[tyre]

Look like a great idea and technological advancement, but the biggest thing holding back Google Glass is not that it lacks feature X.

Glass will be held back because most people don't want to look like geeks. Meta's next design looks like it's from an 80's Sci-Fi movie. I'm not trying to be an asshole, but there is no way I could take someone seriously wearing those things.

[ryoshu]

Most people wouldn't want to look like a geek, typing on a handheld computer while out with friends. Yet here we are.

[majormajor]

Did texting ever had a "look like a geek" stigma? As far as I remember, cell phones have always been "cool" even back when they were super clunky like in Saved by the Bell. Pagers, too. And texting took off pretty damn fast after it was introduced, even before stuff like the Sidekick, let alone the iPhone.

[cglace]

And they didn't until apple made them sleek and sexy. It will be the same with these glasses.

[FaceKicker]

Texting was pretty mainstream popular in the US for at least 3 years before the iPhone came out...

[solistice]

Which makes me wonder why Apple is betting on the smart watch and that trashcan they started selling, ehhm, I mean the new Mac Pro.

[nlh]

My attitude is this: You're right. And this isn't really about what people look like now. This is about the first few steps in what I (and others, I assume) predict is going to be a fairly major change in the way people interact with computers.

Don't think about Google Glass / Meta as they are now, think about what happens when they fit on a contact lens...

[kayoone]

I dont think this is meant to be used 24/7. More like when you want to play a certain game/do a certain thing at home/work and for that usecase i think its ok if it doesnt look totally normal. Id rather compare it to the Oculus Rift than Google Glass in terms of looks. If its meant as a 24/7 device, i am with you, looks too geeky.

[michaelbuckbee]

I'm with you, but it's important to keep in mind that the current iteration of Google Glass is the rough equivalent of the old "mobile phones" that looked like plastic brick with a antenna sticking out of them [1] and that Meta's sure seems more like a proof of concept and tech demo than something they would put forward as polished.

These devices are going to keep getting smaller and in a few generations will be fairly indistinguishable from a pair of glasses (which many people wear now).

1 - Seriously, look at this guy: http://vni.s3.amazonaws.com/120802142609275.jpg

[infectoid]

Totally agree with you here. But my approach to this kind of tech in the next decade is to treat it like another i/o device for my computer.

Like you, I'd never really consider wearing these things in public (or more specifically, in a casual setting when socialising), but I'd definitely consider using them at work/home if I could make them do neat time-saving things that other i/o devices couldn't.

Ultimately, I'm happy to be an early adopter but for me to use them in the public context shown in the video, they'd have to be somehow integrated into something much much smaller. E.g. contact lenses (but that is seriously way off).

Between this, Google Glass and Oculus, we will hopefully see some serious progress in the VR/AR industries.

[mcintyre1994]

Completely agree, their next iteration looks better but I just don't see most people wearing them. I honestly don't think this technology is going to become ubiquitous until and if somebody manages to get past the issues of getting it onto a contact lens.

I'd even go as far as saying the current efforts might be a bad thing for that possibility, if it is even possible, since we might just end up with a patent encumbered wasteland by the time the technology's there.

[smtddr]

Ya know, I'm more or less with you and I am a Google fanboy.

The 2 things that Glass will have to overcome:

1)The not-so-fashionable look. I'm sure this'll be corrected in the future.

2) The way people feel about a device that may or may not be recording them at any given moment. Let's not even mention anything about a red light glowing during recording because we know that'll be hacked out. Google Glass will be able to record you without you knowing, period. People will simply have to accept that or the product will fail or get banned in so many places it'll almost be not worth owning at all unless you're a hardcore geek. Then of course someone does some super slick mod where Glass just looks like any ordinary pair of glasses; then mass paranoia breaks out and either people get over it or any glasses are banned. ;)

Mind you this paranoia will be happening despite the fact we've had wearable hidden HiRes cameras smaller'ish than a penny for over a decade already... http://www.brickhousesecurity.com/product/b-w+indoor+high+re...

[read]

It's almost scary to imagine there will inevitably be Glass-like contact lenses. How do you protect yourself from that?

Which makes me wish there was an anti-Glass product out there. Something that makes you disappear, or at least masked as a see-through hologram. It's perfectly acceptable if anti-Glass does not hide your feet for regulatory reasons.

People who are not comfortable being recorded might welcome invisibility as protection.

[agumonkey]

Google did quite a great job in the aesthetic department (considering the goal and size of the device) but it's still 'invasive'.

ps: It's funny how public react to obvious recording devices when they're surrounded by them.

[jrockway]

The way people feel about a device that may or may not be recording them at any given moment.

It's pretty difficult to go out in public without being recorded. Security cameras are ubiquitous.

[smtddr]

True, but people feel different about an individual they may or may not know recording them versus a security camera at the Bank. All it will take is one melodramatic FOX-News piece on TV connecting Glass to cyber-bullies or crime or some other ThinkOfTheChildren/terrorist nonsense and a bunch of people will freak out. I don't want it to happen, but I know it will and suddenly Google will have to explain how it's "Keeping our children & the public safe" or some other intangible goal.

EDIT: And look at the comment replying me below by user "read" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6189941 . If we have HN-users who already feel like they need to "protect themselves" against Glass, the general public would be whipped into a frenzy by one FOXNews report.

[jrockway]

If we have HN-users who already feel like they need to "protect themselves" against Glass, the general public would be whipped into a frenzy by one FOXNews report.

I don't think this is true. There is already "revenge porn" and upskirt shots from cell phones. Nobody has suggested banning cell phone cameras, or even complained about it in any serious way. (Remeber that law that would require camera phones to always make a noise? How did that go? http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h414/show. Out of 435 potentially paranoid Fox-News-loving representatives, he could get no other sponsor.)

I think the whole Glass camera thing is just people trying to rationalize their intrinsic dislike for the thing. (It's new. It looks like glasses. I got made fun of for wearing glasses when I was a kid. They are intrinsically weird.) You can already surreptitiously record pretty much anything that happens in public, and people upload the result to Facebook and YouTube regularly.

[hayksaakian]

On the other hand, Glass could make something like Meta MORE socially acceptable, by pioneering the concept of having strapped to your face in public.