But Meta is thriving with Meta Ray Bans, they have sold over 2M as of few months back. (Yes I know that number seems small compared to other devices, but for a new form factor, that seems like a great early success)
The glasses with a HUD are a different product line, latest ray bans are just camera mic and audio, but I still count them as AR because the AI voice in your ear can see what you see. I tried them for a few months and returned them, not a good enough camera to enjoy the hands free snapshots I was looking forward to, and just didn’t have a use for a q&a bot attached to my ear.
For what they are I’ll give them props for a nicely designed product, the charging case is clever and works well. I liked them for music with the Apple Watch, pretty slick combination. Maybe if I could stomach giving a llama bot access to email and calendar etc etc to have a real personal assistant it would be an attractive offering in a world that accepts being watched 24/7 by AI/billionaire overlords
> Maybe if I could stomach giving a llama bot access to email and calendar etc etc to have a real personal assistant it would be an attractive offering in a world that accepts being watched 24/7 by AI/billionaire overlords
I share this general point of view but take it further: I really want something in this direction (a quality AI assistant that can access my communications and continuously see and hear what I do) but it MUST be local and fully controlled by me. I feel like Meta is getting closest to offering what I'm looking for but I would never in a million years trust them with any of my data.
My wife has the first-gen raybans and they're great for taking photos and video clips of e.g. our kids' sporting events and concerts, where what it's replacing is a phone held up above the crowd getting in the way of the moment. But even with that I feel icky uploading those things to Meta's servers.
AR can surely be audio only. Or are you suggesting a blind person getting navigation instructions via cameras and speakers isn't augmenting their reality? If so, I violently disagree.
Meta Ray Bans and Googles Project Aura are products that I absolutely want, but absolutely don't want to buy them from either of those companies, or any company as invasive as they are.
It's long past time for enhanced privacy regulation in the North American market because these products are going to be wildly invasive as people depend on them to mediate their experience with the world. I don't know what the right answer, and I am very much aware that building products like these that don't focus on monetizing user interaction and advertising would likely mean that they are priced out for lower income users, but I hope someone smarter than me can figure it out :S
Meta Ray Bans and Googles Project Aura are products that I absolutely want, but absolutely don't want to buy them from either of those companies, or any company as invasive as they are.
This! So much this! If a product from these companies could make my life 1,000,000x better I would still be in “thanks but no thanks crowd”
