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[–] 57 points 4 months ago (13 children)

I don't even get why companies are still pushing smart glasses. There's no legitimate use for them on the consumer market. There's already legislation being put into place to restrict what they can do because people immediately started using them for criminal activity. They're just an obnoxious annoyance to everyone who isn't wearing them 99% of the time.

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  • [–] 23 points 4 months ago (11 children)

    I’d be interested in them for like hud reasons but I wouldn’t want a camera or mic in them which is what they seem to think people want.

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  • [–] 18 points 4 months ago (7 children)

    It requires a camera to do any remotely useful HUD stuff. If you want automatic translation, or in-world displays, it needs to see the world.

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  • [–] 11 points 4 months ago* (3 children)

    Smartwatches don’t have cameras for the most part, smartglasses don’t need them either. Also a camera isn’t required for audio translation.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    I meant text translation obviously. You don't need glasses for audio.

    And yeah, smartwatches don't have cameras. They aren't doing anything that needs them. AR, by definition, requires it to know about its environment. It needs a camera at minimum. You could have just smart glasses that can display texts or something, but AR needs cameras.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    Smartglasses don't need to be AR though, you could make one that is just a HUD that displays information

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    Sure. I don't want that though. Whatever benefit smart glasses could provide can also be provided by just a phone. If you want slightly faster access, a smart watch works too, with slightly less ability for input. Smart glasses, with no camera, can only display this same information, but it's right in your face. Also, without cameras, the only input it could have is on the side of your head, which seems horrible.

    AR has some utility I would like. Am I a fan of them putting cameras everywhere? No, so I probably wouldn't buy a pair of AR glasses (and would discourage it of others too). Do I see the functionality? Sure, which I don't see for smart glasses.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    In my fantasyland you would pair them with another device, like a phone, and it would do all the work. The glasses would basically be nothing more than a receiver and a display

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  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago

    Yes, well that's a fantasy when it comes to AR. It's augmented reality, it needs to see the reality to augment it, else it's just a static screen in front of your face. It isn't anything new or interesting if you don't have the camera in the front.

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  • [–] 8 points 4 months ago* (1 child)

    Just a wireless HUD, with eye tracking, and agnostic to connected tech. (Camera is needed for this, but needs a manual kill switch on the device)

    That is all that is needed from the glasses.

    Wearable tech is going to need to be modular, replaceable, and reparable...

    All things big tech companies hate right now.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

    There was barely a legitimate use for smart phones at the time either. Times are changing and they are betting on smart glasses being the next big thing. I tend to agree with them to an extent but the current implementation leaves to be desired. There are still clearly some large hurdles.

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  • [–] 101 points 4 months ago (9 children)

    Man wears largest sunglasses, thinks you may want to crush your ears for 2100 also

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  • [–] 9 points 4 months ago

    I thought this picture was a meme until I opened the article to see a picture of them. Jfc that's bad. They're not going to sell any of them other than to reviewers that aren't given a free pair to promote.

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  • [–] 29 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    Whoa! They look like a very long line of obviously bad decisions. Unwearable. Not even ironically ugly. Like a CEO designed it himself surrounded by a vacuum of yes men.

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  • [–] 19 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    The perfect glasses for when you are driving your Cybertruck.

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  • [–] 32 points 4 months ago (14 children)

    It's so funny to watch all of these tech companies try to make Google glass again like the concept didn't fall flat on its face a decade ago.

    Only a small handful of people are interested in the idea, and the general public hates them.

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  • [–] 9 points 4 months ago* (2 children)

    They’re trying to create a new something. and there doesn’t seem to be another idea. The iPhone really only blew up the world because of the quality of its execution. The idea had been bouncing along for a long time. So every asshole thinks “we’ll just execute right and nail this thing.”

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    The thought they have immediately before or after is also, "I'm the next Steve Jobs." It's always about the ego before any product or need.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    Their situation is: they’re a tired social media site that is traded on the stock exchange and it’s just all downhill for them unless they change something big. They do want to be Steve Jobs, the guy who created a trillion dollar platform ecosystem, and they think hey we can use our social media site as one big ad for it to get things going. What else are you going to do with a tired social media property? You can at least fool some shareholders by telling them no, we have a whole new chapter about to begin. It’s a stupid game, I think driven more by market capitalism than personal ego, though of course there’s also plenty of that.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago

    Google Glass was like the 3rd time this tech has fallen on its face. I mentioned this before recently but I can remember when Sony had some that used a CD-ROM Walkman for the HUD data. They were going to be on the face of every engine mechanic by the end of the 90s…

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago

    For it to be desirable, the form factor needs to be indistinguishable from normal sunglasses or specs. With current technology it's not even close to being achievable. The battery tech just isn't there for starters. I have no idea why big tech thought this was just around the corner and thought just throwing money at an impossible problem would just make it possible.

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  • [–] 6 points 4 months ago*

    You clearly don't understand. Google glasses didn't have Augmented reality.
    With these AR glasses you can have fluffy fur balls in different colors that jump around you everywhere you go.
    If that isn't worth $2200 to look like an idiot, IDK what is?

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  • [+] -19 points 4 months ago (6 children)

    Hates? No. Not even near. Just cannot afford.

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  • [–] 8 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    No, people still like a lot of things that they can't afford. People hate these things because they are a privacy nightmare with minimal practical application.

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  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago (1 child)
  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago

    Not true, lot's of people can easily afford these.
    And a shitload of people can if they really want them.
    The rest can pay over multiple years, in easy to afford monthly payments. /s
    Meaning the people that can't really afford them, can buy them anyway and pay twice the price with interest.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (1 child)

    Would you daily wear them if they were giving this for free at an event?

    People is paying this kind of money to do an operation to remove glasses, then they introduce the "master of glasses", that weigh like 20 glasses

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    Depends on the software part. If there will be freedom of compiling\installing arbitrary software then yes. I'm sure in this case it would be full of very interesting things in no time. But if it would be "fenced" like META does with their VR headsets, then those glasses would be almost useless.

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  • [–] 15 points 4 months ago

    Copy of the article since the site requires you to disable your ad blocker (reader mode worked at least)

    Snap’s long-awaited AR glasses, Specs, didn’t have the best debut.

    The company’s stock hasn’t been on the healthiest trajectory lately. It’s dropped 30% over the past year. Following Specs’ launch, it sank more than 5% — falling from $5.86 a share on Tuesday to a low of $4.83 on Wednesday morning. As of this writing, the stock still hasn’t recovered the position it held prior to the announcement.

    The big concern surrounding Snap’s new smart glasses — which the company has been working on for over a decade — is the cost: The company maintains they will retail at nearly $2,200 apiece.

    It’s worthy of note that Snap’s core user demographic — teenagers — are not typically equipped with that kind of pocket change, leading onlookers to question the profitability path for the new product.

    Snap’s CEO, Evan Spiegel, did an interview with CNBC on Tuesday (during which he sported the new glasses) and, when questioned about the hefty price, responded: “The most important way to think of Specs is as a computer, and so they’re comparably priced to other high-end computers or high-end laptops.”

    Spiegel further justified the cost by saying that Specs occupies a unique space in the AR market between glasses like Meta’s Ray-Bans — which cost a lot less but provide significantly less compute power — and bulkier headsets like the Apple Vision Pro, which are powerful but very expensive.

    Spiegel said his product was both “highly wearable but also incredibly capable for immersive computing.”

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  • [–] 61 points 4 months ago (6 children)

    Look how out of touch we are with ordinary people but it's ok because you have also never heard of us.

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  • [–] 31 points 4 months ago (5 children)

    You've probably heard of Snapchat.

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  • [–] 16 points 4 months ago (4 children)
  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    And alll the glasses do is tell you where to but their drinks, haha

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  • [–] 9 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    They look fucking stupid. It looks like when my toddler wears my sunnies, but even worse.

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  • [–] 6 points 4 months ago (1 child)
  • [–] 6 points 4 months ago

    Getting over the aesthetics hurdle is going to be so difficult for AR glasses.

    Everyone keeps saying VR isn’t what people want, they want AR glasses.

    But then the first AR glasses are not exceptionally thin and small. So it’s revealed that people were saying they actually wanted something seemingly impossible instead.

    I have faith that the industry could get to “small enough” eventually. But I don’t know if the market will give them the runway they need to get there. Anyone paying attention knows what they are showing is a major improvement on previous AR devices in size and weight. But your average person looks at it and laughs at how big it is.

    I wonder if the industry has the fortitude to keep pressing forward. Because if AR glasses did work as people dream they can, in the form factor they expect, then everyone will want them. Even if we have to set up strict laws around them.

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  • [–] 19 points 4 months ago (5 children)
  • [–] 23 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    Snapchat maybe? I have no clue.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago

    $2200 for glasses is insane regardless of what they can do. That's more than a powerful computer.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago

    Considering how cool 😎 they look, $2200 is a steal!
    Now you are not wearing the glasses, the glasses are wearing you. 🤣🤣🤣

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago

    I remember when Snapchat first tried to make glasses that would've been tied to Snapchat - and not much else.

    From what I remember, they looked utterly ridiculous: bright yellow thick frames, almost circular lenses and a big camera right between them that could take pictures and automatically add them to your snap story.

    It didn't gain the traction I think they were wanting at the time.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    Did elon draw these too?

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  • [–] 0 points 4 months ago