

Why I'm sending back Google Glass - r0h1n
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9248434/Why_I_m_sending_back_Google_Glass

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ctdonath
Glass is at the stage tablets were at when the Newton arrived: the concept
thrills the imagination, but the hardware is so far behind (despite the
laudable attempt) expectations that odds are it will fade into oblivion until
significant factors (battery capacity vs size, processing power, significant
FOV coverage) are improved 100x and the "right" UI/UX is designed (which will
look staggeringly obvious _after_ it's invented).

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LandoCalrissian
One of my friends had one and I got to use it for a few days and I largely
agree with the article. It's really a solution look for a problem at this
point. It's interesting too that the API has been available for a while now,
yet there haven't really been any huge ideas that have really come from that.

I like that Google is trying, but as it stands right now the hardware
limitations are just too real. This is by no means a consumer ready product at
this point.

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ant_sz
I am really looking forward to something like the Oculus but combines the
virtual world with the real one, not something like Glass,

~~~
frobozz
Like Spaceglasses?
[https://www.spaceglasses.com/](https://www.spaceglasses.com/)

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cjensen
Guy pays for a beta, finds out it's not perfect, and wants his money back?
That's really not reasonable.

~~~
Ensorceled
Well, there you go, the first problem is ... "Pays for a beta". Why does
Google need to have people pay to be their beta test group?

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ToastyMallows
I feel like the section about crooked pictures is disingenuous. The picture in
the article is crooked by about 30 degrees clockwise, but then the next
picture below, still taken with Glass, is almost perfectly straight. There's
no way his ears are that misaligned to take a picture that's rotated by 30
degrees.

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rememberlenny
Another write up on the same topic.

[http://blog.rememberlenny.com/2014/01/05/i-return-ed-my-
goog...](http://blog.rememberlenny.com/2014/01/05/i-return-ed-my-google-glass-
after-30-days/)

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efnx
I'm waiting for my fully AR capable RayBans. :) Virtual Light was a cool book.

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ChikkaChiChi
Glass is infinitely more useful when you don't have to worry about battery
life. I rigged up a Leopow Moonstone to mine and suddenly found myself using
it a ton more.

That being said, I looked like a Borg.

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Zigurd
I have Glass and I have been looking for use cases. The set of real use cases
is probably narrower than Google would like, but it's there. You have to be
using your hands, and you have to need information without using your hands to
access it.

That's interesting, and it is potentially high-value. But it isn't the set of
use cases for a consumer product.

~~~
dragonwriter
From your description of the qualifications for the use cases, I can
immediately think of several consumer markets, with the right content. There's
a chicken-and-egg problem of content and adoption, though.

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praeivis
Finally somebody with guts to acknowledge reality.

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Methusalah
Lots of exaggeration and subsequent backtracking to bring that exaggeration
back to reality. But even having not used glass already it's pretty easy to
find fault with his points:

1\. Eye Contact - Just don't look at glass while you're talking to people.
Problem solved. Why did he begin the article with this again?

2\. Not a good listener - Probably the strongest reason in the article. Not
really a surprise having used voice recognition on my phone, but this will
definitely cause problems.

3\. Battery death - You knew this before you bought it. Everyone knew this.
Google was completely open about this. Meh.

4\. Too big and bulky - He complains that it's too big for a shirt pocket and
then shows it inside a shirt pocket. It looks kind of silly there, but having
somewhat unsightly bulges is par for the course for anyone fond of carrying
gadgets around (the kind of person who'd be interested in an early version of
Glass). Basically a non-issue. Also, there's no way it's too big for a purse.

5\. Conspicuous - Another issue he knew from the start. There have been
numerous articles on the topic and most people have come to the conclusion
that other people would get used to it.

6\. Tilted photos - As others have pointed out, lots of exaggeration here.
It's easy enough to fix via software regardless.

7\. Direction drawbacks - You need a data connection to use google's
navigation services? No shit. Moving on.

8\. The earbud - It's just an option on the rare occasion that you somehow
need slightly better sound for glass. You already have your phone with you,
why would you need to use glass to listen to music?

9\. Explorer envy - That's a problem with him, not glass.

10\. Too little, too soon - Yeah, he wasn't a good candidate. There's a reason
it's only intended for developers hoping to get a head start at this point.

Pretty disappointing article.

~~~
pessimizer
Your arguments seem to boil down to saying that the things that he found
intolerable are all true, but some other people find them tolerable. That's
not very interesting.

Pretty disappointing comment.

~~~
Methusalah
That isn't an accurate summary of my comment. I'm arguing that this article
isn't revealing anything unexpected about the nature of the device and is only
a list of reasons why the author made a poor purchasing decision by ignoring
readily available information about the device he was purchasing.

