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    Apple is investing in augmented reality, says Tim Cook

    ‘AR can be huge,’ he says

    Pokemon Go
    James Bareham / The Verge

    It’s Apple earnings day, which means analysts are allowed to ask Tim Cook probing questions about when the new iPhone is coming out and he is allowed to dance around those questions with exquisite grace.

    But sometimes Cook actually answers those questions with real info — as he just did when asked about the Pokemon Go phenomenon and the future of AR. “We are high on AR in the long run,” he said. Here’s the full quote:

    It also does show that AR can be really great. We have been and continue to invest a lot in this. We are high on AR for the long run, we think there’s great things for customers and a great commercial opportunity. The number one thing is to make sure our products work well with other developers’ kind of products like Pokemon, that’s why you see so many iPhones in the wild chasing Pokemons.

    (Cook actually pronounced it “Poke-mans,” which was adorable.)

    Cook also said that he thinks “AR can be huge,” but expressed some doubt about it being the next new platform. “There’s a tendency to call everything the next platform... but regardless, it will be huge.”

    We’ve long heard that Apple is more interested in AR than VR, and this pretty much firms it up. So that’s Apple and Microsoft on the AR side, Google and Facebook on Team VR. Let the battle begin.