
Google Glass sales halted - kerrsclyde
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-30831128
======
saosebastiao
Google Glass took a good idea for some contexts and mass marketed it to a
completely different context where it's primary feature was mostly useless.
HUDs and AR make a ton of sense when you need to augment human knowledge,
intelligence, and sensory in real time with voice as the primary user
interaction. Flying fighter jets, driving race cars, fighting on a
battlefield, working in complex and unsafe industrial operations, etc.

AR doesn't significantly augment your experience of riding the bus to work,
ordering dinner at a restaurant, taking a walk around the block, or even most
forms of labor (manual or otherwise). So not only did Google Glass not have
much of a benefit, but it had the drawback of annoying countless people who
had to be around the glasshole who never stopped yapping at their glasses.

~~~
coffeemug
_> AR doesn't significantly augment your experience of riding the bus to work,
ordering dinner at a restaurant, taking a walk around the block, or even most
forms of labor (manual or otherwise)._

It could. Riding the bus? It could automatically pull up the bio of a person
sitting next to you. Ordering dinner? It could approximate calorie counts of
the food on your plate. Taking a walk? It could pull up information about the
flora and fauna around you, and the history of the buildings.

AR _could_ be amazing, but the tech isn't there yet. Google Glass reminds me
of Apple Newton -- an amazing piece of technology that's a decade or two too
early.

~~~
GuiA
> Riding the bus? It could automatically pull up the bio of a person sitting
> next to you.

Jesus Christ please no. Does anyone really think this is a good idea?

Addendum: of all the people replying to my post, saying how great it could be,
I'd be willing to guess that none are in positions where they get harassed on
the bus on an almost daily basis (eg being a woman).

~~~
1ris
In Japan I believe it's a legal requirement for cameras to emulate a shutter
sound for privacy reasons. I want that, too.

Oh, and I that my consent is required before somebody does face recognition on
me.

~~~
alexbecker
And I want my consent required every time someone who overhears my name digs
up my facebook.

It's not even remotely enforceable. For better or worse, this is the future.

~~~
1ris
There is a huge difference there. First of all, I don't have facebook, and I
barely use my real name on the internet. So I can defend against that. And
second, my name is absolutely not unique and if needed I can adopt other
identities. My face is and i can't get a new one.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Do you wear a mask when walking down the street? Do you ask people to sign a
document if you want them to see your face? There is always a way to abuse
anything, and at some point we need to address it on a societal level, and not
by blocking technological progress.

~~~
1ris
No, I'm not wearing a mask, and I don't want too, that the whole point. The
fact that people do need my consent before they film me, or make anonymous is
state of the law in may places.

I don't see how a mandatory shutter sound is blocking "technological
progress".

------
donpdonp
Google Glass was ahead of its time, for a while. They re-engineered the guts
of a cellphone to fit into an eyeglass frame. The visual 'cube' that forms the
display was a novelty and kept the project within the bounds of whats possible
to be manufactured today.

Then Google came across a _fiber optic eye-ball projector_ that made the Glass
visual interface look like an 8-Track of the Doobie Brothers. They immediately
realized this and dumped a _half billion dollars_ on the project, Magic Leap.

[http://gizmodo.com/how-magic-leap-is-secretly-creating-a-
new...](http://gizmodo.com/how-magic-leap-is-secretly-creating-a-new-
alternate-rea-1660441103)

Some day, Google will spring a productized version of this on the public and
it'll be like nothing before, including Oculus. Its the best shot we've got at
'true' augmented reality.

~~~
3_2__1
Google will never bring a Glass-like product to market successfully. Period.
They are incapable.

~~~
andrewfelix
You need to elaborate. Adding the term 'Period' doesn't magically strengthen
your argument.

Genuinely interested in your rationale though.

------
ChuckMcM
So some speculation (since we on the outside can never be sure, and when I
worked at Google it was always interesting to see the difference between what
was reported vs the reality inside the company.)

I've always felt that consumer products were going to be really hard for
Google to pull off. It reminded me of Intel trying to make an LED wristwatch
in the early 80's. Too much consumer 'hands on', too much industrial design.
Neither of which Google are strengths.

I expect glass is dead, all the money they might have invested in making it
real they spent on Magic Leap, and now its up to the Leap guys to be the
'visual interface to Google.' The small android experience will fold into the
IoT part of Google (Nest) and that will be that.

~~~
fidotron
One of the most stinging criticisms I've heard of Google is that they just
don't get products. They can, in some cases, do services, but the idea that
something ever reaches a finished state in which everything is complete
doesn't seem to be part of their DNA.

It's as if they are an eventually consistent system that is constantly moving
towards a state of consistency that they never completely reach.

~~~
danieldk
_It 's as if they are an eventually consistent system that is constantly
moving towards a state of consistency that they never completely reach._

They have some products which were nearly perfect. For instance, the
Chromecast is more or less finished. It's not intended to be a game console or
something to have apps in on a television. It's an extremely cheap device that
allows you to stream a tab or from apps. That vision is well-executed, because
it is cheap and works well for streaming. Of course, some people will have
gripes about the Chromecast, but the fact that a device that looked incredibly
boring at the start is now a pretty big success indicates that for many people
it's exactly the product that they want.

~~~
Mithaldu
Due to the fact that the chromecast requires an always-on internet connection
it's far from finished and entirely useless in many cases.

~~~
dragonwriter
I think you've confused "finished" with "what Mithaldu wants".

~~~
Mithaldu
"Mithaldu and everyone in his cicles of friends, relatives and work
acquaintances."

Maybe it's different where you are, but where i live the chromecast is
literally useless due to the restriction and nobody has one.

~~~
teraflop
A lot of people live in places where a telescope is literally useless (for
astronomical purposes, anyway). Does that make it a worthless product?

~~~
EpicEng
False analogy. First, the parent didn't state that it was, in ask scenarios, a
useless product. S/he said out was useless _where s /he lives_ due to a design
decision. Secondly, we can't control the atmosphere, but Google can certainly
control the design of the Chromecast.

------
xacaxulu
"calls end to" apparently equals "moved to another division for continued
development on different timeline". Linkbaitish title.

~~~
gwern
I don't know, if they were simply reorganizing it, _stopping sales_ , period,
seems like a very strange move. Not only does it look like killing to the rest
of the world (which to some extent is going to be a self-fulfilling prophecy),
it also does a lot of damage to uptake since, well, you can't get one anymore.

~~~
chinpokomon
It isn't weird if the explorer design is being retired. I fully expect them to
stop selling the current model.

------
amikula
It seems to me that Glass wouldn't have suffered half the backlash it got if
the original release had excluded the camera. Even if everybody was just
grumbling about how useless the product was without a camera, people still
would have bought it, and it probably wouldn't have gotten half the bans or
negative press it ended up getting.

~~~
shadowmint
That's always been the problem with glass; it's not an AR application
platform, it's just an awkward mini-screen floating in the middle of your
face.

Without a camera it would have been so pointless no one would have bothered to
look at it.

(seriously, can you imagine the sky diving demo sans camera? 'What was thing
thing on his face?' 'No idea, I think it was showing him tweets or something')

------
alextgordon
If Google wanted to sell it to the world, they should have first made it
without the camera. Later on when people are comfortable with the form factor:
add the camera.

This is how we have ended up with mobile phones with cameras that nobody seems
to mind about. Phones only got cameras halfway through their life. By then, it
was too late to stop.

~~~
bdcravens
I think cameras in phones had a lot to do with the limitations of the tech.
Even so, it's a conscious action to hold your phone and take a photo, and
while there's plenty of idiots on Reddit that don't care, it's not socially
acceptable to take photos of strangers without permission. Everytime I've
spoken to someone wearing Glass, I was so paranoid that a photo of my mouth in
the wrong pose would be used for someone's karma.

~~~
alextgordon
It's still not socially acceptable to take photos, but it's a lot more
acceptable to carry a camera around with you.

What percentage of drug deals do you estimate _both_ buyer and seller are
carrying a phone with a camera? 70%? 90%?

I laugh when I imagine how many movie plots are broken now that _everybody_
has an audio recording device in their pocket.

------
fidotron
Aside from the mismanagement of the software/hardware associated directly with
Google Glass the true problem it had was the contradiction between the
benefits of the user and those around the user. The single greatest thing
about Glass, and it really was brilliant, was the ability to take pictures
that almost perfectly captured your field of vision. This is, however, the
precise feature those around you might take objection to. Take that feature
away and Glass really has no use at all.

The irony of this is it's not hard to conceal cameras on people in order to
record their surroundings if you're so inclined, and the reception to Glass
just demonstrated how opposed people are to this when it's a visible
intrusion, regardless of the actual threat presented.

~~~
forgottenpass
_The irony of this is it 's not hard to conceal cameras on people_

The idea that something is technically possible but socially unacceptable is
not irony. Concealing something socially unacceptable is not ironic.
Expressing disapproval of someone openly breaking social norms is not
inherently ironic. The idea society runs on trust is not ironic!

~~~
ignostic
The person you're responding was clearly just saying that it's funny how
uncomfortable people were about being recorded by Google Glass, while covert
methods of recording are not difficult but rarely worried about.

Take it easy - we know what was meant. No need to get pedantic about the
definition of "irony."

~~~
0xDOOD
>while covert methods of recording are not difficult but rarely worried about.

Unless you're a woman who's ever worn a skirt in public, gone to a gym, or
used the changing room in a store.

~~~
avar
...or a guy who's used the changing room in as store. What's so different
about being a woman in that context?

~~~
hackmiester
Nothing, in theory. In reality, women are the ones who have to worry about
change room cameras. There is definitely a disconnect there.

------
psbp
I'm not sure what it means for the future of Glass, but doesn't the title and
most of the content of the article undermine that it's being moved to an
actual product division?

~~~
kolencherry
The title is sensational and meant to be clickbait. It does not focus on the
fact that by moving Glass to an actual product division, Google is expressing
commitment to the ecosystem and the product.

Edit: "Glass at Work has been growing and we’re seeing incredible developments
with Glass in the workplace. As we look to the road ahead, we realize that
we’ve outgrown the lab and so we’re officially “graduating” from Google[x] to
be our own team here at Google. We’re thrilled to be moving even more from
concept to reality."
[https://plus.google.com/+GoogleGlass/posts/9uiwXY42tvc](https://plus.google.com/+GoogleGlass/posts/9uiwXY42tvc)

~~~
aaronbrethorst
::cough::
[http://ourincrediblejourney.tumblr.com](http://ourincrediblejourney.tumblr.com)

------
ereckers
I see it as something like Google Wave, a bit before the market is ready for
it with a terrible form factor. However the technology and intent is correct.

These things will be back, but they won't be Google Glass, they'll be the
"GoPro of Google Glass". Probably single function at first, cool looking,
wearable/usable, with modders and hobbyists starting to build out
functionality piecemeal until they have something really cool.

And back to that form factor, I'm just a regular guy, and I wouldn't be caught
dead in these things. When the visual impression of your product is Robert
Scoble wearing them in the shower, you know you're doomed.

------
untog
And by "Glass programme" they mean the Explorers program, not the entirity of
Glass itself, which is being moved from Google X to something less R&D-y, in
the hands of the Nest CEO.

Probably about time - Glass needs to sink or swim already.

~~~
owenwil
It's more specific than that: current versions of Google Glass are dead and
are planned to be sunset. So, Glass, as we know it, is dead.

~~~
AlyssaRowan
This is totally not a surprise regarding the current version of Glass. To
paraphrase briefly:

Google Glass = ti OMAP 4430 → Texas Instruments axed the OMAP division → no
more (closed source) driver updates → no more easy kernel updates → no more
Android/system software updates → end-of-life. ☹

~~~
guyzero
Exactly. This is like the G1 being discontinued. It's a product EOL, not a
product line being killed.

~~~
vmlinuz
If the G1 had been discontinued at 3 days' notice - and without there being a
replacement already on the market - I'd have expected people to have some
pretty harsh things to say about the future of Android...

------
chaostheory
If I didn't read this line I would feel that it would be a dead product:

> She and the Glass team will report to Tony Fadell, the chief executive of
> the home automation business Nest

It sounds like they're just transitioning the responsibility to an Apple vet
who has good taste.

------
bitemix
I think we place too much emphasis on visuals simply because they're more
readily at-hand for the individual user, even when doing so forces _those
around that individual_ far outside their comfort zone. It creates a barrier,
putting both sides on the defensive, at odds with each other.

Meanwhile, we drastically underestimate the potential utility of non-visual
sensory augmentation. For instance, a hidden device providing vibrotactile
information could provide far subtler, lower-level cues about the world around
us, _even to the point of widening the human experience to nearly limitless
novel senses_ [0].

That's the direction I'd love to see us move wearables and technology in
general: pervasive, yet unobtrusive.

[0]:[http://www.mase.io/tech/wearables/2014/10/23/wearables/](http://www.mase.io/tech/wearables/2014/10/23/wearables/)

------
tmwh91
The glass team sent this email to Explorers:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8895743](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8895743)

tldr; all XE development stopped as of Monday

------
huhtenberg
It's the camera.

Google made a _massive_ mistake by bundling the Glass with the camera. Camera
is _the_ reason for the backlash and the seriously tainted brand ("glassholes"
and such). Of course they couldn't launch it as is. Though I wonder if they
learned the lesson or if they will just hold a pause and relaunch it with no
hardware changes.

------
sambeau
So, is this good news or bad news for current Glass owners?

If it was me I think I'd be upset to see that my expensive piece of kit had
effectively (if not officially) been end-of-lifed. (if not for Google
themselves but almost certainly for any 3rd-party developers.)

But, I suspect some people would like the new exclusivity and perhaps the rare
collectibility?

~~~
lnanek2
Disappointed owner here. I'm a developer, but I'm not going to write software
for a product that isn't even for sale. There just won't be enough users, and
even if I wrote something that justified the cost of buying it, people
couldn't. That said, it was very clear last Android update that Google just
isn't capable of supporting the TI chip any more. It was horrendous.

~~~
turnip1979
Me too. Kinda annoying I paid 1500 to be a beta tester for a product that
never properly launched. Explorer ... yeah.

------
Isamu
I was hoping this would be useful at some point for my daughter, who has low
vision.

So I am hoping that augmented vision catches on, in more than just niche
categories, so that the hardware can evolve more quickly.

It probably needs to be carefully separated from the recording capability, to
work around the "creepy" factor.

------
auvi
This is a speculation but I think Google is dropping Glass because they are
convinced that Magic Leap will be the winner. We have to wait to see what
comes out from Magic Leap.

------
jonpress
"Instead it will focus on 'future versions of Glass' with work carried out by
a different division to before."

Is that division made up of people from Magic Leap by any chance?
[http://gizmodo.com/how-magic-leap-is-secretly-creating-a-
new...](http://gizmodo.com/how-magic-leap-is-secretly-creating-a-new-
alternate-rea-1660441103)

The next step is to project 3D images directly into the eyeballs!

------
hnriot
not a big surprise, they've all but completely disappeared from sight around
S. Another Segway, but I doubt Google were ever serious about Glass, it was a
demonstration of Google as committed to being a futuristic hi tech company.

The problem with the product is that people like the compartmentalization of
the smartphone, you take it out of your pocket to take a photo, nothing
surreptitious. And to be honest, the smartphone just does a lot more. This is
going to be the challenge that the Apple Watch will also face, it competes
with the smartphone for your attention and has to add enough additional value
to justify the product segment.

Meanwhile, it's no big deal, products come and go and some end up with much
smaller target customer base, although I suspect Glass is (as Segway was)
being considered for a few specific markets but over the coming year or two
will just vanish only to be revisited in a decade but with holographic
projection (a la R2D2) and streetview-like surround-camera and built in
plethora of biometric sensors that all feed into the big post-Singularity
GoolgleBrain to provide it's eyes, ears and voice...

------
aledalgrande
I bought one for dev purposes, and I was never really convinced about the
design (even being a prototype). It looks nice, but it is unbalanced on a
side, they could have put an extra battery on the other side, the official
blog was just talking about Instagram-like uses (who is that had that horrible
idea?) and the screen was not great.

------
SocksCanClose
augmented reality's first home run will be in the mundane industrial sector
where it can be used for training, inventory management, logistics, and any
number of other things.

i take this as a cautionary tale of product-market fit. as mark andreessen
says, where a market exists and a competent but not visionary startup finds
itself, the market will often "pull the product out of the startup."

that obviously didn't happen here. i think it is because glass was both
narrative AND product. narrative meaning that glass was supposed to be a
transformational product, meant to elevate google from a search company to a
product company.

they weren't going to let the product find its market (my thesis: industrial).
instead, pushed it to the market they wanted it pushed to (consumer), because
it fit a narrative they _wanted_ to be true.

------
mmanfrin
Google's Lisa. Maybe I can recoup the cost 20 years down the road as a
collectors item.

------
DonHopkins
What's a narcissistic douchebag to do for attention, now?

[https://www.facebook.com/RobertScoble/posts/1015157966444465...](https://www.facebook.com/RobertScoble/posts/10151579664444655)

~~~
DonHopkins
"7\. On that note, don't give one to Robert Scoble"

[http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/google-glass-2-0-eight-things-
addre...](http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/google-glass-2-0-eight-things-address-if-
next-generation-headset-succeed-1483755)

------
lgleason
From the glass-community forums they are not shutting down and will still
support existing warranties etc..... My understanding is that there are some
exciting things in store for the platform.

------
mrslx
i would absolutely love to use my glass at my desk when working. would do
wonders to clear away all the apps i'm running for notifications and
constantly checking my phone to see if i got a text or missed call from a
client while i was in a meeting or drafting an email.. the major prob is the
product is heavily focused on google services. if they came out swinging with
a mac notifications app and ios app - i would use it all day. but they didnt,
it sits in my drawer as something i use for show and tell.

------
rbrogan
Wondering if Google had always expected this and Glass was a long-term
strategic move or if this was unexpected and should be considered a blunder.

------
tdicola
Weren't they building some insane barge in San Francisco and New York to be a
consumer showcase for Glass? Guess that's sunk now.

------
cddotdotslash
Sometimes, technology is simply ahead of its time. Honestly, I don't see a fit
for Google Glass in society right now. That will likely change in three or
five years, but right now, I feel there needs to be some kind of evolution to
where Google Glass is considered "normal." It has already started with
wearables - smart watches, fitness bands, etc. But it needs to expand in a
more logical way before Glass can be included in that list.

~~~
bsder
> Honestly, I don't see a fit for Google Glass in society right now.

There's a huge fit for Google glass. But there is no _high volume_ huge fit.
And Google doesn't care about low-volume as they can't move enough ads across
it.

------
Pxtl
Glass should not have been pushed at the cellphone consumer-good fashion-
accessory market until they had something swanky that actually looked tasteful
on a set of glasses.

At the current price-point? Enterprise would be the only market that would pay
$1000 in decent quantities for such a niche device. If they could get it down
to $200? It could be great for the GoPro set.

------
owenwil
Based on what Google's implying with this Glass news, seems it wasn't happy
with the product and wants to change course. Now that it's an actual product
division and they're killing the current iteration, I'd expect we don't hear
_anything_ for a long while until there's something new.

~~~
psbp
I don't understand how moving it from (a highly public) R&D to a product
division means that we'll be hearing less.

~~~
lnanek2
This was sort of a public beta, like GMail. A product division won't show it
to anyone until it is done. Maybe even hide it in a fake casing like so many
phones.

------
dghughes
Sales halted of something I could never buy even if I had the money.

------
emodendroket
Wow! Who could have anticipated this? Shocking.

~~~
banana69
Yeah, we were planning apps for it too... Sigh.

------
uptown
Disclaimer: I never tried glass. But the actual product screens I saw never
seemed to come close to the slick marketing demo they showed with the
parachuting guys.

------
jimrandomh
The sad thing is, many of the problems which sank this incarnation of Glass
would have been fixed by the community if only they'd released the source
code.

~~~
dreamweapon
But the biggest problem of all with Glass -- _its affect on other people_
around the Glasshole wearing it -- had nothing to do with source code, of
course.

------
mkawia
Why don't they just pivot . GoPro is not a mainstream product but they are
very successful

~~~
daenz
I don't think Google needs to pivot this project to be successful.

------
cpeterso
Google should rename Google Glass to "Googly Eyes".

------
owly
yay! no more glassholes. seriosly though, they should have given them away to
every popular actor and musician out there and pay them to use at events and
concerts.

------
thankyouu
Thank the lord.

------
koolkoder
Glass doesn't add any value to your life

------
yupyupnice
let us rejoice ;)

------
3_2__1
"An update on Google Glass..."

------
tedunangst
So what will Scoble do when his pair breaks? How will he live?

------
jtlienwis1
I don't know what to say about Google glass, but the women at 3:57 of the BBC
video is IDDG, intellectually drop dead gorgeous. Capturing her smile with
$1500 glasses would be worth it.

------
radicalbyte
One of the largest supermarkets in the UK have just released their own Google
Glass app.

[http://www.pcpro.co.uk/wearables/1000284/google-glass-app-
la...](http://www.pcpro.co.uk/wearables/1000284/google-glass-app-launched-by-
tesco)

Nice timing.

------
stevebot
I remember when it first came out and developers in my area would kind of
gloat over it and being one of the chosen "glass explorers". they would wear
it to meetups and brag about the apps they were developing for it.

I'm kind of glad that it flopped in its current form and that those days are
over.

------
zirkonit
Not really unexpected, the writing was on the wall.

It's a shame though, Glass hate is coming from the old school, technophobe
camp. While it _is_ a clunky, underdesigned, underpowered piece of tech, we
should aim for sleeker, more powerful, more useful head-mounted computers…
instead for no HMC at all.

~~~
saosebastiao
I'm not anywhere near technophobe but I definitely hate Google Glass. It has
less to do with the technology than the type of person that gloms onto it and
what it enables them to do. Examples: Talking loudly to oneself in a
restaurant/bus, not watching where one is walking, elitist or showoff
attitudes, lax attitude toward invasion of privacy, etc.

~~~
waqf
Do you remember when we used to say the same about people with cellphones?

~~~
_almosnow
>Talking loudly to oneself in a restaurant/bus, not watching where one is
walking, elitist or showoff attitudes, lax attitude toward invasion of
privacy, etc.

Are you implying that doing these things with a cellphone is now alright?

~~~
njharman
No they're saying that we use to (unfairly) attribute poor social behavior to
ALL cell phone users. Then we all got cellphones, found out they're neat, no
longer felt "left out" or "inferior" and realized hey it's not the cellphone
that make people obnoxious it's obnoxious people that make people obnoxious.

