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I can think of many professionals who would likely pay good money to have smart glasses. - Mechanics who can see under the car and identify components and pote

by rudasn 5y ago

I can think of many professionals who would likely pay good money to have smart glasses. - Mechanics who can see under the car and identify components and potential issues with those components. - Logistics handlers who can look at a package and know where it goes next, or people who scan QR and barcode codes all day - Construction workers who can measure distances, see wind speed, temperature, etc In other words, there is good use for this tech while avoiding all together any privacy concerns, as you are looking and analysing objects, not people.

asdff 5y ago
In practice can this tech even do that? according the article this is just a 5mp camera on a set of frames meant for taking pictures and stories. To do some of the stuff you mentioned (like measuring distance) you'd need lidar, since construction workers currently are starting to use lidar and this is the new standard. What something like the iphone can do today in terms of measuring is not that accurate in my experience, certainly no good for commercial construction where lasers have been a thing for decades. Smart helmet seems like a better bet since you can shove a ton of sensors in there and have the lidar spinning on top of your head.
- ghego1 5y ago
  Agreed, IMO the most likely market is vloggers
sojournerc 5y ago
If my mechanic doesn't know the components of my car, they aren't a very good mechanic, and certainly human sight and tactile access are better than some augmented reality. How would these "see" wind speed? I just don't get how it's needed to have this in front of your eyes at all times...
- disgruntledphd2 5y ago
  I talked to an acquaintance a few years back, he was working for an AR company that was using Google Glasses in manufacturing plants. It makes it much, much more efficient to ensure that people don't make mistakes. There's definitely a bunch of commercial use-cases. Personally, all I want is for these glasses to tell me the names of people who are my Facebook friends. Given the privacy concerns though, this is very unlikely to happen.
  - srg0 5y ago
    Tell the names of people... that's actually a very good use case for AR!
enricozb 5y ago
Disclaimer: I know the owner of this company. Taqtile's Manifest [0] product does something like this. There are some videos of it here [1] [2]. It's not exactly what you describe w.r.t diagnostics, but instead it's used to speed up training of mechanics/mechanic-like tasks. It uses Microsoft's hololens, so a bit bulkier than these glasses, but it's a cool look into what kinds of tools some of these jobs might have 10-20 years from now. [0]: https://taqtile.com/manifest/ https://taqtile.com/manifest/ [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1xNd_n1QyE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1xNd_n1QyE [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxoczR8-mwU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxoczR8-mwU
- rudasn 5y ago
  Yes! That's exactly what I had in mind. Very cool technology. It's like giving mechanics/diagnosticians an IDE with lining, autocomplete, dev docs, etc as opposed to coding on notepad.
srg0 5y ago
The pitch of how useful AR can be in a professional setting is always about superficial things that are usually non-problems. Car mechanics can recognize components. It's the easiest part of their trade. And doctors know how organs look like. That's not the kind of information they need. And no heart surgeon would look at getting started tutorial with a patient in front of them. Construction workers would use a proper measurement tool if they need a measurement and their decisions depend on this measurement. Another assumption about AR which is often wrong is that looking at things is the easiest solution to many problems. Yes, a cash register worker scans codes all day. No, rotating each and every box to have the code facing you and then moving the head and the upper body to center at the code is not easier than reaching the same code with a hand scanner. Hands are good at reaching things. Neck gets tired. And even a better solution might be transition to RFID, or installing multiple cameras along the belt, or promoting a self service process, none of them require to look at every code. Loooking at keyboard is not the fastest way to type. Many AR usage scenarios are like suggesting to project key labels on a keyboard through a magic HUD when there are already keyboards with labeled keys and many people using them professionally are blind typists.

by rudasn 5y ago

asdff 5y ago

In practice can this tech even do that? according the article this is just a 5mp camera on a set of frames meant for taking pictures and stories. To do some of the stuff you mentioned (like measuring distance) you'd need lidar, since construction workers currently are starting to use lidar and this is the new standard. What something like the iphone can do today in terms of measuring is not that accurate in my experience, certainly no good for commercial construction where lasers have been a thing for decades. Smart helmet seems like a better bet since you can shove a ton of sensors in there and have the lidar spinning on top of your head.

ghego1 5y ago
Agreed, IMO the most likely market is vloggers

sojournerc 5y ago

If my mechanic doesn't know the components of my car, they aren't a very good mechanic, and certainly human sight and tactile access are better than some augmented reality. How would these "see" wind speed? I just don't get how it's needed to have this in front of your eyes at all times...

disgruntledphd2 5y ago
I talked to an acquaintance a few years back, he was working for an AR company that was using Google Glasses in manufacturing plants. It makes it much, much more efficient to ensure that people don't make mistakes. There's definitely a bunch of commercial use-cases. Personally, all I want is for these glasses to tell me the names of people who are my Facebook friends. Given the privacy concerns though, this is very unlikely to happen.
- srg0 5y ago
  Tell the names of people... that's actually a very good use case for AR!

enricozb 5y ago

Disclaimer: I know the owner of this company. Taqtile's Manifest [0] product does something like this. There are some videos of it here [1] [2]. It's not exactly what you describe w.r.t diagnostics, but instead it's used to speed up training of mechanics/mechanic-like tasks. It uses Microsoft's hololens, so a bit bulkier than these glasses, but it's a cool look into what kinds of tools some of these jobs might have 10-20 years from now. [0]: https://taqtile.com/manifest/ https://taqtile.com/manifest/ [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1xNd_n1QyE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1xNd_n1QyE [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxoczR8-mwU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxoczR8-mwU

rudasn 5y ago
Yes! That's exactly what I had in mind. Very cool technology. It's like giving mechanics/diagnosticians an IDE with lining, autocomplete, dev docs, etc as opposed to coding on notepad.

srg0 5y ago

The pitch of how useful AR can be in a professional setting is always about superficial things that are usually non-problems. Car mechanics can recognize components. It's the easiest part of their trade. And doctors know how organs look like. That's not the kind of information they need. And no heart surgeon would look at getting started tutorial with a patient in front of them. Construction workers would use a proper measurement tool if they need a measurement and their decisions depend on this measurement. Another assumption about AR which is often wrong is that looking at things is the easiest solution to many problems. Yes, a cash register worker scans codes all day. No, rotating each and every box to have the code facing you and then moving the head and the upper body to center at the code is not easier than reaching the same code with a hand scanner. Hands are good at reaching things. Neck gets tired. And even a better solution might be transition to RFID, or installing multiple cameras along the belt, or promoting a self service process, none of them require to look at every code. Loooking at keyboard is not the fastest way to type. Many AR usage scenarios are like suggesting to project key labels on a keyboard through a magic HUD when there are already keyboards with labeled keys and many people using them professionally are blind typists.