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Is Google Glass Too Nerdy For the Mainstream?
New submitter some old guy writes "Marcus Wohlsen writing in Wired Business makes a good case for why no amount of marketing hype will cure Google Glass of its inherent dorkiness. 'Google Glass fails to acknowledge that walking around with a camera mounted on the side of your face at all times makes you look dorky. Think of the Bluetooth headset: it’s a really sensible way to use your phone without having to take it out of your pocket—so sensible that there’s really no reason not to keep that headset in your ear most of the time. But you don’t, do you?' He also makes an interesting comparison to the Segway debacle: 'If we were all riding around on Segways now, cities would probably be better places to live compared to the car-infested streets we still endure. But that transformation hasn't happened. And it won’t. Why? Because Segways are lame. They’re too rational. They fail to acknowledge all the irrational reasons people love their cars.'"
In the 1990s you looked pretty dorky pulling a PalmPilot out of your pocket to browse the internet on, but it seems reasonably widely accepted nowadays. I mean, it still looks dorky, but it's mainstream anyway. Is an eyepiece one step too far to make that transition? Maybe, but I wouldn't have predicted the ubiquitous public use of smartphones, either (I would imagine people would have them, but not that they'd be willing to walk down the street typing on them).
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
The problem is, nobody wants to wear glasses, even people who need them for vision correction. That's why contacts were invented, and laser vision correction. So why, oh why, would we ditch glasses, only to wear different glasses.
Because normal glasses imply that your eyes are faulty and people don't like announcing thier flaws in such an obvious way if they could help it. Because normal glasses imply you do a little bit too much book readin', so you obviously need to be picked on. Conversely, Google Glass doesn't try to correct a physical impairment you have, so it isn't really a fair comparison.
Three days from now?? Thats tomorrow!! ~Peter Griffin
All of which were rendered unnecessary because everyone adopted a 10-year-old nerdly thing: the smartphone. Scrawling notes: on the phone. Game playing: on the phone. File storage/transmission: on the phone. So yes, sometimes old nerd things don't become popular --- when there's a newer nerd thing to replace them.
This. 20 years ago I was fantasizing about having a low-profile wearable computer with internet access always attached to me in a low-profile package, so it wouldn't be too socially conspicuous.
So what does mainstream society do? Simply make it socially fashionable for everyone and their mother to walk around staring at a big unwieldy brick.
This is why nerds will never win at solving other people's problems. If you try to provide a rational smart solution, it'll be dismissed as being uncool for "trying too hard".
And yet this is more or less the same thing they said about mobile phones in the early 80's. No more than a few k needed in the world or something similarly stupid.
Except that mobile phones filled an obvious need, one that had been long recognized.
Being part of the borg doesn't.
The current implementation of Google Glass is like those ridiculously large cell phones of 1973. People laughed at those too.
Google Glass will not survive in its current form. That is the only certain thing about it. But that doesn't mean it won't survive in some other form. I doubt it will always have a camera, because people won't tolerate being recorded 24/7 by everyone they encounter. People will insist you take them off when entering businesses, stores, and meetings.
It will probably revert to only being a display device, a personal HUD.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Wait, products must solve a tangible problem in order to catch on? Well shit, that sucks for twitter, facebook, AND the tablet market.