Alex Heath

I also write Command Line, a weekly newsletter about the tech industry's inside conversation that is now part of The Verge's overall subscription. I'd love for you to check that out. If you like Decoder, please share it with your friends and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. This episode was edited by Travis Larchuk and Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. See you next time.

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. This episode was edited by Travis Larchuk and Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. See you next time.

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. This episode was edited by Travis Larchuk and Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. See you next time.

Yeah, so the big headline this year out of Connect is Orion, which are AR glasses that Meta has been building for a really, really long time. Some important context up front is right before we started this interview, we had literally just demoed Orion together. I think I'm the first journalist, the first outsider to do that with Zuckerberg on camera. That's on The Verge's YouTube.

Yeah, so the big headline this year out of Connect is Orion, which are AR glasses that Meta has been building for a really, really long time. Some important context up front is right before we started this interview, we had literally just demoed Orion together. I think I'm the first journalist, the first outsider to do that with Zuckerberg on camera. That's on The Verge's YouTube.

Yeah, so the big headline this year out of Connect is Orion, which are AR glasses that Meta has been building for a really, really long time. Some important context up front is right before we started this interview, we had literally just demoed Orion together. I think I'm the first journalist, the first outsider to do that with Zuckerberg on camera. That's on The Verge's YouTube.

But yeah, we had just come fresh off that demo and literally walked in the podcast studio and sat down and hit record. So- It was fresh on our minds, and that's where we started. Orion is very much the story of AR as a category. It's something that Meta hoped would be a consumer product and decided towards the end of its development that it wouldn't be because of how expensive it is to make.

But yeah, we had just come fresh off that demo and literally walked in the podcast studio and sat down and hit record. So- It was fresh on our minds, and that's where we started. Orion is very much the story of AR as a category. It's something that Meta hoped would be a consumer product and decided towards the end of its development that it wouldn't be because of how expensive it is to make.

But yeah, we had just come fresh off that demo and literally walked in the podcast studio and sat down and hit record. So- It was fresh on our minds, and that's where we started. Orion is very much the story of AR as a category. It's something that Meta hoped would be a consumer product and decided towards the end of its development that it wouldn't be because of how expensive it is to make.

So instead, they've turned it into a fancy demo that people like me are getting around Connect this year. And it's really meant to signify that, hey, we have been building something the whole time. We finally have something that works. It's just not something that we can ship at commercial scale.

So instead, they've turned it into a fancy demo that people like me are getting around Connect this year. And it's really meant to signify that, hey, we have been building something the whole time. We finally have something that works. It's just not something that we can ship at commercial scale.

So instead, they've turned it into a fancy demo that people like me are getting around Connect this year. And it's really meant to signify that, hey, we have been building something the whole time. We finally have something that works. It's just not something that we can ship at commercial scale.

And it's, in my mind, a marker of where we are actually in the development of Aeroglasses and led me, honestly, to feel like it's finally getting really close to being commercial and being mainstream.

And it's, in my mind, a marker of where we are actually in the development of Aeroglasses and led me, honestly, to feel like it's finally getting really close to being commercial and being mainstream.

And it's, in my mind, a marker of where we are actually in the development of Aeroglasses and led me, honestly, to feel like it's finally getting really close to being commercial and being mainstream.

Yeah, and they're seeing a lot of early traction with the MetaRay bands. We talked a lot about that, their expanded partnership with Ellesore Luxottica, why he thinks this really storied eyewear conglomerate out of Europe could do to smart glasses what Samsung did to smartphones and for Korea. He sees this as becoming a huge, you know, millions of units a year market.

Yeah, and they're seeing a lot of early traction with the MetaRay bands. We talked a lot about that, their expanded partnership with Ellesore Luxottica, why he thinks this really storied eyewear conglomerate out of Europe could do to smart glasses what Samsung did to smartphones and for Korea. He sees this as becoming a huge, you know, millions of units a year market.

Yeah, and they're seeing a lot of early traction with the MetaRay bands. We talked a lot about that, their expanded partnership with Ellesore Luxottica, why he thinks this really storied eyewear conglomerate out of Europe could do to smart glasses what Samsung did to smartphones and for Korea. He sees this as becoming a huge, you know, millions of units a year market.

And I think everyone here at The Verge can see that the Ray-Bans are an early hit and that Meta has tapped onto something here that may end up being pretty big in the long run, which is just not overpacking tech into glasses that look good, that do a handful of things really well. And Meta is expanding on that rapidly this year with some other AI features that we also talked about.