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Facebook, Ray-Ban debut picture-taking smart glasses
- fudged71 5y agoI don’t understand why these aren’t programmed with rolling buffers like dashcams. Often I want to capture something that already happened, not something that is about to happen.
- asadlionpk 5y agoexactly! I wish this had that feature.
- polartx 5y agoDash cams are wired to a car battery and often only record when the engine is running. If these glasses were constantly recording, the battery would last less than 60 minutes
- crorella 5y ago> "Weighing just a teaspoon of salt more" why not just say the glasses are 5 grams more? I like that there is a light signaling the glasses are capturing photo/video, although it might not be noticeable in some cases, just like other devices Cool to see the pictures/videos don't go directly to FB.
- cwkoss 5y agoDon't go directly to FB... yet. FB always launches things in a better state then errodes privacy and user value to tilt towards more data collection.
- Darmody 5y agoThat's the thing with Facebook. They want it all and if they can't get it now they will try again the next day until you give up.
- httpsterio 5y agoI was just thinking that if these are going to be used by perverts, its going to be trivia to paint over the light with something like nail polish. At least a proper audio cue like the camera snap noise which has been forced on at least in Japan, would be a bit better.
- httpsterio 5y agoClarification, its not in the Japanese law but all phone manufacteurs have agree upon it together.
- sneak 5y agoWhat stops one from defecting and building one without?
- IfOnlyYouKnew 5y agoDecency. ...and the certainty that a law will then be passed within a year. Also you're no longer getting government contracts.
- thesausageking 5y ago> Cool to see the pictures/videos don't go directly to FB. Yet. They also said you'd never need a FB account to use Oculus. Or that Whatsapp data would be kept separate.
- akomtu 5y agoI'm sure the FB's plan is to see everything you see, analyse faces and places and build a better personal profile of its users. These glasses will be connected to network and linked to your real identity, or there's nothing in it for FB.
- the-dude 5y agoInteresting to see no mention of Google Glass or Glassholes.
- coding123 5y agowhich means it's a paid spot.
- babelfish 5y agoOr even the Snapchat Spectacles
- Apocryphon 5y agoIt's like Facebook finally caught up to 2016.
- SirHound 5y agoIt doesn’t really have anything in common with them other than the camera. It’s more like the Spectacles
- spywaregorilla 5y agoThe camera was the controversial part
- jonathanlb 5y agoShades of Google Glass!
- K5EiS 5y agoReminds me of the Snapchat Spectacles, but i guess getting another form factor for glass cameras is hard with the limited space.
- binarynate 5y agoAn interesting review from Katie Notopoulos at Buzzfeed: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/katienotopoulos/facebook-is-making-camera-glasses-ha-ha-oh-no https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/katienotopoulos/faceboo...
- api 5y agoFacebook wants me to wear a camera. That is a really hard "nope."
- azinman2 5y agoSounds like you’re not the target demo then.
- llbeansandrice 5y agoI don't understand why companies keep making these glasses with cameras on them. That's the main issue and concern that people have with these devices. Something like a HUD would be great but people don't want cameras pointing at them all the time.
- sneak 5y agoPeople in public spaces in the USA have cameras pointed at them all the time and they don't seem to care. Even local bars and restaurants that don't even handle that much cash have tons of surveillance cameras up everywhere.
- yur3i__ 5y agoSurveillance cameras are entirely different, in the same way as people don't care about giving their data to a company but do care about giving someone else their phone, a persons camera pointing at them is much different to a surveillance camera.
- ryandrake 5y agoReminds me of "Surveillance Camera Man" [1] from several years ago. His YouTube channel seems to have been scrubbed of videos, but basically the guy just stood out in public recording people, just like thousands of surveillance cameras currently do, with lots of subjects objecting, berating him, becoming scared, upset, even violent. Point being, it's no different than all the surveillance that is already done, except people freak out when there's an actual human visibly holding the camera. 1: https://blogs.harvard.edu/internetmonitor/2013/07/10/surveillance-camera-man-draws-ire-provokes-questions-about-recording-in-public/ https://blogs.harvard.edu/internetmonitor/2013/07/10/surveil...
- micromacrofoot 5y agoNo. I see this guy mentioned all the time and he wasn't simply standing there. He was invading people's personal space, responding to them in antisocial ways, lightly following them, and in some cases trespassing. He's a total creep, triggering people's fear response, and people would likely react in a similar way if he didn't have a camera. Much of the time he was absolutely not simply standing in a corner stationary, which is what security cameras do.
- 0des 5y agoAbsolutely not.
- blocked_again 5y agoOver the years I have become very mindful of what tech I choose to adopt. Which means I first encounter a problem and then try to find a solution for it using tech. I can't think of any worthwhile problem that this smart glass will solve. So I am going to pass on it.
- the-dude 5y agoApple will release the Apple Glasses when the time is right. Since Apple hasn't released the Apple Glasses, it is obvious the time is not yet right.
- xen2xen1 5y agoThat doesn't really seem to fly, as smartphones existed before the IPhone, but they were not done with the "no stylus" idea, thus not done correctly. When Apple does their best, they make the market by just doing it better, and everyone follows.
- jamespullar 5y agoPosted earlier in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28471302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28471302
- xnx 5y agoI'm probably in the minority, but I would like a record of everything I see and hear for my entire life. If every other private company gets to monitor me, why don't I? That said, Facebook is probably the very last company I would want to buy that kind of a device from.
- fnord77 5y agome too. every day when I go out for lunch I witness at least one crime, sometimes multiple crimes. At least one involving a gun per week. Nobody believes me how bad the crime has gotten here. I'd like to document it.
- reactspa 5y agoSorry to hear about this bad situation. A great benefit from having cameras everywhere (e.g. Ring), is the crime evidence aspect. May we ask what general area you live in?
- camillomiller 5y agoYou don't need smart glasses, you need drastic gun control laws.
- fnord77 5y agoSF already has the strictest in the nation!
- camillomiller 5y agoGun control is not effective on a local level, c'mon. I'm talking Australia-style ban of guns on a federal level.
- Duralias 5y agoWouldn't that make you a target for any criminal who has heard of these glasses?
- deleted 5y ago
- sneak 5y agoGreat, more ways for parts of my life to get uploaded to Facebook against my will and without my consent. I hope wearers of these get the same stigma that the Google Glassholes did.
- commandlinefan 5y agoCreepshot types will be a big market for these.
- sneak 5y agoThere are already countless easily concealed $20 cameras available for that, including ones in pens and, yes, sunglasses. This isn't enabling any new functionality there. The danger from these is the internet-connectedness, and Facebook.
- SyzygistSix 5y agoFacebook has been helping to make being a creep seem normal and acceptable for a long time.
- lostgame 5y agoI don't understand how these are legal. I would sign a petition in half a second against this technology's use in public spaces. I swear to God. What about a camera you can wear in a public bathroom don't people get the obvious 'wrong'-ness of? "Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should."
- 0des 5y agoHow do you feel about people walking past you with their cell phones pressed to their ear? Surely that camera is also an issue.
- 6gvONxR4sf7o 5y agoI trust that people with a cell phone in their ear are probably using them to talk. On the other hand, if someone has their phone up in the usual taking-a-photo-with-their-phone pose, then I'll also assume they're taking a photo, and if they are holding their phone out like that in the locker room, I'd ask them not to.
- floren 5y agoI didn't really understand the bathroom objection when it was Google Glass, and I don't really follow it now. I've got plenty of problems with the general idea of camera glasses, but in terms of bathrooms... The wearer can't really record anything he/she can't directly see already. Is the concern that the guy at the next urinal might crane his neck over the divider and film your junk? Would you consider that acceptable behavior if he didn't have camera glasses on? Is the worry that someone might capture you entering or leaving a bathroom stall, or record your back as you stand at a urinal? It seems like a regular old cell phone would be a more effective way to take sneaky pictures or videos, since it doesn't involve popping your whole head under the stall... It just feels like doing anything truly unpleasant with camera glasses would require a serious breach of standard bathroom etiquette, and even considering how shitty the general public can be, I've never experienced that level of bad behavior in a public bathroom in all my years.
- 5y ago
- Etheryte 5y ago> Alex Himel, VP of AR at Facebook Reality Labs, informed me over a Zoom chat that taping over the LED light was a violation of the terms of service of the glasses, which prohibit tampering with the device. This is a good summary of the kind of deal buying a pair of these would be. Even putting a piece of tape on something you bought and supposedly own is a violation of some contract and may in theory render your device inoperable. It's not hard to imagine that the companion app, which is the only way to use the device, requires Facebook login and then you just end up with a few hundred dollars worth of regular old glasses.
- Apocryphon 5y agoWell, it's a policy that's uncharacteristically protecting user privacy, or rather the privacy of those subjected to the user's presence, so it's not the best example of onerous TOS.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 5y agoWell.. my main objection would be that it seems impossible to detect such manipulation, and therefore these ToS are toothless. As to your complaint: I don't see a problem? Assuming for a second that such a scheme would work, it allows transactions to happen and devices to be sold that otherwise would not or could not. That's the basic mechanism of how contract law and court system help a society: a bank wouldn't have the capability to build its own mercenary force to collect debt (or, at least, it would be expensive and a nightmare for civil liberties). So, counterintuitively, by allowing you to bind yourself to an agreement to pay back a loan, your range of options is only expanded.
- murderfs 5y ago> Well.. my main objection would be that it seems impossible to detect such manipulation, and therefore these ToS are toothless. I don't think that's true: LEDs can also be used as light sensors. If the camera sees a bright day and the LEDs see pitch black, you know something sketchy's going on.
- 908B64B197 5y ago
- vineyardmike 5y agoI really appreciate that FB keeps trying to make hardware and products that don't need to be a data collection funnel. It's like they want to free themselves from the cursed golden goose that is data driven ads. I really don't appreciate that every attempt by FB to free themselves of ads they end up with a product perfect for scooping up data so it either flops out of consumer fear and/or turns into a data collection funnel. I want FB to be more than a heinous data trap. I don't think it's going to happen though.
- sneak 5y agoI don't appreciate it, because it means that good product designers are going to work at a terrible data collection funnel advertising company. I would really like our world to be one in which attracting top talent requires more interestingness than simply being an a data vacuuming ad service. If you work at, or would work at Facebook, you should probably follow Bill Hicks' advice.
- ryandrake 5y agoI don't know if you should paint the entire company's employees with the same brush. There are probably people at Facebook working on user privacy, trying to fight the good fight. Are they still tainted because they are fighting that fight at a "terrible data collection funnel advertising company"? These companies are huge and have lots of departments within that are not feeding the beast at all. (Disclaimer: Not a Facebook employee :) )
- bserge 5y agoWell, it is rather clear which departments have higher authority.
- type0 5y ago> Are they still tainted because they are fighting that fight at a "terrible data collection funnel advertising company"? They are, how naive could such hypothetical employees be that they wouldn't know FB's stances on privacy?
- fnord77 5y agoI don't suppose these can be used without a FB account?
- commoner 5y agoYes, the "View" app requires a Facebook account to log in. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/katienotopoulos/facebook-is-making-camera-glasses-ha-ha-oh-no https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/katienotopoulos/faceboo...
- ortusdux 5y agoA white LED light on the front indicates that a picture or recording is in progress. I am generally weary of government regulation, but, depending on the implementation, I might be onboard with a law that requires cameras and microphones to have a power indicator. Specifically, the LED should be hard-wired into the main power wire going into the camera/mic, so that it will activate any time those sensors are receiving electricity.
- Daniel_sk 5y agoYou can then just paint over the LED...
- gregmac 5y ago> I might be onboard with a law that requires cameras and microphones to have a power indicator. Specifically, the LED should be hard-wired into the main power wire going into the camera/mic, so that it will activate any time those sensors are receiving electricity. Such a law should be equally applied to police body cameras.
- gunapologist99 5y agoThat would present a severe risk to officers working at night and turn them into a lit-up target.
- cwkoss 5y agoCops don't need to sneak up in cover of darkness. They are safety officers not special ops
- gunapologist99 5y agoMost crime occurs at night. Cops frequently have to chase suspects into dark areas. Being lit up will both help suspects get away easier and massively increase the risk that the suspects will be able to easily shoot their pursuers.
- 5y ago
- cs702 5y agoIf you think addiction to social-media via round-the-clock mobile-phone use is a serious problem today, wait until you see what addiction will be like via always-on glasses. A new kind of always-on addictive-social-porn-on-steroids industry is likely to emerge on this technology. I'm not sure these glasses are a Good Thing™ for humanity.
- bserge 5y agoMy retirement plan is to kill myself, failing that, a piece of land far from everything and everyone where I would do substinence living and a lot of cannabis consumption. I'd only need around $50k-100k, so it looks doable.
- ortusdux 5y agoStandups have a strong incentive to keep their routines off youtube, so comedy venues use products like Yonder to secure phones at the door. Imagine needing to relinquish your prescription lenses because they have cameras built into them. https://www.overyondr.com/howitworks https://www.overyondr.com/howitworks
- dclaw 5y agoDeath to facebook. No one really wants crap like this, and facebook needs to die like myspace.
- banana_giraffe 5y agoTwo cameras, separated by a good distance, and no mention of any stereo image capability. I'm actually surprised. Just looking at the glasses, I'd expect some sort of "make 3d cameras popular" attempt to help create 3d content.
- asadlionpk 5y agoThere is a 3d feature, inside the app. I am guessing it exports as 3d post on fb (already a feature that uses iPhone's portrait photo to get depth data)
- throwaway2016a 5y agoI had a pair of Google Glasses when they first came out in beta. Looking at the HUD was a bit of a strain but these look like they don't even have a HUD. Plus the privacy concerns and the "glasshole" nickname. I see that there is an activity indicator LED (just like there was with Google Glass) but even the article admits there will likely be nonconsensual candid photo taking. Which raises the question: Did things really change that much about how people perceive privacy since 2013 that now no one cares? I'm happy with with smart watches at this point. I'm not convinced smart devises were meant to be attached to our head.
- HWR_14 5y ago> Did things really change that much about how people perceive privacy since 2013 that now no one cares? My guess is that is a mixture of glassholes from back then are willing to try again and younger people who would have been glassholes back then never got a chance and so are trying again. The societal expectations probably haven't changed, although the loudness of the different voices in society may have. I almost expect more pushback now, given the increased awareness of privacy invasion and the greater trust Google enjoie(s/d) vs Facebook
- fossuser 5y agoI take this as work towards the next platform/UX of AR enabled glasses. These look a lot better than previous attempts and embed the hardware pretty well so that's cool to see. Absent the actual AR part though I don't think there's much here that's an improvement on previous failed attempts (with a big exception for improved hardware integration/design which does matter a lot). I don't personally find the camera/video recording stuff compelling (but I'm also not the target audience) and there's still the negative privacy/social element of it. That's been talked to death so nothing interesting to discuss there imo. I think Apple's focus on airpods/lidar and waiting on glasses with cameras until they have the actual UX/AR working in hardware probably makes sense, but FB always has a bias to shipping and testing new stuff early.
- nine_k 5y agoWhen you do, say, extreme sports, you can attach your GoPro to your helmet, and produce an almost your-point-of-view reporting. But this is unpractical in less extreme situations. I can imagine that various video lessons can benefit from a camera positioned right at your eyes; there are several other offers for that on the market. OTOH reporting in a social situations, like a birthday party, can benefit even more, because you don't have to carry the camera around, keep it pointed, etc, you can participate and sometimes make shots, or shoot video. As an aside: an ideal reporting camera would have a button like "save the shots from 10 seconds ago to now", and "start video recording 10 seconds ago". This hardware likely lacks the battery capacity for such a mode, though.
- darepublic 5y agoI would like something like this to try to realtime predict events of one sort or another by taking in video and performing analysis on the phone
- humaniania 5y agoRay-Ban is Luxottica and they have done a lot of not great stuff: https://www.forbes.com/sites/anaswanson/2014/09/10/meet-the-four-eyed-eight-tentacled-monopoly-that-is-making-your-glasses-so-expensive/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/anaswanson/2014/09/10/meet-the-...
- camillomiller 5y agoYeah this is basically like Exxon partnering with Nestlè
- lunatuna 5y agoWhen Clearly Contacts was bought out by Luxottica it was described to me as the Mafia coming in. Clearly Contacts had gotten too big to ignore and it was starting to impact their bottom line. Yes was the only answer, how much was negotiable. Rayban integrating with Facebook looks like the Mafia and Triads joining forces.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Tenoke 5y agoTo be fair at least this is the first time where the pricetag on Luxoticca glasses makes sense.
- VRay 5y agoyeah, except that I'm seeing similar devices on AliExpress for $10 to $50
- VRay 5y agoIt's pretty wild People look at me like a madman when I try to explain that you can buy good-quality glasses for $7 online + $6 shipping (or ~$40 with all the coatings and fancy upgrades you could ever want) I just buy a sack of glasses every couple of years and then treat them with absolutely no respect whatsoever. My toddler loves to rip the glasses off my face and chew on them or use them as a club to beat on random objects around the house.. This is not a problem for me. I popped the lenses out of a $7 pair of glasses and strapped them into my VR headset. When I find an old scuffed-up pair of glasses, I just throw them in the trash. I wonder how many other parts of our society are a blatant scam without me knowing about it.. I know that the way people study English in Japan and Korea is a giant scam where they basically learn nothing, but I could only recognize that thanks to my outside perspective
- annadane 5y agoPutting aside the whole "Facebook has something to do with this so I will dismiss it out of hand because blah blah blah evil company" I don't really see the point in smart glasses, though yeah I'm sure it has some uses
- durnygbur 5y agoThe glasses of the future with camera(s) and needing frequent recharging... yay!
- mkr-hn 5y agoEverybody's talking about DSLR vs mirrorless cameras when the real topic was Black Mirror cameras.
- fassssst 5y agoThe best part of these is the Bluetooth speakers and Bose Frames do that without the creepy cameras. It’s really nice to go running without earbuds.
- neogodless 5y agoSibling dicussion (apnews.com) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28471302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28471302
- vmoore 5y agoQueue the Ray-Ban smartglasses spam links in my Facebook feed.
- jldl805 5y agoYou have ads in your facebook feed? Weird, I'd assume someone who posts on HN and has an opinion on this would also know how to shut that down.
- haliskerbas 5y agoI presume what the parent poster is referring to isn’t ads but spam images posted by people whose accounts have been compromised. They promise huge discounts on ray ban sun glasses. I still haven’t gotten my pair of $20 wayfarers!
- novok 5y agoMy guess, it will be as popular as Snap's Spectacles after the hype died down. Not at all basically.
- sydthrowaway 5y agoSnap is still hiring embedded engineers.. what the hell for
- NoGravitas 5y agoI thought we firmly kicked this idea to the kerb the last time they tried to push it on us.
- calebm 5y agoFacebook wants more eyes.
- type0 5y agoWill these glasses be sold in Five-eyes states or will it also be distribuited to Nine-eyes and Fourteen-Eyes states?
- d--b 5y agoThis feels like Holy Motors. Wearing these will inevitably change the way the bearer or the person pointed at will behave. They'll start being actors in their actual lives. Weird blending of life and film...
- SyzygistSix 5y agoThanks for mentioning the film. Never heard of it. Looks like a winner.
- darod 5y agoI"m curious as to how these will be received at U.S. ports of entry considering U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s policy and practice of prohibiting the use of cameras and video recorders. Will they take people's prescription glasses away?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- dafoex 5y agoHonestly, it sounds a lot like Google Glass but with none of the actually useful stuff like heads up navigation, AR translation, heads up documentation, etc. But given how everyone seems to have forgotten about privacy and invited always on microphones into their homes, maybe this won't hit the same brick wall Google did in 2012?
- standardUser 5y agoVideo recording is already ubiquitous since everyone carries a camera. Glasses just make it slightly less obvious.
- Duralias 5y agoOr everyone more aware that anyone with these glasses could be recording you at any time. I can already tell that this will be popular with creeps.
- SyzygistSix 5y agoDestigmatizing creeps by turning everyone into one seems to be Zuckerberg's overall goal.
- lunatuna 5y agoA bit childish, but this seems like it was built with PoV porn as the primary use case. Saves a hand. Likely good for creeps too. I can't figure out who else would be using it. Good way to lose friends and make enemies. I wouldn't be hanging out with anyone with them on. Would stay away from any strangers with them on.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- standardUser 5y ago"I wouldn't be hanging out with anyone with them on. Would stay away from any strangers with them on." I imagine a lot of people will choose to only cavort with people who have hidden audio recording devices, as opposed to visible video recording devices. At least until we all get used to this in 2-4 years.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Johnny555 5y agoPOV porn seems like a pretty niche market for a mainstream company to target when they couldn't even host most of the content produced from this use. And why buy a $299 device when you could just buy a $5 headband mount for a phone or GoPro?
- bin_bash 5y agoParents (myself included) love taking videos of their kids and often have their hands full when outside. There's a lot more parents out there than amateur pornographers. At least I hope so.
- nly 5y ago>There's a lot more parents out there than amateur pornographers. At least I hope There is a huge overlap :P
- modriano 5y ago
- madrox 5y agoI’ll never forget the time I wore google glass to a bar in Palo Alto and a very annoyed bartender told me to take them off. I wasn’t even using them for video or picture taking, which I wanted to explain but he had no patience for. Maybe attitudes have changed but I can’t imagine it going much better.
- motohagiography 5y agoThe world just wasn't ready for glassholes. I remember those and thinking how alien someone's socialization would need to be to consider recording in strange peoples faces to be appropriate, but now that we are just getting comfortable with totalitarianism, they can do their part and keep society safe from people with personal boundaries. Nobody is ever recorded in public to exonerate them. The idea someone could have an objection to carrying firearms as public aggression but not see how recording people is effectively brandishing with an implied threat is going to be one of those things we will look back and laugh at.
- madrox 5y agoTell that to everyone who saw the George Floyd video. I watched an excellent interview with Khary Payton where my ideas on surveillance really changed. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GnZ1HCRqdB4 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GnZ1HCRqdB4 I think socially there’s a difference at play between recording in general and headwear for it, specifically.
- 10x-dev 5y agoI personally separate things into different categories. Weapons that can be used to kill me are in a different category from dogs that can bite me, from phones that can take pictures of me and from glasses that can film me. People will attempt to blur the lines between adjacent categories to argue their point, but you're going from the first straight to the last, skipping over everything in the middle. That's what I call 'a stretch'.
- motohagiography 5y ago
- mdoms 5y agoIf some Silicon Valley turd came anywhere near me wearing these things he would be asked - very politely, but only once - to take them off.
- coolspot 5y agoThen what? You pickup a felony battery and/or assault charge?
- type0 5y agothen the battery in the glasses would explode
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- mdoms 5y agoIf he refused to remove his surveillance equipment, yes. Absolutely.
- ByersReason 5y agoYou mean this. Which already happened: https://techcrunch.com/2012/07/16/augmented-reality-explorer-steve-mann-assaulted-at-parisian-mcdonalds/ https://techcrunch.com/2012/07/16/augmented-reality-explorer...
- SyzygistSix 5y agoIf you hit them from behind, your crime is recorded on the hidden cameras that are everywhere.
- fortran77 5y agoOooh! These HN nerds are so tough … when they’re typing anonymously on their keyboards.
- literallyaduck 5y agoIf you don't like them get your local government to pass a law. These are a great opportunity for creeps and perverts and we should ban the devices from the community .
- idworks1 5y agoI was thinking about this recently when I took an Asus laptop apart. You can get a 720p camera and microphone for $5.00 [1] It weighs nothing, cost nothing. I just have to figure out how to plug it into a raspberry pi for an augmented car experience. (right not using my bulky laptop) I've trained a small model with my voice to respond to basic commands. No need to go through a Facebook server or any cloud server for that matter. Tech can be a lot of fun when you get your hands dirty and ignore FAANGs. [1]: https://www.ifixit.com/Store/PC-Laptop/Asus-G75VW-DS73-3D-Camera-Board/IF335-051 https://www.ifixit.com/Store/PC-Laptop/Asus-G75VW-DS73-3D-Ca...
- doc_gunthrop 5y agoWidespread adoption of these kind of products are a precursor to a big-brother dystopia. Given FB's reputation (and raison d'être), it's plausible that these devices will become tools for purposes such as crowd-sourced sousveillance.
- awkward 5y agoGoogle glass had this air of inevitability about it. The glasses were hyped to be the the next iphone. Not only that, but tech was going to create iphone-level product categories every 3-6 years. Then it completely fell flat. It just didn't cross the divide from enthusiasts to the wider culture at all. The term glasshole was invented. We all saw scoble in the shower. It might be that the culture's moved enough over the last decade that smart glasses will be a thing, as more people see social media success as aspirational. AR and VR give a value prop that wasn't there. Still, it seems like there's a big gap between the enthusiast market and the mainstream, and this release doesn't do much for that.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- baby 5y agoGoogle never gave an explanation as to why google glass was killed btw
- type0 5y agothe title should be: "Facebook, Ray-Ban debut picture-spying smart glasses"
- tyrfing 5y agoInteresting to note that Facebook advertises on Axios (see any recent copy of Axios AM) and that fact isn't disclosed despite an editorial policy stating "If a story involves an investor, board member or business partner, we disclose the relationship in the story or on the bottom of the story."
- snuser 5y agoWe really need laws banning devices like this before they become common place, Illinois at least has some laws regarding facial recognition it's probably a good starting point
- beezischillin 5y agoMaybe I’m old or have the mentality of an older person, I don’t know… but this seems very deeply unappealing to me, even though I have looked at bluetooth-enabled sunglasses before with potential interest. My subjective take-away is that Facebook’s hardware release attempts are always tainted by the company’s previous behavior (rightfully so) and they just come off as pretty uncool regardless of the marketing angle even when they partner with insert brand name here. Oculus stands alone in that they offer a product that’s good enough to get some people to ignore that and all the potential future Facebook-initiated awfulness that will inevitably come down the pipeline. Even then I’d happily buy a Facebook-less Oculus device, though I understand that the financial realities of VR R&D kinda necessitate having them there.
- woodpanel 5y agoFor a moment: Let's step aside from the glaring immorality of Ray-Ban (aka Luxottica SpA) and Facebook. And instead ask: Is there a reason to not immediately "defend yourself" against any person who is looking at you with a pair of these? (Physically or not)
- SyzygistSix 5y agoI don't have a problem with people wearing these glasses as long as I'm allowed to wear full body armor and carry a disruptor beam.
- jensensbutton 5y ago> Is there a reason to not immediately "defend yourself" against any person who is looking at you with a pair of these? Yes. You would be guilty of assault and potentially end up in prison. You would not be in the "right" in this scenario.
- snuser 5y agoif enforced, wouldn't surprise me of flashmob style groups of protestors got together often and started doing it
- arnaudsm 5y agoThe reveal trailer is so dishonest, it shows environment-mapping AR features, while the glasses don't even have a display. Please calm down the creative department.
- ourcat 5y agoLike they eventually did with thhe Oculus Quest, are these going to need a Facebook account to get any use from them?
- bitL 5y agoWith 2 cameras they should at least record VR 180, otherwise they don't provide much value compared to cheap Chinese "spy glasses" for $30 from eBay and they look basically the same.
- ByersReason 5y agoMore broadly that the worry about the device being locked IMO is the issue of consent. I, personally, don't consent to being filmed by what amounts to facebook in a public space and then especially not to having that data being input to a ML system and analyzed. I understand that the way the law works now, if I am in a public space, I can be filmed. But that law was not written when this particular problem - ie persistently capture everything which is going on in the real world, and store it forever, with analysis, was in view. Panopticon.
- okareaman 5y agoWe'll need to reconcile the need for a disguising mask for privacy with anti-mask laws here in the US No Face Halloween Mirror Mask / Anonymous Disguise https://www.thegreenhead.com/2014/10/no-face-halloween-mirror-mask-anonymous-disguise.php https://www.thegreenhead.com/2014/10/no-face-halloween-mirro... Anti-Mask Laws https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1169/anti-mask-laws https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1169/anti-mask-...
- emodendroket 5y agoI hate to be an old stick in the mud but that sounds like a solution in search of a problem.
- sillypuddy 5y agoCreepy
- xnx 5y agoIs there an explanation somewhere of why there are two cameras? Different focal lengths? 3d photos? Bracketing for HDR?
- modriano 5y agoI hate this. If people are recording me, I want the cameras to be obvious. I don't want them to just look like Ray-Bans. If they have to exist, I want them to look ridiculous, like Google Glass did. And I absolutely don't want Facebook to have more portals into more of society. Also, based on every choice Facebook has ever made, any claim that FB makes implying or asserting they can't access video/image/general camera data is not credible. I really hope FB doesn't make a dominant product. I'm excited about the possibilities afforded by a mature AR platform, but the idea of giving FB the ability to see through my eyes is so viscerally repulsive that no product could be amazing enough to offset that.