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Wednesday, January 21, 2026
The Sphere Could be Headed to Your City (With a Smaller Footprint)
gizmodo.com: The company behind Las Vegas’s Sphere announced plans on Monday to bring a smaller version of the orb-shaped venue to the National Harbor outside Washington, D.C.
I don't know how to feel about the sphere. On one hand, it's a crazy technological feat that is impressive to look at, on the other hand, it's a giant glowing billboard that has become part of a city’s skyline. While these buildings are cool, the cost of creating them makes attending events is prohibitively expensive for the vast majority of people, and if they're going to start popping up all over the place I think it's just going to create a bunch of light pollution and fill the skyline with ads for clash of clans. To quote my friend Lydia “they're making more? Why?” I don't think we as a society need to be spending half a billion dollars to create glowing buildings, but I don't think the CEO of Sphere tech is listening to me. So I guess when one eventually pops up here in pittsburg, I might go to give it a look.
The sphere is an interesting venue and I think it will be interesting to see how it continues to evolve over time. I think that having a network of spheres around the world to tour shows through after their initial run in the Vegas sphere makes a lot of sense, but we will have to see how it ends up working out. I think that part of why the sphere can be successful right now is it’s novelty, and I wonder how long that novelty will take to wear off. The more spheres that you have, the less unique each one is and the less people there will be who have never seen a performance in a sphere before and want to see what it is like. I do think that in the long term there is a change of spheres being a wide-reaching way to exhibit media, but I doubt that the economics will work out compared to a normal movie theater, arena, or just someone's phone at home.
I absolutely hate the sphere. It's ugly, loud, and just straight up light pollution. Why does it exist, other than to be a big surface to advertise on? It makes sense in Vegas, a city that is meant to keep you awake as long as possible. BUT DC? That's insane. To me, DC is a very serious city - it's where the government goes to play. A giant sphere that occasionally blinks at you, or plays an advertisement for Coca-Cola is not an appropriate thing to exist in that space. DC is not a place people go to for nightlife or media. I don't even think the sphere should exist in Las Vegas, hot take. It's ugly and extremely bad for the energy usage of Las Vegas. It's also consistently LOSING money, because nobody wants to go there. I wish i could be a fly on the wall in the executives' room hearing them try and pitch another sphere. Not fun.
3 comments:
I don't know how to feel about the sphere. On one hand, it's a crazy technological feat that is impressive to look at, on the other hand, it's a giant glowing billboard that has become part of a city’s skyline. While these buildings are cool, the cost of creating them makes attending events is prohibitively expensive for the vast majority of people, and if they're going to start popping up all over the place I think it's just going to create a bunch of light pollution and fill the skyline with ads for clash of clans. To quote my friend Lydia “they're making more? Why?” I don't think we as a society need to be spending half a billion dollars to create glowing buildings, but I don't think the CEO of Sphere tech is listening to me. So I guess when one eventually pops up here in pittsburg, I might go to give it a look.
The sphere is an interesting venue and I think it will be interesting to see how it continues to evolve over time. I think that having a network of spheres around the world to tour shows through after their initial run in the Vegas sphere makes a lot of sense, but we will have to see how it ends up working out. I think that part of why the sphere can be successful right now is it’s novelty, and I wonder how long that novelty will take to wear off. The more spheres that you have, the less unique each one is and the less people there will be who have never seen a performance in a sphere before and want to see what it is like. I do think that in the long term there is a change of spheres being a wide-reaching way to exhibit media, but I doubt that the economics will work out compared to a normal movie theater, arena, or just someone's phone at home.
I absolutely hate the sphere. It's ugly, loud, and just straight up light pollution. Why does it exist, other than to be a big surface to advertise on? It makes sense in Vegas, a city that is meant to keep you awake as long as possible. BUT DC? That's insane. To me, DC is a very serious city - it's where the government goes to play. A giant sphere that occasionally blinks at you, or plays an advertisement for Coca-Cola is not an appropriate thing to exist in that space. DC is not a place people go to for nightlife or media. I don't even think the sphere should exist in Las Vegas, hot take. It's ugly and extremely bad for the energy usage of Las Vegas. It's also consistently LOSING money, because nobody wants to go there. I wish i could be a fly on the wall in the executives' room hearing them try and pitch another sphere. Not fun.
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