Travels

Also known as Project Glass, Google Glasses are Google’s dive into a genre of technology known as augmented reality. For those of you who aren’t familiar with that idea, augmented reality is a term that essentially denotes that technology and the real world can exist side-by-side, providing you with a real-time view of the world that is “augmented” by technological information. I have a more in-depth outline of augmented reality listed on this post. 

*Now before I take off in what I'm about to write down, I'd like to throw a small disclaimer out there: I am about to write about the impact of augmented reality in recent years, and it may sound like I am putting my faith in Google Glass, and leaving out some other important contenders. I know there have been some other serious undertakings aside from Google Glass, such as EyeTap - Don't get me wrong; I'm aware of those. However, technological impact is measured by how many people have access to it just as much as the power of the equipment, at least when dealing with consumer electronics. Therefore, I'm leaving those endeavors out of this particular blog as they're simply not well known enough.  We're talking about the future here, and in my opinion, those other attempts at perfecting this technology do not represent the future, but rather the past, which will be built upon going forward.

The first real notable accounts of this kind of technology came in the form of smartphone apps that utilize the camera of the smartphone as a view screen on which to overlay the augmentations onto the real world. Some notable apps will place twitter posts from friends over top of their location (so, if you point at the last place that a friend checked in with your camera, that check in will appear as a bubble of text “floating” over the building), augment your driving experience by highlighting fast-braking cars or lane-changes, or even overlay Wikipedia facts onto historical landmarks.

This sounds like awesome technology, doesn’t it? Well, it is. However, in its current state, the technology is very clunky.
I am a firm believer in the “practicality breeds growth” model for electronic development – in other words, I believe that new technology will not catch on in today’s market if it cannot perform the existing, tedious everyday technological tasks better than the previous methods. Computers replaced books for searching and scratch-paper for basic mathematical calculations; smartphones replaced computers for on-the-fly information and cars replaced horses for travel. However, tablets have not been able to gain traction as a laptop replacement – why? Simple: it is not easier to type or work with them, period. Therefore, practicality dictates that the laptop will continue to be favored by corporations and people who require efficiency and power, simply because it fits the bill more appropriately for those requirements.



My point in all this is, if you can already Google something, why both going the extra mile to use an augmented reality app, point your camera at the place you were going to "Google" and hold it up, just to get the information you could get on Wikipedia anyway?


In steps Google Glasses.


Google Glasses aims to implement a small computer system into your glasses that will allow you to augment reality on the fly. This means you will be able to take pictures, get directions, text message and even check the weather without ever pulling out your phone. As of right now, there have even been rumors of text to speech technology integrated (for translation, or for the hearing impaired), a video camera, and even the ability to update Facebook or Google+ right from the minimalist-style view screen in the glasses.  Everything that you do will be right in your eye, augmenting the reality you already live in. If you want to take a look at exactly what it might look like wearing the glasses, check out the concept video.

This brings the augmented reality technology out of the “novelty” category, and right into the realm of practicality. The best part about that is, when novelty, sci-fi-esque technology suddenly becomes practical, people eat it up. So, if you ask me, this technology could be huge if done correctly.

Google Glasses were announced early last year by way of the concept video that is linked above. Since then, a lot has developed, and several pictures of high-profile Google employees have been captured, doing nothing but adding to the hype. Additionally, “Project Glass” has a Google+ page, on which they have been posting photos that were actually taken with the prototype of the glasses. The technology itself has been rumored to be out sometime next year, thanks to an interview with Sergey Brin (a Google co-founder) who was wearing the glasses in an interview and speculated a rough completion date of “sometime next year”.

If they make it out by then, I’ll be very curious to see how it turns out. If it can do even half of what the prototype video shows, then they will be extremely an extremely useful piece of tech. I’m wary, though – Google has announced that not all of the features shown in the concept video will be available. They have seemingly confirmed the mapping, at least, and we all know it can take pictures. However, if the 1^st version is under-released with a lack of features to speed up the release date, the Glasses could flop in a very bad way. A piece of technology with this much needs to live up to it. This is how Apple succeeds, and Google will need to do the same thing. Not only do the glasses themselves come with hype, but the new technology does as well. High hopes need to equal high yield.

Tell me what you think. Email me, hit my Google+ profile, or what-have-you, but I would love to get some other perspectives. My personal opinion - I'm planning on buying a pair.

On a more technical side note: for those people who are more technologically inclined: Google Glasses are supposedly android based, and also supposedly operated via a small trackpad on the primary housing. This contradicts the original rumor that the glasses will be controlled with eye movement, and may pose to be somewhat cumbersome for picture taking and OS navigation, but only a real test will determine that. Additionally, the viewscreen is also rumored to rest slightly above your line of sight, not totally imersing you in the effect of augmented reality. To be honest, I don't know if I like that or not.

I'll update this post as more comes to light.
Ciao,