

Google's Project Glass Lets Technology Slip Into the Background - cjoh
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/01/google%E2%80%99s-project-glass-lets-technology-slip-into-the-background/

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jsz0
Our culture has to change a lot before a product like this can be mainstream.
I don't think I could feel comfortable being in the same room with someone
wearing one. The core problem is they break our ability to perceive the
environment we are in. I can see that I'm in a room with 5 other people but I
cannot comprehend that thousands, maybe millions, of other people are
streaming it at the same time. I would constantly be thinking that one wrong
move and I'm going to be embarrassing YouTube #1 clip of the day.

~~~
Kiro
First time, yes. Second time, not so much. Third time, you'll want one
yourself.

In a near future we will all look back to the day we thought no-one would ever
wear it and laugh.

~~~
glhaynes
I dunno… I always feel like jsz0 does when there's a camera being used in the
room. And they've been around all my life. Hard to say until it's tried out in
real life.

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scott_meade
Agreed. I've found myself too many times watching my kids' activities through
the viewfinder of a camera or holding up and iPhone between them and me. When
staring at a device, you're seeing them but you're not in the moment with
them. (The other option of course, would be to stop acting as if everything
needs recorded and shared.)

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mc32
Glass will definitely have privacy implications.

1\. who owns the data. 2\. who has access to the data. 3\. how do you opt out
from my recordings? 4\. will this lead to a private crowd-implemented version
of pervasive CC-TV?

This could the the penultimate implementation of a system to surveil a
population. If this becomes ubiquitous, who would ever need state installed
CC-cameras?

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jedc
Agree that there are privacy implications, but don't believe they'll be quite
as drastic as you make out.

From what I understand, Google Glass connects to your mobile phone, so it's
effectively outsourcing a mobile phone's camera, video speaker and microphone
to a pair of glasses. So the answer to a lot of your questions is the same as
if you were asking them about mobile phone technology. I wouldn't think
anything differently of someone wearing these glasses as I would of someone
using a mobile phone to take photos or video in a place or at an event. (And
importantly, I would assume the same battery life constraints around video'ing
and constantly taking photos would apply to glasses just like they do with
phones.)

The key difference is that it's very obvious when someone is using their phone
to do this, where it's not with glasses. This could be bad (being video'ed
when you don't want to be), but could also be pretty good (taking photos of a
fantastic meal at a great restaurant when you don't want to disturb anyone
else.) The product people behind this need to understand where those lines are
and design to them.

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mc32
You make some good arguments. However, one big difference, is that to take
photos or videos, you actively have to point the device at people and make an
effort to record. With Glass, that's taken out. You could be recording and no
one would be the wiser --one might have to assume that anyone wearing Glass
was recording. This could be a bit creepy.

Now, I know there is no expectation of privacy in public places --this is what
allows photographers to photograph anyone on the streets (with very few
exceptions). However, a photographer is very noticeable. If this becomes
ubiquitous, there is no way of avoiding being recorded. Now, what happens on
private property? What laws would apply there?

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enjo
Yep. It's why camera phones, in some places, have to make a noise when they a
picture (by law). You have to announce that you are doing something.

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Apocryphon
I think some of the comments on that article bear merit towards a contrary
position:

'Right now, the book is giving way to the screen and hypertext, and who knows
- how can we possibly know, stuck as we are in the heart of the maelstrom? -
what this will do to our concept of self. Nick Bilton writes that "When
technology gets out of the way, we are liberated from it." But perhaps what is
also true is that we ourselves are getting out of the way of technology,
adjusting and morphing our selves to adapt to and accommodate it, encouraged
all the way by gee-whiz journalism, advertising, and the whole throbbing.
hissing, bloated blogosphere itself.

Too bad for Sergey, I say, that he can't enjoy playing with his child more in
the moment, without a computer to mediate and record the event (and the
smiles) for later viewing in case he misses it when it happens.'

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delackner
It isn't inherently terrible or good. It just is. We will change, and it will
change with us. Your example is poorly chosen though, as the current model of
standard parent behavior is to just sit there with a big SLR taking photos of
the kid playing with the other parent, or playing alone, since how can you
play while you are busy using a camera? Sure you can say people _SHOULD_ be
present all the time, but the reality is people want to take pictures of their
kids.

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timmyd
im all for Google Glass - but I just don't see anyone talking about the health
aspects of these glasses. Given the prominence of electromagnetic radiation
and the often fear that it has spread around the globe in respect of brain
activity, heat and so on.

how possibly can it be healthy to be wearing a set of these around, all day
long, with data beaming towards your temple as it processes what you are
looking at ?

i love the idea and concept - im just not sure I like the idea of the
electromagnetic radiation being so rawly exposed to your head for as long as
you are wearing the glasses. at least with mobile phones you are subjected to
"bursts" in the sense that its only for the duration that the phone is against
your head (which many fear - regardless of whether you personally being FUD or
not)

contrast this to glass however, it's there constantly and design to be so. i
would just love to know the risks associated with the volume of data, the
impact of such exposure and the level of heat generated etc. it just seems to
be swept aside in my mind

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mattgreenrocks
My fear is not even that: I worry about a future where we're so used to loads
of context sensitive information bombarding us that we see it as weird to
unplug or otherwise try to slow down.

Consider Facebook: it is probably a net negative for me, but in the past five
years it's become weird not to have an account. So, I delay killing it off,
justifying it not by the utility, but instead by the apparent necessity.

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listic
See Charles Stross' "Accelerando"; chapter 3, "Tourist". When heavy user of
glasses is being mugged of them, they lose nearly all of their intelligence
and identity. They stumble around like a blind idiot, trying in vain to
remember what they lost and how to get it back.

The book is available for free from the author's website, and individual
chapters make sense as self-contained short stories.
[http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-
static/fiction/accelera...](http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-
static/fiction/accelerando/accelerando-intro.html)

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bribrian
Black Mirror Episode 3 is worth a look, if your interested in where this could
end up going. It deals with ubiquitous interpersonal surveillance.

[http://www.channel4.com/programmes/black-mirror/episode-
guid...](http://www.channel4.com/programmes/black-mirror/episode-
guide/series-1/episode-3)

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damoncali
Anyone know how your eye can focus on a screen so close to it? How do they
pull that off? I have a headache just thinking about it.

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brandon
It doesn't.

 _Glass is designed to project the image at far-focus, so if you have good
eyesight or corrective lenses (like me) that allow you to see in the distance,
there is no need to re-focus to see the image._

[http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/131877-ive-seen-the-
futur...](http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/131877-ive-seen-the-future-hands-
on-with-google-glass)

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epaga
I can't see this working legally for privacy reasons without the glasses
having an LED go on when the camera is recording anything.

Not to mention the more sticky social issues: Imagine a guy in the subway with
these glasses on - every woman in that subway will feel "watched" any time he
looks in her general direction.

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bergie
The subway is already full of cameras

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siteshwar
Reminds me of Alan Kay's forbidden quote "A computer should disappear in the
environment".

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rimantas
I fail to read it as "A computer should appear on everybody's face".

