Glass worth toasting: It’s groundbreaking
Google’s ‘ moonshot’ project draws stares, even in New York
The reason we are talking about wearables is because we are not at implantables yet. RODRIGO MARTINEZ LIFE SCIENCES CHIEF STRATEGIST WITH DESIGN FIRM IDEO
NEW YORK — Shaped like a lopsided headband, Google Glass is an unassuming piece of technology when you’re holding it in your hands. You feel as if you can almost break it, testing its flexibility.
Putting it on, though, is another story.
Once you do, this Internet- connected eyewear takes on a life of its own. You become “The Person Wearing Google Glass” and all the assumptions that brings with it — about your wealth, boorishness or curiosity.
Such is the fate of early adopters of new technologies, whether it’s the Sony Walkman, the first iPod with its conspicuous white earbuds, or the Segway scooter. Google calls the people who wear Glass “explorers,” because the device is not yet available to the public.
Priced at $ 1,500 US, the device is far from having mass appeal. At the South By Southwest Interactive tech jamboree in Austin, Texas last week, I counted fewer than a dozen people wearing it, including technology blogger Robert Scoble, who isn’t shy about posting pictures of himself in the shower, red- faced, water running, wearing the device.
Google, like most successful technology companies, dreamers and inventors, likes to take a long view on things. It calls some of its most outlandish projects “moonshots.” Besides Glass, these include its driverless car, balloons that deliver Internet service to remote parts of the world and contact lenses that monitor glucose levels in diabetics.
There’s an inherent risk in moonshots, however: What if you never reach the moon?
Ten years from now, we may look back at Google Glass as one of those short- lived bridges that takes us from one technological breakthrough to the next, just as pagers, MP3 players and personal digital assistants paved the way for the era of the smartphone. Fitness bands, too, may fit into this category.
In its current, early version, Google Glass feels bulky on my face and when I look in the mirror I see a futuristic telemarketer looking back at me. Wearing it on the subway while a homeless man shuffled through the car begging for change made me feel as if I was sporting a diamond tiara. I sank lower in my seat as he passed.
If Google is aiming for mass appeal, the next versions of Glass have to be much smaller and less conspicuous.
Though no one knows for sure where wearable devices will lead us, Rodrigo Martinez, life sciences chief strategist at the Silicon Valley design firm IDEO, has some ideas.
“The reason we are talking about wearables is because we are not at implantables yet,” he says. “( But) I’m ready. Others are ready.”
Never mind implants, I’m not sure I’m even ready for Google Glass.
Specs in place for the first time, I walked out of Google’s Manhattan showroom on a recent Friday afternoon with a sense of unease. A wave of questions washed over me. Why is everyone looking at me? Should I be looking at them? Should I have chosen the orange Glass instead of charcoal?
Google Glass lets you do many of the things we now do with our smartphones, such as taking photos, reading news headlines or talking to our mothers on Sunday evenings — hands- free. But it comes with a bit of baggage.
Glass feels heavier when I’m out in public or in a group where I’m the only person wearing it. If I think about it long enough my face starts burning from embarrassment. A friend called the device “the scarlet letter of technology.” The most frequent response I get from my husband when I try to slip Glass on in his presence is “please take that off.”
Instead of looking at the world through a new lens on a crowded rush- hour sidewalk, I felt as if the whole world was looking at me. That’s no small feat in New York, where even celebrities are afforded a sense of privacy.
But that’s just one side of wearing Google Glass.
The other side is exhilarating. Glass is getting some bad press lately. Some bars and coffee shops in Silicon Valley and Seattle have banned it, for example, and federal authorities in Ohio interrogated a man earlier this year after he was suspected of recording a movie with the device.
But the truth is, it’s a groundbreaking device, even if it doesn’t take off.
I strolled around for a few hours with the cyborg glasses, happily snapping photos. With a mere wink, I captured snowy streetscapes and my reflection in the grimy subway- car windows.
There were some whispers. (“Did you see? Google Glass!”) There were some comments as I squeezed into the subway with commuters.
For more human interaction, I walked into a small macaroon shop to buy a friend some birthday sweets. Alone but for the store clerks, I fumbled to take them off, find a place to put them on the small counter and get my wallet out of my bag.
“Sorry. You’re the first people I’m interacting with wearing these. I don’t mean to be a jerk,” I told the man and woman at the counter.
It was fine. The woman thought Glass was cool. The man, he might not have, but he didn’t say anything.