Great, soon it won't be enough to block browser cookies. I'll have to avoid glancing at <i>actual cookies</i> lest my search results start filling up with Snackwells coupons and special offers from the local gym.
Not saying this is what they're selling, but: Real-time overlays are still impractical, right? My intuition is--without a really high speed camera and high fidelity environmental cues--the overlay will have a lag and high uncertainty wrt where you're actually looking... or has the state of the art moved on? Or are their labs advancing the state of the art?<p>Any idea how they're making the screen usable at that focal length? Don't VR headsets usually need optics much more bulky than sunglasses for comfortable viewing?<p>Anyway, even if it's smartphone-like functionality in a more convenient form factor, I'm looking forward to being an early adopter.
From the linked previous post about wearables:<p><a href="http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/18/wearing-your-computer-on-your-sleeve/" rel="nofollow">http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/18/wearing-your-comput...</a><p>"Kids will play virtual games with their friends, where they meet in a park and run around chasing virtual creatures for points."<p>Lucky kids. I suddenly feel like Old Man Luddite because I grew up playing with sticks and crap.<p>Related:<p><a href="http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2011/01/the-5-best-toys-of-all-time/" rel="nofollow">http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2011/01/the-5-best-toys-of-all-...</a>
I am horrible at remembering names. The day these things can do facial recognition againt my address book, Facebook, and LinkedIn profiles and pop up a little box with the person I'm looking at's name is the day I will never go without glasses again.
Here are some high-quality sf books you can use to imagine the possibilities of this technology.<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Light" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Light</a><p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbows_End" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbows_End</a><p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_State" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_State</a>
Huh, two days ago Gabe Newell was talking about Valve maybe going into the hardware business to do wearable displays:<p><a href="http://penny-arcade.com/report/editorial-article/valves-gabe-newell-talks-wearable-computers-rewarding-players-and-whether-w" rel="nofollow">http://penny-arcade.com/report/editorial-article/valves-gabe...</a><p>Well timed.
My biggest concern is if this is executed poorly it could undermine future attempts to bring wearable computing to the mainstream. It still feels a bit early for this to work well. Google can pull off the technical challenges, surely, but the usability hurdles here are outside of their comfort zone.
Does anyone see this actually catching on in the next five years and becoming something more than a gimmick?<p>I'm as excited about the prospect of viewing the world through a HUD as the next guy, but I can't imagine these glasses looking sleek in the slightest, and they will likely be rather bulky.<p>But beyond ugliness, it seems to me that someone would rather pull out their smartphone than put on a pair of HUD glasses for any given use case for this product. Augmented reality is "cool" but I've never used an AR app more than two days after I downloaded it.<p>I think for it to catch on, this technology would have to be baked into glasses that are designed to be worn all the time, not just put on when needed. People aren't going to carry around AR glasses in their back pocket with their phones and wallets. So a place to start might be enhancing the glasses used by people with vision trouble, rather than creating a whole new glasses product.
I've been waiting for this for a long time. I wear glasses currently and have always felt that some kind of overlay could provide tremendous value.<p>From simple reminders, augmenting my environment with meta data, or giving access to real time updates about almost anything the possibilities are almost endless.<p>Batteries are going to truly be the limiting factor IMO. Forget plastics, the future is batteries. I assume version 1 of the product will require some kind of external battery pack, I'd think it was certainly worth it if the tech is what it should be.
Have Google figured out a way to solve the accomodation/vergence problems inherent in screen based 3D displays (<a href="http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=64028" rel="nofollow">http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=6402...</a>)? Because if not, these things are going to suffer from the same dismal failure that every other 3D display product has over the last 30 years.
Exciting news! Just yesterday I was watching John Carmack's interview from 2011's QuakeCon and at the end he mentioned that he was going to soon start playing with display glasses to see if anything interesting would come out of it (for id, I imagine).<p>Driverless car, now digital glasses. I'm positively impressed that Google keeps pushing the envelope in all these different fields.
This is potentially awesome for two reasons:<p>1. I can lay in bed and read an ebook without having to hold a device.<p>2. Google can parse any situation I may be in and recommend the optimal action based on its data of every single other human on earth.
Even the smallest smartphone chipsets still need big batteries, I suspect it's going to be a pocket device with a wire or bluetooth of some kind going to the glasses.<p>Still an amazingly aggressive technology product.
i find this very hard to believe. it seems obvious to me that smartphones and tablets have completely filled the niche invented by the HUD glasses of yesteryear's science fiction. they will never be popular, because they are too invasive. people like to be able to put the internet in their pocket and take it out again when they need it.<p>i wouldn't be surprised if google has a bunch of engineers working on the technology that could be used in HUD glasses, but i would be very, very surprised to see anything ever come to market. google will not enter the hardware market with such a risky product.
I can't imagine them not looking hideous, but i want them. i've wanted them for pretty much two decades now. I'm sure they will suck. I will happily give google a pile of money for the few weeks of usage i'm guaranteed to get out of them. It's just a bonus if they're actually useful.
I wonder if this will eventually intersect with the gamification trends. This article had me imagining a crude augmented reality MMO, routine tasks are assigned point values and so are items for purchase. Walking through the store you could see that Sara Lee white bread nets you 100xp, paying your mortgage on time, Bank of America has awarded you 1000xp. A look at someone and the HUD displays their level and point value along with their various badges. Of course check-ins will be automatic.<p>I doubt this iteration will be very advanced, but the article definitely made me think.
I”m really surprised that no-one’s talking up the accessibility benefits of something like this. Imagine a version for blind users that dumped the screen in favour of a headset and mic. A little voice recognition and your glasses could tell you where you are, what you’re facing, and even do basic hazard avoidance. That sounds invaluable.<p>Actually, it sounds like the 90s kids show Knightmare :)
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciIfcYwI6Ps" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciIfcYwI6Ps</a>
Sounds like a more generalized, urban version of the Mod Live ski goggles (<a href="http://www.reconinstruments.com/products/mod" rel="nofollow">http://www.reconinstruments.com/products/mod</a>). The Mod Live googles look amazing, but pretty bulky (plus, I don't ski). If the Google glasses end up being half as cool I'd definitely be interested.
Is this article implying the glasses will work like a HUD, with the image displayed on a transparent surface that you can also see through? Or is it an opaque screen off to the side? Or it couldn't possibly be an opaque screen over your eyes that redisplays what you would have seen behind it?
I wonder what the field of view is? That's been my main problem with HMDs in the past. Maybe now I'll finally be able to build my wearable computer from COTS components.<p>Exercise: taking the hardware as a given, what would you do with it, what software do you need?<p>Steve Mann: 20 years ahead of the curve.
If anyone hasn't read Daemon & FreedomTM by Daniel Suarez I highly suggest it. His use of tech like this in the novels was pretty well thought out. Can't wait until Google uses these to integrate a MMORPG with RL.
Google is pretty ballsy.<p>After their Safari tracking system fiasco they announce this: the ultimate form of tracking. It shouldn't come as a surprise that Google would make this considering the rest of their products.<p>I love Google and their products, but I feel this takes it over the line. At what point will Google be satisfied with the amount of information they're able to collect? Maybe the world will become some strange Utopia where products like these glasses are acceptable and Google made the right call, but Google should take a step back and realize they're making technology for humans, not robots.<p>If this trend continues I bet we'll see Google Children roaming our street. Ok, that's pretty hyperbolic but you get my point.
I definitely checked the date a few times, but this makes an awful lot of sense given Google's position. At this point it's really just hardware to bridge the accessibility gap.
But can they look good? Those oakleys linked to are awful. If they look stupid then I doubt they will work... Until apple steps in and does it right, that is ;)
<i>"... One Google employee said the glasses would tap into a number of Google software products that are currently available and in use today, but will display the information in an augmented reality view ..."</i><p>wonder how many Steve Mann patents they are using? ~ <a href="http://www.eecg.toronto.edu/~mann/" rel="nofollow">http://www.eecg.toronto.edu/~mann/</a>
How is the reading experience? Can you get 80 chars into it?<p>I hope there isn't a good one hand keyboard interface (chording?) so you can write email/code while bicycling/driving/etc -- with my simultaneous capacity, it would be my death...
Yeah so everything I look at is going to go through Google's servers, and be processed and display Google ads constantly no matter where I'm looking. Yeah right. Google is flat-out lunatic if they think consumers want this level of invasion into their lives. They're taking the Orwellian computing idea, big brother always on everywhere, to the absolute extreme here.