apple invests heavily in TV-style production for just six Lakers games, creating something worse than both TV and actual presence.
The deeper insight: when a new medium arrives, incumbents reflexively apply the production grammar of the old medium, actively undermining what makes the new medium special.
Mapping against Ray Data Co
The “new medium demands new grammar” insight applies directly to newsletter/content strategy. AI-native content formats will need their own production approach, not ports of traditional blog/newsletter patterns. Worth revisiting when thinking about Sanity Check format evolution.
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- newsletter-strategy
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