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'Wearable Computing Will Be the Norm,' Says Google Glass Team
An anonymous reader writes "In an interview with Wired, Google's Steve Lee and Babak Parviz spoke about how they've come to use Project Glass in their lives, and where they expect the mobile computing industry to go in the near future. 'We've long thought the camera's important, but since we've started using this in public and with our family and friends and in real situations, not just hidden in the Google lab, we've truly seen the power of being hands-free. ... It's my expectation that in three to five years it will actually look unusual and awkward when we view someone holding an object in their hand and looking down at it. Wearable computing will become the norm.'"
People with all the smart phones around, people with blue tooth headphones in their ears, it's already 'the norm', it's just it's not very convenient to have various electronic interfaces sticking out of your body, once the technology allows people to have all of this stuff on their bodies without the inconvenience of wires, weird gadgets that make you look like an Apocalypse Now character, then it will be part of daily life.
You can't handle the truth.
/me looks at his digital wrist watch
You already do.
Yes and we were already going to have flying cars and mars colonies by now.
What made the smartphone ubiquitous was that it already had a hundred years' worth of communication progenitors prior to its serving as the vehicle for the personal Internet. it will take a lot to remove the stigma that interaction with air carries. There is no one who looks sane with Bluetooth headsets on the bus.
Self adjusting clothing, self closing shoes and a hoverboard.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
... when you saw someone standing alone and talking, sometimes even getting animated and agitated, you thought they were crazy.
Now you look and hope they're wearing a bluetooth headset before making a judgement.
Soon, with the further miniaturisation of wearable computing, you won't be able to tell the difference between a gesticulating drunken bum, and a drunken, gesticulating businessman.
--
BMO
I once saw this concept videovideo at Nokia Research Centre in Helsinki more than 3 years ago. Too bad Nokia failed to capitalise it on time and now they are failing big time.
they patent the heck out of it, share it with their Android partners, and kick Apple to the curb for violating the unstated rules of the tech patent game.
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
Are google staff really so smart that the only things they can come up with are rehashed failed hacker ideas of the last 15 years ?, i guess this is a reflection of the staff they hire and the stupifying enviornment they boast about ... as always google is just a bunch of so called smarties trying to pull the wool over the eyes of another generation of newbies that havent seen this type of thing, i guess they hire staff based on how much they can beat their heads against a brick wall ! or how much they can recall cool slashdot stories from years ago ....
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Wearable computing will continue, since modern smartphones are pretty close to the desired ideal.
However many proponents of wearable computing are explicitly associating it to wearing headsets, Borg-like heads-up displays, cameras, GPS, implanted compasses, and whatnot. These, IMO, will not be popular just because there is no need for them. Even the heads-up display is a distraction for most people. A cell phone form factor is with us since the days of ancient clay tablets. It is something that we are well equipped to operate - we can take it, give it, leave it, look at it, and work with it. I can imagine a communicator from ST:TNG as well. But even those communicators, as shown, are pretty limited. They had no video, for example - and many an away team would benefit from that. They would be better off with a modern smartphone, actually, as long as it can communicate with the orbit.
At most I can imagine a heads-up display that is wirelessly linked to the smartphone in your pocket. That would have some use. Beyond that I don't see anything obvious; perhaps future developments give us other hardware that is worth wearing.
Also in all these cases we must remember that the battery technology is still not good enough. Replacing batteries in all these wearable gizmos is a hassle - and a visible expense.
... see the implications on the professional life.
I want to see a manager blatantly lying to me when wearing one of those. :-)
Lisias@Earth.SolarSystem.OrionArm.MilkyWay.Local.Virgo.Universe.org
It's my expectation that in three to five years...
I agree with their view and disagree with it. I agree that wearable computers are the future but I disagree with their timeline - I believe "three to five years" is an enormously, overly aggressive timeframe.
First of all, project Glass is coming to market next year at a price of $1400 (iirc) and is only available for developers (currently - which I would imagine means the price is as low as possible to help get developers involved rather than to generate profits). This is already one year of their three-to-five timeframe eaten up. While I realize that price will come down as the tech gets better and once it's made available to the general public economies of scale will also help drive the price down, I believe there's still far too big a difference between "price the tech has to be sold at to make it a viable business" and "price most consumers are willing to pay". So, first of all, I believe the price is a significant barrier and it will take longer than three to five years to get the price into a realm where the average consumer feels comfortable paying for the tech.
Second, and more importantly, people have zero experience with the interface. Smartphones were set to explode because people a) understood phones and b) understood computers so the marriage of the two as a technology as easy to understand and required minimal learning to use. It was easy for the mass market to pick up and go. For something like project Glass, I cannot see the average person easily figuring out how to use it. Now, understand, this is absolutely independent of how easy it actually is to use - it might be the easiest, most intuitive thing in the world to use but people won't feel that it's easy to use because they've never used anything like it which will serve as a barrier to adoption. People intuitively knew how to use a phone and knew how to use a computer so selling them a phone that was a computer was easy. Selling them a set of glasses that is also a computer will not be an easy sell. Thus, there needs to be a significant amount of effort spent making that usage scenario _feel_ easy and intuitive to the average consumer before they will actually pick up the device and that will only happen over time. It will happen, eventually, but it will take time.
All in all, I agree that wearable computer devices will become the norm but I think that "three to five years" is an enormously optimistic timeframe. There will be early adopters and the like but it will take at least a decade, probably a bit longer, before it solidly penetrates the mass market and becomes "normal".
We know that any piece of personal technology that CAN support advertising WILL be used for that purpose - whether we want it to, or not. Imagine how intrusive it would be to be using the Google Glass technology to look at something and suddenly an ad. pops up trying to sell us something that looks like what we're looking at.
What's even worse will be the privacy issues. Not only will advertisers be able to track the users as they can now, with 3G, Wifi and BT triangulation, but they'll be able to infiltrate our state of mind by interpreting what or who we're looking at.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I was just thinking to myself the other day, you know Google doesn't have QUITE enough information about me in their databases, wouldn't it be wonderful if they could track my every motion and everything I see too? Then my life would be complete.
Monstar L
Funny, I see it as being handcuffed.
And I'm sure the gubmint will joyfully go along with that.
We were all supposed to be using Tablet and stylus computing by now, that didn't quite work out now did it....
If you haven't seen the Leap motion (and no I'm not in any way shape or form connected to the company, although I wish I were!) you should check it out.
It's a super-accurate (I think sub-millimeter), low latency 3D tracker with the ability to follow up to 10 fingers (or other objects like pencils) at once. All in a very small box (USB powered?) box that's expected to sell for $70 (this year). I don't know the volume in which it can track the objects but on the demos it appears to be pretty large, large enough that a belt mounted (or necklace version) would be sufficient.
Voice recognition is good and getting better but there are many time when a point and click(?) interface is still much more efficient. Like when you want to access one link out of many on a web page. Or control a complex virtual device that has many degrees of freedom. Humans have evolved to have hands of extraordinary flexibility and control; just look at the amount of our brain dedicated to them. So let's use them! (The reasons why this Leap device is so good as opposed to say "finger detection" using the Google glasses video-camera is because the resolution is much higher, it tracks in 3D and there might not be a problem with occlusion.)
Of course the Google glasses should be updated to have a stereo display (I think currently it's only in the right eye). That would allow truly interacting with items in 3D. (Of course, the above comments about people gesticulating in space would come to pass! I'm wondering if "I'm sorry your honor but I didn't mean to touch the young lady like that, I was turning the knobs on my virtual stereo receiver" would be a valid defense.)
This is the way that Google should be fighting Apple. Not by making incremental changes to Apple's tech (or so it appears to most people* and, apparently some judges) but by revolutionizing the field. If they're right, then in three to five years Apple may only control the remains of a vast but dying industry. Sounds like Microsoft before or IBM before it.
*look, prior to the iPhone, smartphones looked one way and then suddenly they (the successful ones that is) completely changed their basic appearance and interface (touchscreens using fingers not stylii, icons, slide to access, pinch zoom). Coincidence? Coming from companies with decades of experience in making hundreds of cellphone models? That's how most lay-persons (and at least some legal experts) might view it.
Everyone else will do something stupid with the tech, preventing critical mass adoption. Apple will come along and do it right, and the geeks will be outraged.
When wanting to impress this Kardashian society we live in, one must look well beyond the technical capability and instead focus on how it looks and slapping a high-enough price tag on it (at least 2x over other like hardware) in order to even be accepted as a possible option.
And when tech clearly needs to blend with fashion in order to get past the "critical mass adoption" phase, any respectable geek should know damn well one goes to Apple to accomplish this, for there really is no one else so deeply rooted in the business of tech blending with fashion. That should be painfully obvious when you walk into an Apple store and compare specs vs. price tags.
Only one other type of product can get away with charging 2 - 3x more than anyone else...a fashionable one.
Move to LA. People wear nosejobs, fake teeth, fake hair, fake hair color, fake faces and fake boobs to pull the eyes from their fake faces.
It's my expectation that in 2012 it will actually look unusual and awkward when someone makes idiotic statements.
...so it won't be at all unusual to not see people wearing these.
Ever seen a woman wearing an in-ear phone?
Ever seen a man wearing an in-ear phone and not thought it looked silly? Or that he likes his technology a wee bit too much?
You can also live in a tent in the wood and save electricity AND gas...
What was your point?
Why spend $2 for an ice scraper? Apple has worked hard on making the iPhone thin enough to double as ice scraper, so why not use just that? :-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
And two in his home.....
Dammit, I let the secret out, Oh well.
Will you please put some clothes on when you walk around in the living room. Us at the Cable company are grossed out.
And please move the bedroom cable box to the left a little and put the bottle of hand cream elsewhere, it has been blocking our view and we have been using it as a kind of torture device for the new employees.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
"At any given moment Manna had a list of things that it needed to do. There were orders coming in from the cash registers, so Manna directed employees to prepare those meals. There were also toilets to be scrubbed on a regular basis, floors to mop, tables to wipe, sidewalks to sweep, buns to defrost, inventory to rotate, windows to wash and so on. Manna kept track of the hundreds of tasks that needed to get done, and assigned each task to an employee one at a time.
Manna told employees what to do simply by talking to them. Employees each put on a headset when they punched in. Manna had a voice synthesizer, and with its synthesized voice Manna told everyone exactly what to do through their headsets. Constantly. Manna micro-managed minimum wage employees to create perfect performance."
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
They see me trolling...
You can easily design an LCD that fails and turns clear - in fact a modern LCD works exactly like this. They go dark when they lose power because the backlight turns off - but if it stayed on, they'd turn white from constant illumination. On a transparent screen, it would turn clear.
More likely, when driving - or just normally using them - you'd configure a hardware lockout for maximum opacity in advance. Or a clear channel - just turn off the power to the relevant pixels in the middle of the vision field.
it's not like someone else invented this decades ago and has been working on it ever since... oh wait. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Mann
could it be?
it will actually look unusual and awkward when we view someone holding an object in their hand and looking down at it.
You insensitive clod! I take pictures with a TLR Rolleiflex!
That camera has actually started quite a few interesting conversations when people see me using it.
Have gnu, will travel.
This technology has been around for a decade or more. Perhaps not as compact and high resolution, but something like a pair of those wrap-around sunglasses old geezers wear.
There could be some uses for this. We did some R&D on superimposing assembly and test instructions on a technician's field of view. But one conclusion was that this was so distracting for tasks other than those performed sitting down that it could be hazardous or induce equilibrium or vertigo problems. On the shop floor, it is relatively easy to enforce safety rules on the use of such equipment. But out on the street, I see pedestrians walking into moving traffic while watching cat videos.
Have gnu, will travel.
... so will there be "Glass" in the strength I need for my eyes? (I am still looking for sun glasses that are worth that name, preferably mirror sunglasses, in the strength I need. All they try to sell me are slightly darkened glasses and these are not even worth considering.)
" It's my expectation that in three to five years it will actually look unusual and awkward when we view someone holding an object in their hand and looking down at it. Wearable computing will become the norm."
So Google really is coming out with an anal probe.
A pair of prescription eyeglasses with designer frames can easily cost upwards of $1000 dollars or more. Project Glass is going disrupt the current eyeglass industry, as a whole new augmented eyeglasses market is going to open up. It's going to be very interesting times for LensCrafters, Cohen Fashion Optical, Pearle Vision... (and I'd be selling their stock right now if I owned any). Will they go the way of the recording industry and resist the change? Or will they be more like Barnes and Noble and try to adapt with a not-quite-successful proprietary solution? Will Google acquire LensCrafters and will we be able to buy a pair of Ray-Bans running Android? Will Pearle Vision try to avoid a buy-out by building their own Ubuntu powered glasses (sans dedicated hardware like accelerometers and microphones) and wind up being the eyeglass version of the Nook (versus the iPad)?
Project teams predicts their product will be the norm in the future.
"Only one other type of product can get away with charging 2 - 3x more than anyone else...a fashionable one."
Or one that adds 2 - 3x the value. The iPad just works and is ahead of the competition. That is why it commands a higher price. That is why a BMW costs more than a Daihatsu.
It doesn't take genius to predict something like that. Even before the advent of mobile phones as a kid I was rather certain that in the future everybody will have a personal computer, which we will wear as a watch. Nowadays I believe it will be more like glasses. A perfect platform for camera, sound input and convenient interface. I would not be surprised that we would see computers like that receiving instructions directly from thought in less than 20 years. Proof of concept already exists, after all. Glasses, capable of receiving instructions by merely thinking about it, displaying interactive online information about the world around us (think about pulling wikipedia data about any mundane object you are currently looking at), projecting video directly in to our eye (think wathching uber-HD video streamed from a cloud service or a portable device through radio protocol anywhere anytime). Perhaps even capable of running programs streamed from a future supermachines via internet as well (programs such as gaming, virtual reality overlay or interfaces of connected machines such as car computer or testing software and robot interface for an engineer). I hope I will live to see it.
Been waiting for this for years. It was pretty obvious to me that the problem has always been the display. They can only get so large before they become unwieldy, heavy, fragile, power hungry and difficult to use away from a desk. With something like this you can have a big screen in a very small form factor and the phone can go back to being something easier to carry, though I'm still fine with it doing the computing. Add in a wireless chording keypad for power-user input and you've got a great platform for mobile computing. It's not really anything novel, the pieces have been around for years, but it needed someone to put them together, do the software layer and mass produce them to bring the price down.
It will still be niche, the vast majority don't even need all the computing power their phones contain, and it does look sort of silly... but the idea of being able to boot up linux (you know it will happen) on my sun-glasses is a sort of sublime perfection.
The NBA star trend of wearing fake glasses will have an actual purpose.