It happened when I first used a PalmOS device. It happened when I first used the BeOS. It happened when I first used an iPhone. And now it’s happened by just watching a video – that sense that there’s no need to wait for the future, because it’s already here. Google has just unveiled its augmented reality glasses, Project Glass, and it will blow you away.
Getting excited over a mere video is not something I’m prone to do. I need to see things in action, touch them, learn how they work. This time, however, all Google needed to do was show a video of Project Glass. Futuristic, strange, nerdy, awesome, useful, scary – this has got it all.
It’s called Project Glass, and rumours about it have been swirling for a while now. Developed at Google[x], the company is now ready to start field testing Project Glass – but it’s a Google employee-only thing, for now, so they won’t be for sale. The models shown off today are just a selection – Google has more versions in testing, including a version that can be combined with existing regular glasses (yes!).
Still, this unveiling raises a lot of questions, but one of them is addressed already. Doesn’t this thing get in the way of the real world? Isn’t this yet more technology making life more distant? According to one person who has used the device, it’s actually the exact opposite – it gets out of your way.
“They let technology get out of your way,” this user told The New York Times, “If I want to take a picture I don’t have to reach into my pocket and take out my phone; I just press a button at the top of the glasses and that’s it.” He has a point.
The glasses look awesome, but still, also a bit strange. Hopefully, the technology will get ever smaller, up to a point where it can be fully integrated regular glasses so people won’t even know you’re wearing one of these. In fact, scientists are already working on integrating display technology into contact lenses.
There’s dangers, too. What if you’re driving, and this thing goes haywire? On top of that, eyes are quite delicate and complicated pieces of natural engineering, so the question remains if this technology can damage the eyes of the wearer. All important questions which I’m sure will be answered over the coming months of public testing.
I want this so bad. It may not work, it may not be practical, and may not be affordable – but is just so incredibly cool. This is the kind of stuff I used to dream about when I was a kid, watching Star Trek. This taps into a kind of raw sense of excitement about outlandish technology that rarely – if ever – is tapped during these dark days of anti-science.
I feel like a little boy. I want this.
Cool, but only if I can have it in 8-bit NES mode 😉
Too bad they don’t give the tech specs for the glasses. Used to play with this stuff back in college. It was fun, but the devil was always in the details: resolution, virtual/physical world registration, processing power, battery life, weight, fragility.
These appear to be monoptic. Unless a lot has changed in the last few years, monoptic AR glasses feel weird. Of course bioptic glasses have all kinds of problems with inter-pupillary distance which need to be worked out.
…the IKEA catalogue scene in Fight Club
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN8vyO8ILD8
I think watching little adverts appear all around you all the time will be awesome
As opposed to the Apple version, which will work like this:
http://plif.courageunfettered.com/archive/wc161.gif
…regarding safety. I can see the lawmakers chomping at the bit now.
I was always hoping for cerebral implants and bionic eyes.
But again, how could that be regulated so that you aren’t surfing the web while you are driving and such. Even if the device is smart and disallows such things while driving, there are always ways around limitations…
A demo
http://youtu.be/_mRF0rBXIeg
So in the near future, when I walk into a local cafe, instead of seeing people staring into their phones and tablets being all antisocial, I’m gonna see people staring (and talking) into thin air. Kinda creepy.
Nice concept. Would be nice if someone made a motorcycle helmet/visor with that technology (bigger field of view compared to glasses when riding). I could get satnav, have conversations, take a video of my ride, and possibly write out my last will and testament (and maybe even order a coffin) right before I ride into the back of a trailer.
The phone-sex industry definitely has the brightest of futures, though.
Edit:
The glasses look kinda dorky, but the contact lens concept is downright scary. Retina displays just got a lot more… retina.
Edited 2012-04-04 18:44 UTC
Not just creepy – infuriatingly irritating. They’d better come up with a better control mechanism than speech. There are many occasions where speaking to your device(s) is not acceptable.
That said, I am very interested in the concept, especially if they make it 3D. But I want control over what the device shares with Big Brother.
This concept has some potential for good, but even more for ill.
Hopefully they won’t cause quite the disaster that the Connexus did in Appleseed. http://appleseed.wikia.com/wiki/Connexus
the idea is not new but what they now invest is in the software and that is the diffrence to the oldern time 🙂
I’m eagerly waiting for the first time a malicious app suddenly fills someone’s field of vision with goatse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KahtSmVppPk
It’s the new eyephone.
Anything which messes with your depth of field like this is going to cause problems. But, we’ll see…
I want the bare minimum of the tech to be actually on my head. I’d much rather have a smartphone with the brains and a slave unit on my head. This might already exist, if so at least this device opened my eyes to new possibilities. Hehe.. pun (?)
edit: I guess I want just a hud
Edited 2012-04-05 00:52 UTC
Actually hmd (helmet mounted display). A hud is attached to the cockpit, an hmd to your head.
Yes, it’s cool in concept, but I wonder if it will further isolate people in crowds.
I apologize my parlance is more videogame based but tech would be the dominant definition in this venue.
I have no faith in this device but it has sparked curiosity in the future of this sort of tech.
Keep it simple. Just text, like so:
80 degrees, raining
1.67 miles to 10th Street
Doctor Mayweather, patient Steve Buscemi is flatlining.
Kindle reading glasses (I’m aware of the traffic nightmare it could cause but I’m still looking forward to it.)
Edited 2012-04-05 15:11 UTC
Can this be done with contact lenses in the future?
Imagine when humans already are “born” with something like this in the future and controlled directly by the brain (no voice).
Edited 2012-04-05 01:13 UTC
Supposedly being developed.
http://www.slashgear.com/google-project-glass-smart-glasses-reveale…
There’s a paragraph (and picture) about the contact lens concept at the end of the article.
Recall another company showing off something like this a couple of years ago, but I think that was more medical related. Probably other similar concepts out in the wild as well.
Edited 2012-04-05 01:58 UTC
You just know these things will cause eye problems (that’s on top of the brain cancer). Also they’ll cost more than people are willing to pay for them. There’s a reason these things are experiments.
This looks like another one of those things companies show off to prove they’re thinking of the future. Like Microsoft Surface and Nokia’s paper thin phone.
Edited 2012-04-05 01:12 UTC
I can imagine eye problems… but how would it cause brain cancer?
“So we took a few design photos to show what this technology could look like and created a video to demonstrate what it might enable you to do.”
I want to live in Thom’s world, where the above statement somehow translates to “it’s already here“.
Awesome reporting.
How excited do you get over things that actually exist?
Edited 2012-04-05 04:47 UTC
Have to agree. It’s a neat idea but the concept itself is nothing new (see robocop and terminator for prior art). Also, i’m not quite sure i’d like to have google in my FOV all the time, atleast not without some kind of adblock…
There was this very cool short on dailymotion about augmented reality gone wrong, with an operating system called EYE… Has someone else seen it ? With only such a generic keyword and a few fake commercial slogans in mind, I cannot find it again… :/
Edited 2012-04-05 07:29 UTC
Because the one thing I know >I< need is Google data-mining everything I read…
…Oh, Right.
“I can eat glass, it doesn’t hurt me”
On top of the fact that Google has the ability to track your every movement, phone call, and Internet presence, now they’ll be able to see what you see and say in real-time? No thanks. But at least it’s packaged in a product that seems really cool.
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/04/augmented-reality-experts-sa…