I'm actually somewhat interested to see something like this hit mainstream. Like smartphone-levels of mainstream. Because one of the first apps for it will likely be one that looks at people's faces and immediately digs up everything about them available online. There's already been videos of it working with older tech, so I'm sure it'll work even better now with newer hardware and AI.
Anyway, once it goes mainstream and people see what we've done to ourselves, maybe it will open people's eyes and we'll start fighting for our privacy again.
I'm reminded of the "Gargoyles" in Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. These are people with wearable computers that are plugged into the VR/AR internet at all times. The relevant passage...
"Gargoyles are no fun to talk to. They never finish a sentence. They are adrift in a laser-drawn world, scanning retinas in all directions, doing background checks on everyone within a thousand yards, seeing everything in visual light, infrared, millimeter wave radar, and ultrasound all at once. You think they're talking to you, but they're actually poring over the credit record of some stranger on the other side of the room, or identifying the make and model of airplanes flying overhead. For all he knows, Lagos is standing there measuring the length of Hiro's cock through his trousers while they pretend to make conversation."
Alternatively, the good version of that is AI giving knowledge on anything that exists naturally or artificially that we look at. To flourish we just need a distinction between general knowledge and individualized personal knowledge.
I remain convinced that AR glasses will never ever be mainstream no matter how good the hardware is. They just don't solve any actual problem. Interacting with UI using voice or gesture is just way too hard.
As someone who's been avidly following and sampling VR/AR since the 90s, in recent years I've changed my opinion. While I'm not certain about it, I do now think it probably never goes into widespread all-day consumer use. Although, I do think certain gaming, entertainment and workplace use cases will become much more common.
They don't let you record phone calls (at least in my country, call recording is blocked), but they'll let people look up other people etc?
I guess as long as the data is shared with three letter agencies and data mills, then why not.
With phone calls that would be tricky, so at least they disabled it to protect scammers.
When that feature did work, I was able to get money back from insurer as their sales person misrepresented the policy I paid for. I had it recorded and they had to pay up.
With call recording no longer available, I don't do any calls if I don't have a tablet with me to record it.
> Anyway, once it goes mainstream and people see what we've done to ourselves, maybe it will open people's eyes and we'll start fighting for our privacy again.
The Meta Ray-Bans have been extremely successful for a completely new consumer device form factor. But they don't have a screen. Meta is releasing new glasses with a screen and this is a look into the display technology they are using. It is "newsworthy" for tech people who are interested in the development of new technology in displays and optics, and new computing devices more generally.
This is the kind of content HN was made for, much more so than the Israel/Gaza or Bertrand Russell stories I see on the front page right now for example.
> The Meta Ray-Bans have been extremely successful for a completely new consumer device form factor.
Do you have any sources on them being a successful product by any measurable standard? I honestly wasn't aware that they were even being sold, and I'm sure I don't know anyone that owns a pair. I'm not exactly their target market, but I think at least some in my social circle are.
Periodic reminder to flag submissions that are off-topic, and comments that break the guidelines. HN is mostly moderated by users - dang and tomhow don't do as much moderation as you might think.
Units sold isn't really the metric I would look to either after seeing how their VR initiative played out. They sold tens of millions of Quests, the problem is their user retention was abysmal. Will people actually use their AR glasses?
New? “wearable camera with headphones” is not exactly groundbreaking.
Even a new model with a screen would only be semi-new, other AR glasses have existed for over a decade - with Apple releasing a consumer-focused product last year.
Folks have been predicting that the next big shift in computing will be onto glasses that we wear and away from our phones.
The tech just hasn’t been there yet and most of the devices that do this are heavy clunky and hot
Meta is investing billions to get out ahead of this shift and to own the entertainment and data (and thus advertising) layers that sit on top of the real world through these glasses
The rumor mill is abuzz that Facebook finally making a play for it in the next set of smart glasses after a few years of sticking to VR headsets and audio/camera only glasses
They're also called smartwatches, when most of them are pretty useless without a phone. Even if they offload everything to the phone, they're still much "smarter" than normal glasses, which just sit there doing nothing but correcting vision.
The "old man yelling at the sky" part of me can only hope the side effects of something like this gaining traction might be that physical-world advertisements fade away.
My understanding is that this specific type of lens projection technology hasn't been available at the consumer level before, and is a step up from previous AR approaches.
Noteworthy because it's an interesting extra technical insight about a soon to be announced Meta product, if that's your kind of thing
The site’s “about us” page appears to be lorem ipsum, so
I guess it is probably just somebody’s blog. Showing up there doesn’t make it necessarily newsworthy I guess.
Lumus is just a company. So “Lumus waveguide” doesn’t seem to tell us much other than the supplier.
I'm actually somewhat interested to see something like this hit mainstream. Like smartphone-levels of mainstream. Because one of the first apps for it will likely be one that looks at people's faces and immediately digs up everything about them available online. There's already been videos of it working with older tech, so I'm sure it'll work even better now with newer hardware and AI.
Anyway, once it goes mainstream and people see what we've done to ourselves, maybe it will open people's eyes and we'll start fighting for our privacy again.
I'm reminded of the "Gargoyles" in Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. These are people with wearable computers that are plugged into the VR/AR internet at all times. The relevant passage...
"Gargoyles are no fun to talk to. They never finish a sentence. They are adrift in a laser-drawn world, scanning retinas in all directions, doing background checks on everyone within a thousand yards, seeing everything in visual light, infrared, millimeter wave radar, and ultrasound all at once. You think they're talking to you, but they're actually poring over the credit record of some stranger on the other side of the room, or identifying the make and model of airplanes flying overhead. For all he knows, Lagos is standing there measuring the length of Hiro's cock through his trousers while they pretend to make conversation."
Alternatively, the good version of that is AI giving knowledge on anything that exists naturally or artificially that we look at. To flourish we just need a distinction between general knowledge and individualized personal knowledge.
I remain convinced that AR glasses will never ever be mainstream no matter how good the hardware is. They just don't solve any actual problem. Interacting with UI using voice or gesture is just way too hard.
As someone who's been avidly following and sampling VR/AR since the 90s, in recent years I've changed my opinion. While I'm not certain about it, I do now think it probably never goes into widespread all-day consumer use. Although, I do think certain gaming, entertainment and workplace use cases will become much more common.
oh i think we will see voice becoming a much more popular interface in the very near future, now that it’s actually getting very good
They don't let you record phone calls (at least in my country, call recording is blocked), but they'll let people look up other people etc?
I guess as long as the data is shared with three letter agencies and data mills, then why not.
With phone calls that would be tricky, so at least they disabled it to protect scammers.
When that feature did work, I was able to get money back from insurer as their sales person misrepresented the policy I paid for. I had it recorded and they had to pay up.
With call recording no longer available, I don't do any calls if I don't have a tablet with me to record it.
> Anyway, once it goes mainstream and people see what we've done to ourselves, maybe it will open people's eyes and we'll start fighting for our privacy again.
lol
Seems like a rehash of Adrian Travis's Wedge display idea https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/wp-content/uploads/...
Nice hardware. What a shame that any product that runs a Meta platform is completely dead to me.
My thoughts exactly, looks nice, waiting for a non-Meta company to move into this space so I can try it out.
Thirded
Since the article didn't seem to mention... can someone explain why this is newsworthy? My smoothbrained self just doesn't get it.
The Meta Ray-Bans have been extremely successful for a completely new consumer device form factor. But they don't have a screen. Meta is releasing new glasses with a screen and this is a look into the display technology they are using. It is "newsworthy" for tech people who are interested in the development of new technology in displays and optics, and new computing devices more generally.
This is the kind of content HN was made for, much more so than the Israel/Gaza or Bertrand Russell stories I see on the front page right now for example.
> The Meta Ray-Bans have been extremely successful for a completely new consumer device form factor.
Do you have any sources on them being a successful product by any measurable standard? I honestly wasn't aware that they were even being sold, and I'm sure I don't know anyone that owns a pair. I'm not exactly their target market, but I think at least some in my social circle are.
My friend in England has a pair. They’re selling extremely well
My mate Paul says they're not.
Periodic reminder to flag submissions that are off-topic, and comments that break the guidelines. HN is mostly moderated by users - dang and tomhow don't do as much moderation as you might think.
2 million sold in three years is hardly ‘extremely successful’.
Compare it to devices with similar form factors or use cases sold by competitors:
- Snapchat - has been trying for a decade and has sold ~220K Spectacles.
- Amazon Echo Frames - Reuters estimated less than 10,000 units sold.
- Humane AI Pin - the less said about it the better.
- Google Glass - neat but way ahead of its time, and barely made it to consumers before being quickly discontinued.
- Hololens/Magic Leap - both duds.
- Lengthy list of startups with smart glasses and other wearables that have gained no traction.
Meta glasses are noteworthy because there's finally a company making an AR wearable catch on among a mainstream audience.
Units sold isn't really the metric I would look to either after seeing how their VR initiative played out. They sold tens of millions of Quests, the problem is their user retention was abysmal. Will people actually use their AR glasses?
https://www.roadtovr.com/quest-sales-20-million-retention-st...
It is "for a completely new consumer device form factor"
New? “wearable camera with headphones” is not exactly groundbreaking.
Even a new model with a screen would only be semi-new, other AR glasses have existed for over a decade - with Apple releasing a consumer-focused product last year.
[dead]
Folks have been predicting that the next big shift in computing will be onto glasses that we wear and away from our phones.
The tech just hasn’t been there yet and most of the devices that do this are heavy clunky and hot
Meta is investing billions to get out ahead of this shift and to own the entertainment and data (and thus advertising) layers that sit on top of the real world through these glasses
The rumor mill is abuzz that Facebook finally making a play for it in the next set of smart glasses after a few years of sticking to VR headsets and audio/camera only glasses
Why do they call the smart glasses when they just send everything to the smart phone? Nothing is done on device.
They're also called smartwatches, when most of them are pretty useless without a phone. Even if they offload everything to the phone, they're still much "smarter" than normal glasses, which just sit there doing nothing but correcting vision.
You know, I never thought of this until I took my phone into a repair shop. I was just like “give me a call, I have my watch.”
Two seconds after I walked out … I was like, “oh, that’s not going to work…” so I just sat around for an hour.
It's a marketing term not a technical term
Facebook is trying so very hard to be Innovative Online Industries.
"I get that reference."
And that's the whole book
No deep insights there, but it was a beautiful romp while it lasted :)
The "old man yelling at the sky" part of me can only hope the side effects of something like this gaining traction might be that physical-world advertisements fade away.
I'd love ad-blokcer in my glasses. Replace every billboard I see with fine art.
Or dad jokes.
My understanding is that this specific type of lens projection technology hasn't been available at the consumer level before, and is a step up from previous AR approaches.
Noteworthy because it's an interesting extra technical insight about a soon to be announced Meta product, if that's your kind of thing
The site’s “about us” page appears to be lorem ipsum, so I guess it is probably just somebody’s blog. Showing up there doesn’t make it necessarily newsworthy I guess.
Lumus is just a company. So “Lumus waveguide” doesn’t seem to tell us much other than the supplier.
Karl Guttag has published far more information than you ever wanted to know about Lumus in the past, e.g. https://kguttag.com/2021/05/24/exclusive-lumus-maximus-2k-x-...