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LeVar Burton On Google Glass
An anonymous reader writes "While he acknowledged that technology needs to keep going forward, LeVar Burton didn't seem comfortable with the idea of using Google Glass. '"It disturbed me. I was skeptical... [and] I'm a person that's very open to technology." That's the reaction LeVar Burton, the man best known from Reading Rainbow and Star Trek: The Next Generation, first had when encountering Google Glass backstage at Engadget Expand. Burton, a self-described edutainment pioneer, acknowledges the disruptive power new technologies can have on media and culture — after all, he did help transform television into a worthy educational tool/babysitter with his PBS program. But even with that storied success, and his company's current inroads into digital with an iPad Reading Rainbow application, Burton still had a "knee-jerk" response when confronted with Glass. Although his celebrity status and the resulting paranoia could have something to do with it.'"
... Burton still had a "knee-jerk" response when confronted with Glass. Although his celebrity status and the resulting paranoia could have something to do with it.'"
When you have employers looking at Facebook and college admissions people looking at Tweets, um yeah, the average guy needs to be paranoid. You better be paranoid!
And it's not just self published stuff. How many of you have had friends and family post pictures of YOU without asking?
*raises hand*
It happened to a friend of mine. She wasn't drinking. The waitress was asking us to pass drinks down the table. her friend just happened to snap a photo when she had a drink in each hand - and then she posted the photo on FB.
And with editiing?
Good grief, I can video anyone and with some creative editing, make them look horrible.
And when you are say, trying to get a job, the person who's looking you up isn't going to contact you and ask what the story is! Fuck no! They are going to draw their own conclusions.
People will take any little bit of information about someone and turn it into a complete profile about someone.
It happens here all the time - people draw conclusions about others just from a single post.
Because everyone who opposes some technology is having a "knee-jerk" reaction. Perhaps some people think that having a computer screen in front of one eye all day is a bit pathetic?
Tired of being "punished" by the Slashdot $rtbl since 2002. I'm now over at http://soylentnews.org/ .
listens? Why not ask Roger Moore? How about the closet guy, the ex-Mr Nocole Kidman? The dude is an actor. And from the last Sci-Fi, Syfi?, movie of the day, not a very good one.
Because he spent 10 seasons of TNG wearing a more advanced (and less stylish) Google Glass.
Google Glass is marketed in the wrong way. Just like Segway they're trying to hype it for use by everybody all the time and justifiably it's backfiring on them. They should market it quietly to niche applications, e.g. HUD-like instructions and videos for DIY jobs, easy-to-use trail maps / plant identification for hikers, or self-service tours for tourists. These are useful applications that don't impact society on a grand scale, and later on the public can decide if they want to adapt it to more widespread use, at their own pace.
Because he spent 10 seasons of TNG wearing a more advanced (and less stylish) Google Glass.
Dude, this is Slashdot. You're going to get crucified for that imprecision.
7 seasons of TNG + 4 movies.
Generally accepted episode count: 178
I don't recall everyone thinking cell phones were stupid. When did that happen? I remember a lot of people saying "That's cool. I wish I were rich so I could have one too." I recall a small segment of the population saying that they didn't need one. I don't recall anyone saying they were stupid.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Brown Zune?
Damn... I missed 3 seasons
I've got better things to do tonight than die.
Never heard of this guy.
There are bad, overhyped ideas that are well executed and actually work. The Segway, for example.
A few historical examples:
Google's head-mounted things may be in this category.
Damn... I missed 3 seasons
They were the best 3, too.
Google will probably be at the end of discrimination lawsuits then. The standard for women is having two legs (though sometimes more than two is acceptable) and the standard for men is a car, a full head of hair, a full set of teeth, a job, a single person house, willing to pay for dinner (a coffee date is not acceptable) and willing to accommodate even the worst of character flaws.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
LeVar Burton played Geordie LaForge on Star Treak -- a character who could not see except by virtue of a digital visor he wore. Now the actor in real life tries something that's also sorta similar -- if you wave your hands, squint your eyes and gesture knowingly. What are the odds! The parallels must have been mindblowing! Life imitating art! The jokes must now write themselves! Queue the Benny Hill music...
He was asked what he thought of Glass, and he gave his opinion. Sorry, how is that a "knee-jerk" reaction? Would it have been so if he had responded positively?
Here's my reasoned, non knee-jerk response: Google can fuck off, and -- within the bounds imposed by professionalism and etiquitte -- so can eveyrone else wearing these infringements to my privacy. (In what I consider the moral sense, as opposed to the legal sense)
Everyone thought Segways were stupid.
And they still do.
Where are they now?
The problem with Google Glass is not the hardware itself, it is the privacy implications of using the device, which sends everything to an untrusted third party. It would be different if they offered the option of never communicating with their network, but they don't offer that as an option. So, essentially anyone who has an agreement with google (NSA, FBI, other governments, other companies, etc) will get copies of your location, pictures coming off the camera, video, microphone data, etc. Those issues alone are the reasons why I would never actually use one. Until Google is serious about separating the umbilical cord from devices like this from talking to their servers, it remains a serious problem about ever using it for anything long term. It's bad enough you might be already using an Android or iPhone device which does almost the same thing, minus the video and audio stream.
Because he spent 10 seasons of TNG wearing a more advanced (and less stylish) Google Glass.
Dude, this is Slashdot. You're going to get crucified for that imprecision.
7 seasons of TNG + 4 movies.
Generally accepted episode count: 178
Real fans get the precision down to the number of lines of dialogue, percentage of total screentime, or number of minutes (out to two decimal places), you insensitive clod!
Apparently "knee-jerk response" now means "opinion I disagree with". Good to know!
sic transit gloria mundi
His problem is with the ability to communicate across long distances quickly. He doesn't like the idea that anyone could take a picture *and then send it everywhere* in the blink of an eye. An interesting concern, but let's make sure that we're addressing the proper problem first.
This is clearly a privacy concern, and it's a biggie. If Glass existed without the video/audio recording features, for me at least, it'd be a very compelling product - I would love a heads up display with GPS. Google aimed too far with Glass - society isnt' ready for it yet - with the backing of Android, and their search product, they could have made it useful and cool without making it a massive privacy concern - and then added those features in a subsequent release.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Advanced? It was fictional. It didn't do a damn thing but reduce vision and cause headaches. "It’s pretty much a living hell... 85 to 90 per cent of my vision is taken away when the VISOR goes on... I bumped into everything the first season – Light stands, overhead microphones, cables at my feet – I tripped over it all... So it’s a sort of conundrum – the blind man, who puts on the VISOR and sees much more than everyone else around him, when the actor actually does that he’s turned into a blind person. Then there was the pain. In the second season, we re-designed the VISOR and made it heavier and the way we actually affixed it was that we screwed it, we literally screwed it into my head and so there were screws that we would turn and there were flanges on the inside that would press into my temples and so after fifteen or twenty minutes of that I got headaches. So I had a daily headache for about six years. Which was also no fun."
To be fair, they spent 7 years using it as a plot point. Remember the visor could see many times more spectrum than humans.. That means it could see thru walls, clothes, machines, etc depending on how it was used.
It was always clear from the show's theme, his character was expected never to misuse those abilities.. And even the captain was hesitant to request those abilities outside of "technical" tasks.... The writers thought a lot about what kind of "power" they were writing into the story and really backed off. They probably thought about privacy on a campy 80's TV show more hours than Google Execs have thought about it. Which is more than a little spooky.