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>Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses are designed to help you look up and stay present. With a quick glance at the in-lens display, you can accomplish everyday tasks—like checking messages, previewing photos, and collaborating with visual Meta AI prompts
Can you imagine trying to talk to someone face to face, but they are giving you a blank stare as random notifications and tiktok videos are being beamed inbetween their eyeballs and you.
Meta seems like one of the few large tech companies where if the whole company vanished, the world would be purely a better place.
The Verge's video on these was mostly footage that looked like the person was staring down at the tip of their nose. It definitely didn't feel natural or like the person was looking through the glasses at the world around them.
I do think we're in for a bit of a reality check on how human attention works.
I have a HUD in my car that shows me directions, speed etc and when I'm looking at that the rest of the view out the windscreen is hardly even there to my visual perception even though I'm looking right at it. This seems to be getting largely overlooked but I feel like over time statistics are going to emerge that HUD type displays are increasing accidents rather than preventing them.
You mean a HUD projected on the windshield itself? That's not my experience with it at all; I don't have to "look at" it, when my eyes are focused on the road in front of me, the HUD is sharp enough and positioned so that I always know my speed etc. without having to actively look for it.
Your car might have settings to adjust it somehow, have you tried those?
Same. In fact it is significantly better and less distracting than having to glance at the dashboard. Owning a car with a HUD, I definitely miss it in other cars.
I recently hired a car where I had to duck under the steering wheel to check my speed!
Next time adjust steering wheel position so it doesn’t obstruct
That is sometimes hard to achieve depending on the car and your height.
To be fair, I didn't even try.
Steering Wheel?
wahhhh? is this real life.
Here in the future we use our thoughts.
Isn't it a general rule of driving (or operating any sufficiently dangerous machinery) to keep the eyes on the road, constantly reminding oneself to do so, so the attention is kept where it is needed? I mean, in theory. In practice, I see people deep in their damn phones all the time - and it's scary - but I think that's more of an attitude (social) issue than a display (technology) problem.
And, yes, surely, one needs to periodically switch attention to mirrors and instruments, and I must imagine that shorter gaze movement distance shouldn't hurt. It's the same as checking the speedometer - you don't see the road, only have a rough idea from the peripheral vision.
Although I can imagine that a HUD can be actively distracting, constantly intercepting attention, e.g., flickering.
I have one in my car and it's not distracting. It basically displays the current speed, the speed limit, the current cruise control state, the current gear (PRND), and the current navigation instruction (eg. turn left in 1.5 miles).
It doesn't display notifications or other distractions, nor is it possible to configure it to do so.
It's not flickering when viewed in person, but when filmed with a phone camera they do flicker due to how the display works.
It's a pretty good system, and allows one to keep their eyes on the road without having to look at other screens, and keeping ones eyes focused on far objects.
I think the point is that it's much easier to forget you're focusing on the speedometer instead of focusing on the road when the speedometer is physically displayed by a HUD right on the road. Especially if the speedometer keeps changing, since your eyes are naturally attracted to movement in your current field of view.
With a normal car dashboard, you're much more aware you're not seeing the road while checking your speed, and you don't actually see the speedometer moving while you're looking at the road, so it can't accidentally catch your attention.
Of course, none of this will matter in the vast majority of cases. But driving safety is all about the tail end, when you're slightly tired or when someone in front of you does something unexpected and maybe illegal, or someone jumps on the road - these are the times where accidents are avoided, and a HUD might well hurt rather than help for these cases.
My 2025 Corolla has a HUD and it doesn't flicker. it's also fairly minimal and very easy to keep in peripheral vision such that while looking at traffic and such, I can still grasp what it's saying without messing up my attention.
A HUD reduces the difference in focus distance between "looking at road" and "looking at speedometer." It matters more as you get older, because your eyes focus slower.
Yep. My new car has a digital rear view mirror. You flip a switch and the rear view mirror becomes a screen showing a feed from a camera on the back of the car. It’s nice for night time as well as when the rear window is blocked by rear seat passengers’ heads, or cargo or whatever.
But it’s uncomfortable for me because it requires my eyes to refocus from distant to close and back when I glance at it, which isn’t needed with an actual mirror. So I don’t use the feature.
Once I had a rental car (a Nissan) that only had a screen instead of a mirror. It was absolutely useless since the resolution and dynamic range were too low, and as you mentioned, you have to change your focal distance which drastically increases time/friction to check the mirror.
I found myself actually using the incidental reflection on the surface of the screen instead of the actual pixels. I can't believe this arrangement is legal.
Should have just taped a mirror over it. What a ridiculous use of technology!
Wonder why they don't optically refocus the display at a distance?
There are ways to do stuff like this.
The people working on these things likely don't use the end product.
lol, probably the bane of every industry.
I had an old mazda3 (2014) with a little pop up plastic screen HUD, and it was focused at some distance significantly greater than the distance between my head and the screen.
Like a light field display? ...
Since we are talking about car companies, it's cost-cutting, probably.
Somewhat unrelated, but this discussion made me go from "I don't see what I would need something that tells me tomatoes are tomatoes" (though realtime translation looks very useful), to kinda wanting it only to have a figher plane HUD-like display all the time (to be clear, minus all the fighting parts). Almost useless (at least the attitude and vertical speed part) but would feel kinda cool. Can see some value in having the heading all the time, and speed display to motivate myself to walk faster. (well they have directions which provides much more value than all that).
Though I don't feel comfortable having more Meta in my life.
I think there’s plenty of evidence that they’re better in jet fighters (where users are well-trained), possible also in automotive (where they have been sold for decades; see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automotive_head-up_display), but of course, it will depend on the design of the HUD and on what it displays.
Extreme example: showing random ads every ten minutes, even if the glasses c/should suspect you’re driving a car. I have my doubts as to whether Meta will make the right choices here.
Even less is needed to generate danger: I found myself checking my phone twice during a car trip because when listening to music through the USB-C to Jack dongle, it believes I am blasting music at full volume through my ears and decides to cut off the volume to 10% after 20 minutes.
Don't, and I mean DON'T decide things for the user.
Can't you let your phone know that the USB-C is not connected to headphones?
"Change blindness" is how this is characterized in the research field. Basically any abrupt change in your visual field will prevent you from seeing another change on the road.
What's amusing is the original use case for HUD displays was to reduce attention problems. ;-)
"The World Beyond Your Head" from Matthew Crawford is exactly about this. Definitely recommend reading!
Is this a physical or mental focus thing?
As in, are you just concentrating on the speedometer instead of the road, or do your eyeballs have to adjust because the optics aren't set correctly? I believe a HUD is supposed to focus at infinity, same as a road that's many times farther away than the size of your eyeballs.
There is a difference between status information like speed and directions and messages from other people.
Your attention reacts differently
Honestly, I’m an avid user of Ray-Ban metas and I agree that if Zuck doesn’t want to re-hash his old original sin (distracting algorithmic feeds) into this new form factor, he would block out any feeds and notifications from the glasses when it detected someone was talking to you, which the glasses can do really well. I’m hoping whatever answer Apple comes up with here has this behavior as default because they don’t have an active user axe to grind.
The glasses shine bright when you’re alone, on a walk.
Also while you’re at it, kill the Facebook and Instagram feeds to save humanity. Too much to ask?
Yeah, I was amazed at the brazenness of doublespeak present in that press release.
> It’s technology that keeps you tuned in to the world around you, not distracted from it.
Using this to sell a technology that will keep the wearer even longer in virtual spaces...
Marc evidently hasn't let go of his Metaverse dream and small details, like most of the population finding those ideas completely horrible, aren't gonna stop him...
> Can you imagine trying to talk to someone face to face, but they are giving you a blank stare as random notifications and tiktok videos are being beamed inbetween their eyeballs and you.
They wouldn't do this if the conversation is important to them. Not as much as one would glance on a smartwatch when they get a chirp, which, I believe is perfectly socially acceptable in most business/casual situations.
And if they do it's nothing new - it's a literal equivalent of talking to a person deep into their phone. Exact same audiovisual media consumption - just a different form factor and display technology. Or, in a pre-phone era, a newspaper.
I don't think this technology introduces anything new to this issue.
It's quite different. Both are rude. But in one case the person is looking at their phone, and in another case the person is basically looking directly at you but engaged with some other thing happening on their device, as if they are in some drug induced stupor or having a neurological episode.
The visual equivalent of the etiquette breaches when Bluetooth earpieces became a thing.
You can tell that some people who grew up addicted to video content already sort of just stare at the real world like they are watching a video and don't quite realise they are present. If they were wearing glasses where they were actually watching videos while they stare into space not much would change.
The glasses close the attention loop faster, and the brain really, really likes quick stimuli -> dopamine release loops.
The faster it happens, the more addictive it is. It's the difference between oral administration of drugs and IVing them directly into one's veins.
I don't even think it's cynical anymore to assume that this is the entire reason why Meta are pursuing this.
They see themselves in a race to produce the most radical, most efficient machine that produces the most effective addictive response. Content has been interchangeable for decades, everything is about the naked control over people's attention, because that is having power over people.
There is a very modernist logic in the whole effort. Everything must be taken to its extremes, nothing is ever enough, and nothing good sits in the middle of anything, and having values is only a detriment in this race.
Possibly I'm a horrible conversation partner, but even today already it happens with some regularity that someone is checking their phone while I'm in a conversation with them. It's even more common in group conversations.
And tacking on some personal experience, I've also noticed when I'm meeting over Zoom (i.e. with the rest of the internet within arm's reach), I get distracted way more easily than when meeting in real life. Sure, maybe not all those meetings are super important to me, but I'm not sure if the world would be a worse place if that wasn't possible.
Can you imagine trying to talk to someone face to face, eventhough you're not speaking the same language
It's more like, Meta gets people continuously wrong, like they did with metaverse. I dont think people like walking around with a teleprompter. At least when using a phone it's obvious what they are doing, and that's respectful.
Plus, i dunno, i hate glasses that's why i did LASIK and it was the best decision ever.
There's plenty of people who don't mind using their phone in a socially disrespectful way. Maybe they got it right.
> Meta seems like one of the few large tech companies where if the whole company vanished, the world would be purely a better place.
100%
> Can you imagine trying to talk to someone face to face, but they are giving you a blank stare as random notifications and tiktok videos are being beamed inbetween their eyeballs and you.
You spelled ads wrong.
Also it makes you look like a dork.
Meta has no real internal product innovation since FB desktop.
Every internal innovation after that has been a disaster. Hence the continuous acquisitions they have done.
They made quest 2 and 3. Despite their recent pushing of shitty horizon worlds, the hardware is extremely solid and affordable for VR.
And yet there isnt any large magnitude of buyers in the market, despite the fact that over a billion people use Meta products every month.
In my culture it’s considered extremely casual — and therefore quite rude in social situations other than the most private and familiar — to talk with someone while wearing sunglasses. I can imagine the same thing would apply to AR devices too.
What you describe sounds like it could be a real problem, but one I’d blame on rudeness rather than Meta. We already live in a world where people order coffee while reading E! news on their phones.
That is indeed pretty much culture dependent, in Southern Europe sunglasses only go out during Winter, when indoors or when bumping into a friend.
Now imagine people driving at 130km/h with a 4 ton SUV with these things...
I disagree.
Among Meta's many technical contributions: React PyTorch osquery GraphQL Presto/Trino RocksDB Jest OCP Llama
We don’t need any of those. So many brilliant people working at facebook and wasting their talent.
with the exception of maybe llama, each of these releases represented not only solid, accessible implementations, but actually also a paradigm shift and a massive investment. then they gave each away for free, and continued to invest in them for years. _you_ might not need any of these, but the internet as we know it today certainly is built on the shoulders of each of them, and in some cases, continues to use them directly.
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I mean, if people working on PyTorch, GraphQL and React are "wasting their talent", then bloody hell that is a high bar.
And among their non-technical contributions, you have genocide in Myanmar, election interference worldwide, the explosive growth of hate speech, countless teenager suicides, and more.
Any large company can write a web UI framework, but only a truly special one can directly contribute to genocide, know about it, have employees bring it up and suggest intervening, and decide that nah, they'd rather let people die and make more money.
> Meta seems like one of the few large tech companies where if the whole company vanished, the world would be purely a better place.
This is what I disagree with. Specifically, I don't disagree that Meta has caused serious harm. I just don't think we live in such a black and white world "where if the whole company vanished, the world would be purely a better place".
This might be good for public transport zombies, at least they wont be using their speakers to watch TikTok
Every sufficiently tech obsessed kids dream about being able to look at the screen while walking. It takes experiencting for them to accept it doesn't work.
In this world even a self driving car doesnt help if an individual sporadically walks infront of a car at close range due to being distracted.
Fucking pedestrians even more and destroying cities is a big reason self driving cars should never happen.
And you know that Faceberg’s plan with these is to sell advertising spots directly on your eyeballs haahaha
Imagine talking with someone face to face and there's a giant tv right behind you pumping inflammatory news headlines.
That's a present day situation but I never seen anyone shaking their fist at tvs screens in cafes.
The square in the middle of Woolwich, London has a giant screen showing BBC News all day. No idea who decided to put that there but it gives the place a strong 1984 feel.
Probably because many of us avoid such cafes? The "wall plastered with TVs bar" seems to be much less popular here and those places are aggressively unpleasant for me.
Oof, I hate that. Luckily most cafes over here don't have TVs, or even clocks, for exactly that reason. I've been in countries where TVs in cafes are more common, and I don't know how you put up with it.
Obviously, they don't have the gesture bracelet for the TVs yet.
If you have kids this happens today, except they don't look up from their smart phone.
This isn't a new problem.
Probably about what you get now except their neck isn't craned down to a phone.
> Meta seems like one of the few large tech companies where if the whole company vanished, the world would be purely a better place.
+1 ...and I think about it everyday
Exactly. It is bad enough trying to talk to someone with earbuds in and this just seems 10x worse. Zero chance I would buy something like this or try to talk to someone wearing them.
I've been making an effort to keep my phone in my pocket or even bag when talking to someone, and not having it sit on the table so I can't get distracted. I just can't imagine having notifications literally shoved in your vision automatically all the time.
The whole product category seems to be everything wrong with tech turned up to 11.
I think this is going to be very funny to observe as a third person.
That's already happening with cell phones and wireless earbuds, just without video.
... and I personally find that horrible.
Meta locked two games I already paid for - Blade & Sorcery VR and Beat Saber - behind account verification on the Quest 2. I already bought both of these, played them for a while, but now it won't let me use the headset without "verifying" my facebook account by sending them a photograph of my drivers license. Neither of these games are online, neither allow me to interact with other users in any way.
I will never buy a Meta product again, the brand reputation is lower than dirt to me. Even ignoring all the other awful things Meta does, they have no reason to require a verified account to play two local-only games that I already paid for. No matter how cool glasses like these may look, I have no trust that the brand will not suddenly demand more money or information from me to continue using a product I have already purchased.
Switching from just basic Oculus accounts to Facebook accounts was the dumbest move, I say that from someone who was really enjoying the Rift and Quest 1 hardware. Whole thing was pretty effortless until that moment, then logging into it became this massive chore where you're bounding between the phone and headset twice, really tedious if you're not a big facebooker so haven't used their login flow in years and it was all just extremely janky.
Then there were a bunch of walls in the transition period where Oculus accounts can do X,Y but Meta accounts are needed for Z.
Can really tell Zuck told the teams "All in on VR/AR" and the accounts/FB team began "well if its core it's account should be the core account we use".
Would have been much smarter to keep it like Instagram where it's an entirely separate feeling account but under the hood deeply connected in a way that allows the data syphoning they want but the end user it rarely feels like a Facebook account.
Why did you have to switch to a Facebook account?
I was gifted a Meta Quest 3S, and I was forced to make a Meta account, but I didn’t have to make a Facebook account.
When the Quest 2 came out they shifted from using a specific Oculus account to requiring Facebook accounts. It was a dumb idea and my wife was questioning why I made a Facebook account for my 12 year old kid (who as a typical Gen Z will probably never use FB proper).
They have since reversed that decision.
That was the day I stopped developing for VR completely. Kind of dodged a bullet because the space didn't explode the way I thought it was going to.
Agree. And the constant spying doesn't help either. Who wants an always online meta controlled camera/microphone in their bedroom all the time?
I'm never going to update a photo government ID to some company just to use an app. What kind of a bonkers world are we living in? Totally ridiculous. No app is worth this.
Some sites outsource their ID verification to platforms that want live videos of different angles of your face, along with pictures of your ID.
Literally all the data they could possibly need to build 3D models of your face for even better facial recognition, along with plenty of data to train models on. When that data eventually leaks, it will be interesting.
It's insane that anyone puts up with it.
> "that want live videos of different angles of your face"
Hetzner (outsourcing to Idenfy) dared to demand this of me, three years ago. I'm still mad about it.
> "When that data eventually leaks,"
Indeed, my understanding is these sensitive biometrics are generically (i) uploaded in full to a remote server, where they're (ii) retained for a nontrivial amount of time, because they need to be (iii) manually QA'd by humans. It's nothing like an iPhone's local-only biometrics enclave. My understanding's based on the specific case of Idenfy, and an ex-Idenfy HN'er explaining its workflow[0].
Hetzner (in Germany) never did things like these to me. What were you trying to do with them?
Hetzner uses some kind of AI (the old kind) to assign risk scores to customers. In my case they just wanted a photo of my passport, but that was years ago. For some people they just outright deny access no matter what you upload. Other people just go right on through.
people scan their retina in exchange of coupons amd shitcoins in mall booths
desperate people do that. Scammer Altman went to Argentina during the peak economic crise of the century to make that offer.
likewise, most USA government backed benefits require people to submit all sorts of biometric to a private company who used to monetize coupons for military deployed personel, called gov.id or something.
Some people also eat rocks, it doesn't mean it's common or even a good thing to do.
I had to go through this shit show once in my life, in order to use Airbnb.
It's been a few years since I last used Airbnb and I regret that moment of weakness.
Most new accounts seem to require a face scan too (finally they're true to their name?). I recently needed to get a Facebook account and was not able to use it without providing the scan. Luckily I was able to do an AI face swap, but far from everyone is that savvy.
Interesting. Did you swap your face on a computer, and pointed the smartphone camera on the monitor?
You already have one, regardless of some companies repeating the privacy claim 24/7 to make you believe so.
Objectively speaking, most people do. That's why Meta has so much money.
Lots of people, actually. This website is an echo chamber of those privacy-conscious.
Totally. Most people just click Accept All on the dumb cookie banners, and they don't give a sh*t about privacy at all.
Its not that they dont care at all. They just dont care until they feel the pain of it, because they are optimising for short term satisfaction.
HN is typically slow to admit it, but Facebook and TikTok wouldn't be popular if you were wrong. Consumers don't care.
Consumers don't know or want to know rather - ignorance is bliss when it comes to getting Children to spend relatively quiet time independently. Otherwise the GOP would be virtue-signalling about getting Roblox as a platform getting banned due to the preponderance of predators and material unsuitable or unsafe for children.
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I live in Europe so there are still rules keeping Weyland-Yutani in line.
If you're in the US you're on your own I guess.
Google glass
People care about other people they meet spying on them or doing creepy things. They don't care about people they don't meet spying on them or doing creepy things, because they don't notice it and it has a very low chance of showing up in the social media feed of people they know.
This. Also (if possible) move away from Facebook. I have zero respect for this company, no matter what they do or come up with.
Always remember that you are under their will, be your data, be the devices you purchase from them or any other thing that is related to them.
Microsoft pulled the account verification trick with Minecraft after forced account migration a few years back, locking accounts and forcing customers to verify mobile phone number to even launch the game.
That's crazy.
If you want to play something minecraft-like, Luanti (VoxeLibre) is really excellent. I play it with my child, and it's indistinguishable from 'real Minecraft'.
iirc there's a YouTuber that wants to sue Microsoft for this weird rugpull, although I doubt it will happen
In the most minor defense of the devil: with Minecraft, you have a substantial audience who is underage, the game features multiplayer heavily, and I don't think it's the worst idea ever to have verified accounts there.
At least on nintendo switch that's not true
they don't look cool anymore. they are the eyes of skynet. I have prescriptions coming up and I have always bought ray bans. I won't anymore, I don't want anyone to think I am spying on them, because that's what they are, spy tools.
> now it won't let me use the headset without "verifying" my facebook account by sending them a photograph of my drivers license.
I believe this would be the first time in my life that I would try to generate a fake driver's license.[0] It's completely ridiculous.
[0] Not to mention that I'd only use a fake FB account first anyway, there's no way I'd give them my real data. I know Zuck apologized by "dumb fucks", but while the wording was offensive he was actually right.
How does that work? The Quest doesn't even require a Facebook account. They were decoupled in 2022.
You can’t tell me a Meta account isn’t just a Facebook account with extra steps.
It’s still Facebook and will always be Facebook.
I'd assume the purchases were made with the Facebook account, when it was still required, so the purchase can't be used on another account ?
I haven't checked, but the Facebook decoupling was made kicking and screaming so I assume there will be rought edges
This, plus the fact that if you dig deep enough into your google account you'll probably find an audio file with you saying "really? I can't play this game? Fuck you facebook, never buying your gear again" recorded from your android phone without your consent or knowing.
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The above post didn’t even load for me because I have all of their domain names DNS blocked at my router and in NextDNS on mobile.
I can't wait to read the privacy policy.
A reminder, users cannot opt out of current Meta Ray Bans data recording/storage/training if you actually want to use them as smart glasses.
It seems like there are a lot of negative comments about Meta's glasses which is surprising to me as a regular user. I bought these both in clear and sunglasses and I love them. I've recorded some of the most amazing videos of my baby with them. Listening to music is fantastic as it's different from regular headphones since you can still hear the world around you — I've even done a few longer bike rides with them and it's been great. I haven't enabled any of the AI or smart features on the glasses, although I've been meaning to give it a try. Some things I don't love about them is the proprietary charging cases, the battery life seems to degrade over time (not totally certain though), and they're sensitive to sweat. Overall I think they show a ton of promise.
They have a brand problem. Absolutely no way I buy anything from Meta.
This is my #1 issue. I simply don’t trust them and I don’t know that there is a realistic path to build that trust at this point. They’ve been violating my trust for decades.
I’m happy to let them prove out the tech, and if/when a company enters the market with a compelling product that I can trust, I will consider that competing product.
OP is taking videos of his baby with these when Meta's page here doesn't event mention data privacy or security of the user's information or how it protects them
All babies look the same, out of anything private you could film by mistake, a baby seems pretty harmless.
Face recognition is uninuitively good. Google Photos was able to pick out faces from my baby photos pretty easily.
I was thinking about that a while ago and came to the conclusion that it's likely massively helped out by the narrow search space. They aren't trying to match between every single person, just the ones in your photo library which is an extremely small group compared to what most facial recognition is doing.
Google Photos works in a near perfect extremely constrained closed system: your photos have fewer than a hundred faces, it likely biases uncertainties with more confidence due to those constraints.
Funny because I don't use the feature and in my review tab I have like 15 versions of myself that google thinks are all different people for me to individually name. Mostly different phases of facial hair.
Google's face recognition can't tell the difference between my 5yo and my newborn. And, most hilarious, my 8yo could unlock my wife's iPhone with face recognition when she was 2yo.
Custom ads based on your baby facial expressions 15 years later?
Really? Mine lumps together completely unrelated people whilst failing to group together the same person.
Well. Until that film or metadata getting uploaded on Meta servers or checked by some local child-safety AI, getting flagged for inappropriate meterial and police knocking on your door.
Yeah and stupid babies are too stupid to consent anyway
Note: user has baby.
Yes, it does, the link to Data & Privacy is at the bottom.
> I don’t know that there is a realistic path to build that trust at this point…
I suspect it's impossible as long as Zuckerberg is involved in the company.
Meta has close to 4 billion people worldwide using one or more of their products. Their brand problem doesn't extend much further than the HN comment section.
> Meta has close to 4 billion people worldwide using one or more of their products.
If you ask any of those 4 billion people if they know WhatsApp is related in anyway to Meta, your answers will be split between "no" and "what's a Meta?"
So you are saying people won't buy these glasses because Meta is evil, but they also don't know what Meta is?
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People in HN treat non tech people as illiterate. Everyone knows what meta and facebook is and who owns whatsapp. At least if you remove the >50 years old folks.
Most non tech folks believes that Meta listens to their conversation for ads in Instagram, but that's a different issue, and even with that belief they are fine with that. I have seen this discussion so many times with so many different groups.
and do you think they will stop using Whatsapp if they know Meta is the parent ?
I think 99% of WhatsApp users would gladly stop using WhatsApp and switch to something like Signal, if they had verbal agreements of "everyone else" that they would also switch.
Everyone is only on WhatsApp because everyone is on WhatsApp. That is why they tolerate the Meta ickiness of it.
I bet more than 1% of Whatsapp users make use of their web interface and/or live location. Signal doesn't have either of these. Yes, you can install a Signal app on your computer, but not everyone wants to do this.
Also, that "everyone else" would have to include all business accounts, which I think would require Signal to build out an API
This sounds like a product idea to me. Make a website that shows the status of your friends that are willing to switch to signal. You send an invite to all your friends first so the list keeps up to date as soon as one of your friend made a decision. If everybody agreed you can switch as a whole. Even better if signal would implement it themself!
As far as I can tell, Signal automatically tells me which of my contacts are already on the app. If someone is willing to switch, the obvious thing to do is install it.
I find that list out of date. It shows friends that deleted the app months ago so don't receive the message.
Well, your plan could work if all your future friends also agree to this.
I bet there are more people knowing what Meta is than Signal or Telegram.
You can use their products and still hate the brand.
I use Whatsapp daily (as does everyone I know) and there's no way I'm buying anything from Meta.
You might not be buying anything from Meta with cash, but you are with information about yourself and your network.
Yes, but that's besides the point.
My comment was in the context of "Meta has a brand issue" which is absolutely true.
Actually Facebook and WhatsApp are the only products I know of where even completely non-tech people like my mom or the other parents at my soccer game have ever mentioned something along the lines of "yeah I did X on Facebook so now whatshisname Zekkerburg knows about it too..."
These people probably have zero awareness about cookies, tracking, online disinformation campaigns and online security in general...yet the one "tech" thing they know is that Facebook spies on you.
Everyone is aware of how Meta kills privacy in their products. The products are still useful, especially at price point "free". And they are still riding on an installed base and network effect from a time before we cared that much about the privacy infringement.
But, actually paying for the privilege of being the product...that seems like an extremely hard sell from Facebook for me.
Instagram or WhatsApp are absolutely critical for daily functioning in certain circles of humanity.
WhatsApp. Instagram not really. WhatsApp has unfortunately become "official" (not in a figure of speech) mode of communication in certain countries, one of which has more than a billion people in it.
Instagram as well absolutely. There's all sorts of "small business owners" whose entire existence is conducted via an Instagram account and DMs, the same way there were entire businesses that operated via Facebook pages in the past.
Depends on who you are. Quite a lot of careers require you to market yourself on social media now. You can hate Meta with a passion but acknowledge that you still have to reach customers who are on Instagram.
Well, what you are pointing out sounds like a role “Influencers needed”. So that’s obvious.
WhatsApp I can buy due to the communication factor, but Instagram you're really going to have to sell me on fitting into the category of 'critical for daily functioning'.
Instagram. Critical to life. Naah.
I kind of agree but a lot of modern american small businesses run completely on facebook. At least in the 4wheeling community they do
Yeah, but facebook^WMeta didn’t develop those… they bought them to stifle competition.
In my (totally limited) experience, most non-tech people don’t even know what Meta is. WhatsApp is almost the only messaging platform used where I live (and pretty much everywhere outside the US).
I remember doing Bug Bounty for Meta a while ago and telling some friends and family about it, and I had to repeatedly explain they _are_ Facebook and WhatsApp and Instagram and many other things because they would look at me like I was talking about aliens.
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Mark was right: https://www.theregister.com/2010/05/14/facebook_trust_dumb/
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100% this. I'd love to have some of these features in eyewear, but there is no way in hell I purchase anything like this from Meta.
Less those bastards get of anything I control (data, finances, time) the better.
You’re about to be in a world where your consent is totally out of the picture with Meta releasing this product and people will be recording you all the time now and sending that data directly to Meta where they can then build models about where you are, who you’re with, what you’re doing and what you are talking about and all without providing you and way to opt out other than breaking the glasses when you encounter them in public.
You are expecting meta to succeed and that's won't be happening.
I would probably buy a pair once there’s some progress on an alternative firmware for those. The price is (hopefully) subsidized, so putting Meta in the red while getting some cool tech would be nice. (Same reason I own a Quest 3.)
Hah, same reason I bought my Quest 2. Figured I could buy a device that is subsidized by them, and then buy zero games on their platform and stream from my PC instead.
I was very angry though when they suddenly took away my USB debugging and had to go through another round of "verification".
Which makes you wonder about Ray-Ban. Are they aware that their involvement with Meta risks hurting their brand? Those of us who are critical of Meta might be niche enough that it doesn't matter, but they must have factored that in.
I doubt it is to any measurable extent.
The (literally) billions of people around the world using Facebook and Instagram don't care.
You would avoid ray ban conventional glasses in protest at their association with meta? Don't forget to avoid the rest of Luxottica Group's products. I would bet (on Polymarket) against such a boycott gaining traction.
I wasn't talking about a boycott, I was talking brand damage. It's entirely possible to put less value in a brand, without boycotting it. Previously I had Ray Ban in the "Makes high-end expensive sunglasses" category, but now I mentally moved them to "Makes stupid smart glasses in collaboration with Facebook". This means that I'm willing to pay less for their products, compared to ten years ago, they are no longer a luxury brand, but a gimmick.
I see what you mean now. But all Luxottica brand name glasses have a big mark-up on a quite cheaply made product. They are better made than what you find on the rack at the supermarket but the perception of luxury comes from marketing.
Huh. I genuinely thought they were already acquired.
Luxxotica is already terrible, predatory brand that makes shitty products.
Ray-Ban is part of EssilorLuxottica. They own pretty much every single (sun)glasses brand on earth. I'm sure someone in their organization has made the decision that Ray-Ban was the best fit for a brand in their portfolio to do something together with Meta.
Also, you're right about the niche. A lot of 'normal' people probably don't even have a clue that Meta and Facebook are the same thing.
They probably had two brands that made sense, Ray Ban or Oakley, but just by listing those two, it's fairly clear that the products would be perceived vastly different, had they gone with Oakley.
The rest of the brands are either luxury or fairly unknown brands. Picking a smaller brand would automatically flop the product and going with e.g. Burberry could limit sales or the risk to the brand would be to high.
Mark made the choice to go with RB (MIB inspired).
100% They couldn't pay me to use it. I fully expect it's violating the user's privacy in every way they think they can get away with.
Why do you think they rebranded? They are chasing after Gen Z, brainwashing that clean slate.
"rebranding" takes more than saying "oh, now we are 'meta'" FB launched with great positive repetitional aura, but, at least to me, they have worn that away bit by bit over the years to the point where it becomes hard to earn back,.
You'd be amazed how many <25s have no idea Meta owns Instagram and WhatsApp.
The big “From Meta” at the bottom of the splash screen doesn’t tip people off?
I suspect it’s more that they don’t know who Meta is and because it’s meaningless they don’t link the “From Meta” between the two apps, if they even use both of them.
The inability of most people to notice 11 fingers should have adjusted our estimate of the average person's attention to detail.
> 25s have no idea either!
> FB launched with great positive repetitional aura
As a site that ranked how hot girls were?
The vast majority of users knew nothing about Facebook‘s origins until The Social Network. In the mid-to-late 2000s, the perception was of simply a much better designed, much more exclusive alternative to Myspace.
Hard to imagine nearly two decades later, but for a brief moment in time, it was cool to be on Facebook.
> The vast majority of users knew nothing about Facebook‘s origins
They are all <checks notes>
"dumb fucks." -- Mark Zuckerberg, 2004 personal correspondence documented in https://www.theregister.com/2010/05/14/facebook_trust_dumb/
Bro we get it. It's been done ad nauseam. It's now the equivalent of putting the dollar sign in Micro$oft. Probably the most relatable thing he's done anyway.
The most popular dating apps do basically the same now but since there's no leader board and they aren't side by side it's all good I guess. All the same except for the UX
To the larger public they were the opposite of that... a clean, uncluttered alternative to MySpace that had none of its social baggage, in spite of its DNA which was clearly unknown during the early phases of social media.
Ok, I was trying to give as much benefit of the doubt as possible. You are 100% correct of course...
This. The tech would have to absolutely world-alteringly amazingly unmissable for me to even consider using anything tied to the Meta ecosystem.
The brand on display here is Ray Ban. That's why they spent billions to lock in the partnership.
Facebook changed its name to Meta. Meta is the company with the brand problem, not Ray Ban.
Only on HN do they have a brand problem.
The vast majority of the world doesn’t care. Half don’t know that Meta and Facebook and Instagram and WhatsApp are the same thing.
And even if they know it’s no more concerning than that conspiracy video they just watched and 100% believed about Bill Gates, as they log into Windows or power on their Xbox.
I own two pair and love them yet hate them also because they are not durable and my 1st pair bought Oct 2023 stopped being smart in April so I bought a 2nd pair. After some big-ish water splashes the second paired died in June.
Smart glasses are great for ppl who wear some type of glasses and use their phone to take pics. Also, when I was in Europe asking about my surroundings enhanced my trip per my learning of about many sights I explored in Berlin and Amsterdam.
I do love and miss them but I’m not buying another pair til they are rock solid durable! Also the Ray Ban stores need to act just like Apple stores in terms of tech support but they do not ..and thus both Meta and Ray Ban are just selling a toy that easily breaks / doesn’t last. Even a Ray ban customer service rep said these things break I get so many calls.
I would buy something from them, but until I know I could wear them safely at work while developing, using the bathroom, driving, and watching TV at home, and that I’d want to do that without being distracted all day by texts, etc., I wouldn’t wear them. I have to wear glasses, so they’d have to be clear, prescription glasses with reasonable small and stylish frames. This product isn’t for me, and I don’t see how it makes sense to continue spending money on this boondoggle, which is effectively a massively expensive human-testing project to help them develop reasonable-looking glasses. I love Ray-Ban glasses, but not this style or size, and not with these features.
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Well, your loss. My Oculus Quest remains the best $400 I ever spent on consumer tech.
8 days ago you would never buy a gimmicky device. Now a screen facehugger (which does even less than an iPad and is useful in even fewer situations) is the best thing you ever bought?
One man’s gimmick is another’s useful device.
I don’t use my iPad much…or didn’t, until I had a toddler and long car rides. I either used my phone or my PC, or a projector for movies. The iPad didn’t really fit in there.
I use my Quest 3 often. I can see why someone would have his opinion.
I use my Quest 2 constantly but the moment that rumored Valve Index with inside-out tracking becomes available I'm switching. Not only is the association with Facebook not great, their Windows desktop software is awful and constantly breaking. PCVR took a big back seat to the weak on-board stuff with the Quests.
Almost everyone I know who got a quest stopped using it after a week.
It's a fun toy, but gets boring pretty quickly.
I used mine everyday for about 2 months but eventually reached the boredom stage.
There is just shockingly so little going on in VR.
There is also the issue that it is like a drug that the first few times are so mind blowing but your tolerance builds so fast. Then there is nothing stronger to up the dosage.
Meanwhile I have a friend group (mostly build from real-life relationships) that gets together once a week for the last ~3 years to play VR games.
YMMV :-)
I use mine for flight simming. The screen looks great for the price, and lets me stream games like DCS World from my desktop.
Far as fun toys go, the Quest sits head-and-shoulders over my Nintendo Switch.
For flight simming it really is much better. Being able to look to one side while "feeling" the offset (I can't explain it but you know what I mean) is a huge deal
For me too, I use mine for hours every week
At one point it told you everyone on your friends list that had also got one - and in my case it was basically everyone I knew from work over the years. Literally the only people that used it more than two weeks were those working on VR.
Even if you try to stick with it you grow to dread all interaction with their app or OS. They have some superb technology but the product management is atrocious.
Are you using Chinese brands? Tiktok, AliExpress, ByteDance, Binance, Tencent? If you have no problems with them but with Meta, that's hypocrisy on your part.
I myself don't really have problems with them, and neither with Meta. I don't think they have a brand problem other than in bubbles like HN.
One of these options (Meta vs. Chinese brands) is in bed with a dangerous totalitarian regime.
The other is the Chinese brands.
The Chinese government can’t do anything to affect my daily life. I would much rather the Chinese government know everything about me.
So you wouldn’t have problems with Meta if they weren’t American? Do you think Chinese people should use Meta’s products, if they were available there?
That kind of seems logically to me if Meta isn’t sharing data with the Chinese government.
Meta has a Musk/Tesla problem
Not even close to that level lol
For me it's not so much about what those glasses could do for me if I were to wear them... It's what they do to me if someone else wears them.
I got some of these for a friend who has severe vision problems. They don't seem to be able to read out texts or emails from your phone? If something is in your notifications, it can get to it, beyond that it just constantly complains it doesn't have access or can't do it, despite the app having damned near root on the phone, with every permission possible granted.
Videos are limited to 3 mins, up from 1 min originally.
He says you can't hear the audio or use them for anything useful if there is much noise around you, i.e. in a busy area they become completely useless.
I still think they hold great promise, the main letdown is the awful software. Amazing miniaturization.
I put my hands over my ears if I need to use them in a noisy environment. Not perfect but it works
> Listening to music is fantastic as it's different from regular headphones since you can still hear the world around you
Many earbuds, like Airpods, have transparency mode. The end result is the same…music while hearing background noise. In fact airpods are better because of the ANC mode that tunes out noise except conversation and other “important” sounds. I can also wear airpods indoors without looking like a dork, so that’s also plus. I’m not seeing why this is novel or interesting?
> I've recorded some of the most amazing videos of my baby with them.
This seems like a compelling use case. How is the video quality?
I wouldn't want to wear earbuds while doing anything active, the chance of them falling out is too high.
I've run many hundreds of hours with two variations of AirPods and they've never once fallen out
Not everyone's ears are the same. MKBHD famously does not use Airpods because he can't get them to stay in. I have tried jogging a couple times with Airpods Pro and they pop out every time.
EarPods/AirPods designs assume that you have certain genetic feature on ears called antitragus that hugs the stem with two opposing wings. I looked mine in the mirrors and one of the wings is basically missing altogether, making it not "anti"-ing. Tim Cook visibly has a pair of bulbous ones.
I kind of have different ethnic background than MKBHD, so, it kind of makes me wonder how that design got the shape it got and how it stayed that way.
> MKBHD
For those like me who weren’t familiar with the moniker, it refers to Marques Keith Brownlee, a YouTuber who reviews technology devices.
In his review of AirPods Pro 3 he says they now stay on better.
Might depend on the shape of your ear canal. Mines seem to be weirdly shaped so nothing holds.
I use shockz for running - stable and your ears are totally unobstructed.
Yea AirPods transparency is great, but Shockz is another level. It’s even better than the ray bans because other people can’t hear the audio, and way more comfortable than any in-ear ones.
Wait, are you saying that audio from the ray bans will be heard by anyone around??
Well, it's a speaker. Its not using bone conduction.
Probably not a very loud speaker but if someone is next to you then surely they'd hear it.
Has not been an issue for me (walking, jogging, basketball practice)
but i understand the concern! sometimes it’s sketchy haha. Like riding a bicycle.
I've only had earbuds fall out as the result of actively crashing a bicycle, and even then they usually stay in.
I ski, run, weight lift and do construction work in mine, never had them fall out, ever.
I developed a reflex that I periodically press above my nose to make sure the glasses are in place, which was super funny when I switched to lenses but kept pressing for no good reason.
How do your friends feel when you are having a conversation and you are constantly pointing a camera at them?
Nobody cares, and everyone loves the candid videos I take with it
I use them too for similar uses. Brilliant. I also use zero AI. I don’t care. I totally understand ppl not buying them because they are meta. I get it.
After oculus rift I’m never buying another Meta product either. It doesn’t matter how good it is they have bo trust left for me.
Will happily try an alternative from someone like Valve or, heck, even Apple — although not for a few generations when the price is reasonable.
Zuckerberg: Our baby.
they also don't have an app store and are a closed platform which is a big downside.
Agreed, hopefully that changes as things are more ironed out
Meta’s brand problem won’t be solved until Gen Alpha comes of age. They’re the first generation to accept VR and they won’t remember the Facebook debacle since they won’t be using Facebook, but they will use meta’s AR and VR
> It seems like there are a lot of negative comments about Meta's glasses
The negative comments are about Meta the company. Many here don’t trust them, and with good reason, let’s not forget Zuckerberg literally called “dumb fucks” to people who trust him.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/17/facebook-...
> I've recorded some of the most amazing videos of my baby with them.
Those are now property of Facebook, inarguably one of the most privacy-invasive companies in history.
> Listening to music is fantastic as it's different from regular headphones since you can still hear the world around you
> I haven't enabled any of the AI or smart features on the glasses
Oh, don’t worry, they’ll do it for you. Whatever they want to get, they will.
I think most of the negative comments are about morality and Zuck’s, Meta’s, Meta’s workers and Meta supporters lack thereof.
I wamt less screens, not more.
*fewer* screens.
Maybe that's what you wamt, but not them.
What's the sweat issue about? Does the display fog up?
So META now has videos of your baby. Let that sink in. Hope they were clothed at least.
People never learn. One day your children will be your judge when they are grown up, when they realise what you did to them. I hope it was worth it.
Because kids sure hate putting pictures on instagram...
As someone with a very opinionated 11 year old nephew (so he grew up in the time of ubiquitous social media and he is getting to the age where he starts to understand its upsides and downsides) - I dare say that most children don't hold any grudges against their parents for making digital images and videos of them as babies and storing those on cloud platforms.
Thats such a ridiculously extreme viewpoint. What exactly did the user “do to them?”
The camera is worse than any phone camera and you have been able to buy headphones with active pass through forever to “hear the world around you” including adaptive ones.
And being sensitive sweat is kind of a deal breaker when you are working out.
You record your intimate family encounters using Meta products? Sorry for your family.
You look smart when you complain. Even if you're not.
And yet users here were super bullish at how Apple was reinventing AR/VR with their visor flop 2 years ago.
In every popular thread there are tons of people optimistic and pessimistic about the subject. Saying “users here” shared an opinion is always wrong. Just look at the commend thread, there are all kinds of opinions.
> It seems like there are a lot of negative comments about Meta's glasses which is surprising to me as a regular user.
Really? Does nobody remember the "Glasshole" debacle with another equally large FAANG corporation who tried to push a similar technology? There were incidents of people getting physically assaulted JUST for wearing the things.
In 10 years the mentality evolves.
It used to be considered extremely rude to pull out your phone during a conversation, now all the under 20 do it.
20 years ago the world wasn't so tense and deeply polarised as it is now either. I think many people would object more now, not less.
Google glass isn't that old though. It started in 2012 with selected testing users and in 2014 it became possible to just buy one.
Yet I highly doubt Robert Scoble's tech bro man-child mentality has evolved in 10 years.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/guy-ruined-google-glass-showe...
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/10/robert-scoble-writes...
https://onemanandhisblog.com/2017/10/scoble-utterly-tone-dea...
One thing with technology is "iron sharpens iron" - I'm sure as advances in batteries (although I imagine there comes a point where that stops) occur it will have downstream effects of making all these things better
...unless part of the package for the improvements are things like "more likely to catch fire"
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These things have cameras and mics in them. Am I the only one concerned about people walking into every space with surveillance systems that are capturing us and sending that data to some random set of companies who have no obligation to keep our information confidential? How can I have a conversation with a friend wearing one of these? And surely workplaces will ban these?
> And surely workplaces will ban these?
For all but the most security-conscious companies, that ship has probably sailed. Bringing a camera into many companies used to be an exercise involving forms, approvals, and so forth. Now everyone has camera, video, and audio recording in their pocket.
To those around you, there is a big difference between having a video recording device in your pocket compared to on your head. I would personally feel pretty uncomfortable if someone pulled up to the next stall in the workplace bathroom with these on
Yes huge difference. If someone at work was pointing their phone camera at me especially while we're having a discussion I would object also.
Most of the people in this thread are agreeing with you. You are not even close to the only one.
Hookup culture or any space (bars, clubs, festivals) where some level of shenanigans are expected will be destroyed by this even further than what smartphones has already done.
Imagine you take your kids to the beach and people are wearing these things. So even the beach won't be safe anymore.
Perhaps or maybe they will require them?
The live demo of this is brutal. https://x.com/ns123abc/status/1968469616545452055
All the VR/AR/XR demos are so insanely trivial and yet still manage to be much more difficult than current methods of doing things. Like, really, cooking?
Normal method:
* Search for a recipe
* Leave my phone on a stand and glance at it if I forget a step
Meta glasses:
* Put glasses on (there's a reason I got lasek, it's because wearing glasses sucks)
* Talk into the void, trying to figure out how to describe my problem as well as the format that I want the LLM to structure the response
* Correct it when it misreads one of my ingredients
* Hope that the rng gods give me a decent recipe
Or basically any of the things shown off for Apple's headset. Strap on a giant headset just so I can... browse photos? or take a video call where the other person can't even see my face?
This reads a bit like like a pre-PC take: "Why use a computer when a cookbook works fine?"
Imagine it’s 1992:
Cookbook: Open book, follow steps.
PC: Turn on tower, wait for DOS, fiddle with floppies, pray the printer works, hope the shareware recipe isn’t weird.
Not saying you're wrong but its easy to miss the big picture
> "Why use a computer when a cookbook works fine?"
I still feel that way. I have cookbooks because I find the UX better than searching for recipes.
honestly cookbooks genuinely are better
i got the art of italian cooking recently and it's genuinely far easier to get a recipe than trying to scroll through a 50 page monologue about the intracicies of someones childhood before even listing the ingredients
Indeed. There is an element of trust with an actual cookbook - it signals quality.
The internet over time has been riddled with junk, especially since the cost of production of information is just your opportunity cost of time. Even that is going away with the use of LLMs....
Core issue within the content age that I don't see being readily resolved. Unfortunately, I think the SEO marketing crowd are slowly catching up with LLMs, which is leading to poorer actual output when attempting to get information.
In the same way that google search used to be amazing before it was taken over by optimization, I think we're seeing a mass influx of content production to attempt to integrate itself into training corpus.
TBH I for one am glad about this.
I have always believed there is a cost borne to get the best of something. This means a sacrifice is entailed. Theres something very important about this re. the culture - a culture in which everything is free is how you get crap stuff produced. And people settle for crap stuff just because its free.
People who can see the bigger picture when you have this, can see the dangers of it.
I dunno, if these worked perfectly I don't think it'd be awful to be able to open my fridge and say "what can I make with this" and it could rattle of some suggestions based on my known preferences and even show me images in their new display.
Hands-free while cooking (not having to touch my phone with messy hands) is not a bad thing either.
I touch my phone with messy hands all the time. They are water resistant now, just wash it after
I think more so I feel like after touching the phone I should really wash my hands before touching the food or doing anything food related etc.
Yeah but I already live by the 5 second rule anyway so I'm more careless, you do have a point though, it's less hygienic for sure.
Yeah, I care less myself, and I'd probably believe I was training my immune system, but my partner would kill me though.
I suppose thats a bit easier than reading it out to ChatGPT.
It sucks now, no idea why, but a few years ago, with the Google Home mini, I could just yell out all kinds of cooking related questions with "Hey Google" and it would always give me a good answer, was great for doing stuff hands free when cooking, like when I just don't want to get raw chicken or whatever on my phone.
But yeah, it doesn't give me good answeres any more, usually trys to start an unrelated YouTube video or email me something about Youtube plus or w/e
But your $800 glasses are exposed to the cooking area with steam, grease fumes, heat etc.
Watching the announcement, every feature felt like something my phone already does—better.
With glasses, you have to aim your head at whatever you want the AI to see. With a phone, you just point the camera while your hands stay free. Even in Meta’s demo, the presenter had to look back down at the counter because the AI couldn’t see the ingredients.
It feels like the same dead end we saw with Rabbit and the Humane pin—clever hardware that solves nothing the phone doesn’t already do. Maybe there’s a niche if you already wear glasses every day, but beyond that it’s hard to see the case.
If executed well I think this could reduce a lot of friction in the process. I can definitely unlock my phone and hold it with one hand while I prepare and cook, but that's annoying. If my glasses could monitor progress and tell me what to do with what while I'm doing it, that's far more convenient. It's clearly not there yet, but in a few years I have no doubt it will be. And this is just the start. With the screens they'll be able to offer AR. Imagine working on electronics or a car and the instructions are overlaid on the screen while the AI is providing verbal instructions.
I'm oldish, so maybe I'm biased, but this sort of product seems like something no one will want, outside a few technophiles, but that industry desperately needs you to want. It's like 3d TV, a solution in search of a problem because the mfgs need to make the next big thing with the associated high margins.
To me the phone is a pretty good form factor. Convenient enough(especially with voice control), unobtrusive, socially acceptable, and I need to own one anyway because it's a phone. I'm a geek so I think this tech is cool, but I see zero chance I would use one, even if it were a few steps better than it is.
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These companies are reaching really hard for use cases while ignoring the only ones VR actually works well for. If they just went all in on gaming it would be a much better product than trying to push AI slop cooking help.
As a gamer, in my experience people don't want to play VR games either.
Beat Saber as a social party experience with friends in the same room, sure, that's fun... but for day to day gaming the amount of people who want to play VR games on the regular is nearly zero.
If they really want to lean into the VR use case that people want, its porn, but I suspect they won't put that front and center.
I LOVED VR gaming, but after playing the same 2 games for 10 years, it never really evolved. They stopped innovating and went all in on AR.
I had a HTC Vive and I really loved playing VR games, particularly a shooter called Pavlov. Felt pretty social with a ton of absurd custom maps where the actual game was almost secondary to experiencing the immersive and strange maps.
But since I moved I didn't want to screw the base stations in to the walls again and haven't played in a long time. I feel like I probably still would like VR gaming but haven't been tempted enough to buy any of the newer systems since it seems like Meta has fully captured the market and it all seems pretty distasteful now.
I think you're very much in the minority. Also, VR games didn't really evolve because it can't really evolve - the fundamental thing that makes it attractive (immersion in a digital space) can't work well because of motion sickness. So, the only way to make an immersive VR game is to have an extremely tiny game world or an on-rails experience, and that drastically reduces the appeal.
Of course, you could make all sorts of traditional top-down or isometric games work well without motion sickness - but no one is going to pay for VR to play Civilization or Star Craft or Baldur's Gate 3, since these would be fundamentally the exact same experience as playing on PC or console, but with a display strapped to your head.
This is such nonsense. The new Batman game on VR has full motion and smooth turning. It's not on rails at all. Games have got better at reducing motion sickness, and players also adapt over time.
The many of us who get motion sickness have simply stopped bothering with VR. Since the market has shrunk anyway after the initial excitement, the few VR games left can afford to be less accessible.
Indeed. I put on any kind of VR helmet for more than 2 minutes and I'll be queasy and/or throw up outright. My level of motion sickness is maybe extreme... but i guess that definitely messes with the total addressable market.
They adapt to the taste of their own vomit? Or mitigate it by drinking lots of chocolate milk before playing?
In my experience, the biggest obstacle to broader AR and VR adoption beyond reducing the price, size, and weigh of the hardware will always be the lack of good content creation tools.
I've been involved with two VR projects that were ultimately cancelled because, while we developed a sexy tech demo that showed the potential, building things out into something sustainable required too many resources and took too much time to maintain.
VR gaming seems like it is a bit of a niche, though. I think they want to sell glasses in quantities more like cellphones than gaming peripherals.
I agree they are reaching (and not finding) for an application.
I agree that VR gaming is a niche, but I think it could be explosively improved if we had the kind of all-in idealism that the previous commenter referred to. I think because VR gaming IS niche, we haven't yet delved into what VR/AR could do in non-gaming.
An idea that I've had before is like 'augmented curated experiences' for all kinds of things--for example imagine playing a Magic the Gathering (or similar) card game, and watching your cards come to life on the board in hologram-esque 3D. Or while watching a sports match, being able to pull up the stats or numbers of any players, or flip through channels of POV camera from helmets. Car navigation that shows you what turns to make by augmenting lanes or signs with highlighting. Brick and mortar stores having a live wayfinding route to products in their store based on your grocery list, recognizing and highlighting items you like.
> for example imagine playing a Magic the Gathering (or similar) card game, and watching your cards come to life on the board in hologram-esque 3D
This is the kind of thing that buries VR ideas. It's very cute in a demo, but as an actual product, the cost of coming up with 3D models and animations for all MTG cards currently being played is many orders of magnitude more than the total number of people who would pay for this. Ultimately this is completely unnecessary fluff for the game, like chess games where the pieces actually fight: irrelevant, and it actually detracts from the game because it interrupts the flow of what you're actually doing.
I remain convinced VR gaming is niche because despite these companies being willing to drop boatloads of money on all kinds of things they for some reason never decided to just allocate a few billion to create a handful of true AAA games and jumpstart the industry. I think even just 3 proper games with several hundred mil budgets and VR gaming might be in an entirely different space than it is now.
Facebook made a very expensive new Batman game in VR, there's also Resident Evil, Assassin's Creed, a ton of other high budget games like Red Matter.
It just isn't taking off. In my experience even though VR is unique and amazing, it's not that much better than playing those games flat screen. I tend to spend most of my time in Beat Saber.
Expensive in the context of other VR games sure. I couldn't find any official numbers but i'm sure it pales in comparison to dozens of other games that came out this year.
Also i'm not sure what these single player relatively short playtime/runtime games accomplish as you buy it play it in less than a week and are done. What I would like to see is the large scale infinitely playable MMO type game done on VR with at least at 250M budget.
I think this is extremely doubtful. The reality remains that it's impossible to make a first person or even third person VR game with free movement, because of fundamental limitations in how human brains process movement. Having your eyes tell you are moving but your muscles and inner ear tell you that you are not makes you extremely sick very quickly, and technology can't actually fix this. The better and more immersive the visual illusion of movement, the worse the movement sickness you'll experience.
And without free movement, you can't build any of the mainstream game genres. You can't build and get people excited in a Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed or Fortnite or Elden Ring or Zelda where movement works like Riven, the sequel to Myst. Valve actually tried with the first Half-Life game in a decade, and even that didn't work.
Add to this massive gameplay limitation the second massive issue that you can't get a mass audience to pay hundreds of dollars extra for a peripheral without which they can't play your 70-80 dollar game.
> Valve actually tried with the first Half-Life game in a decade, and even that didn't work.
Half Life Alyx is still considered to be one of the best VR games ever made and one that is still consistently recommended to new users even years after release. IMO people buy hardware because of the exclusive content. If a standard game console came out and it only had one AAA game on it, I probably wouldn't bother buying it. But if there were 3-4 games that looked really interesting it starts to look more worth the investment. Playing VR games takes a lot of committment (time / physical space / $$$) so the payoff has to be worth it or you'll lose people. With the huge amount of money spent on R&D for new hardware I think it's a valid argument to say that maybe funding content would have been a better investment in terms of ensuring platform growth.
Also, side note but not every game requires free motion. Plenty of hits had no movement or teleport etc. A lot of these were completely new (sub-)genres that didn't exist or hit the same as they would in a traditional pancake game. Plus lots of kids seem unaffected by free movement (maybe as high as 50% of users by my rough estimate).
Those games literally exist now. Almost all new VR games use free movement not teleportation. It is frustrating that you seem to be talking confidently when your knowledge is 5 years out of date.
We should re-watch Dennou Coil every few years to be reminded of what we’re working towards :)
No offense, but there it this chart, and what this tells me, maybe just me, is that gaming is a niche within VR, not even majority use case. Zuck is probably right about VR/AR being the next big social media, only he's wrong that it'll be like Facebook/Instagram type of social media; it's old Twitter type of social media.
[1]:
Most played VR games
Rank Name Curr 24h pk All-time
1. VRChat 33,032 46,652 66,824
2. War Thunder 26,388 65,589 121,318
3. PAYDAY 2 23,513 31,619 247,709
4. No Man's Sky 22,509 46,010 212,613
5. OBS Studio 11,434 22,388 27,334
6. Phasmophobia 7,716 22,789 112,717
7. Forza Hz 5 4,940 13,617 81,096
8. Assetto Corsa 3,885 13,598 19,796
9. OVR Adv. Sett. 3,030 4,299 6,418
10. Tabletop Sim. 2,902 7,755 37,198
To me the chart shows that VR is mainly used for games. And the steam chart don't include the games played directly on the Quest headsets.
That's certainly one useful spin, but the red flag here is that these don't correlate well with games known as best VR games to VR communities. What I believe to be a more accurate interpretation is, there's nothing but VRChat in VR, and gaming demand in VR can be ~10x smaller per title relative to it.
> the only ones VR actually works well for
I had really expected a different "only one"
Games are not a prolific spy tentacle for hoovering up all kinds of data. They may have changed their name, but this is still the facebook company.
People dont realise how amazingly efficient touch interfaces already are.
THere is no need for these stupid glasses. Some refuse to accept it - especially Zuckerberg who relies on folks like Apple to make his money. Thats really whats driving this project if you tear away all the BS.
I wear my glasses all the time. If I could just talk to the void and get help with things I’m directly seeing reliably that would be a game changer. I’ve used Gemini’s video mode and we’re not all that far away.
If you watch it carefully, he preempts the AI with "What do I do first" before it even answered the first time. This strongly suggests it did this in rehearsal to me and hence was far more than just "bad luck" or bad connectivity. Perhaps the bad connectivity stopped the override from working and it just kept repeating the previous response. Either way it suggests some troubling early implications about how well Meta's AI work is going to me, that they got this stuck on the main live demo for their flagship product on such a simple thing.
I think preempting the AI the first time was meant to be a feature (it's not trivial to implement and is something people often ask for). Failing from there definitely wasn't great, although it's kind of what I'd expect from an(y) LLM.
No, he preempted it because it was about to list all the ingredients necessary to make a steak sauce, despite having them in front of him. These are glasses, it should have skipped that part and went straight to what to do first.
> Either way it suggests some troubling early implications about how well Meta's AI work is going
I fully expect the AI to suck initially and then over many months of updates evolve to mostly annoying and only occasionally mildly useful.
However, the live stage demo failing isn't necessarily supporting evidence. Live stage demos involving Wifi are just hard because in addition to the normal device functionality they're demoing, they need to simultaneously compress and transmit a screen share of the final output back over wifi so the audience can see it. And they have to do all that in a highly challenging RF environment that's basically impossible to simulate in advance. Frankly, I'd be okay with them using a special headset that has a hard-wired data link for the stage demo.
I assume you couldn't watch the video because it's just a live stream of a guy standing in a kitchen and talking to his glasses. He's not on the stage with hundreds of people on the wifi and you can't see what the glasses are displaying at all.
I run multiple live streams from speakers to conference rooms and other bandwidth intensive offerings throughout the day in an incredibly crowded RF space. WiFi is certainly up to the task. Meta is a nearly 2 Trillion dollar company a failure of this order is ridiculous.
The way he clung to „what do I do first” makes me think that the whole conversation was scripted in the prompt and AI was asked to reply in specific way to specific sentences. Possibility not even actually connected to the camera?
Yeah as a fully integrated system and the selling point I'd expect you'd say something like "Look again I think you're getting ahead of yourself".
Maybe the tech wasn't quite fool proof and they tried to fake it and then the fake version messed up.
Comment was deleted :(
Ouch. Kudos for trying, though. I miss the days of live demos at Apple events, instead of all these polished videos of people standing in silly poses around the Apple campus.
I've done live demos of AI. Even with the same queries, I got a different answers than my 4 previous practice attempts. My demos keep me on my toes and I try to limit the scope much more now.
(I didn't have control over temperature settings.)
It looks like true 0-temperature (i.e. determinism) will happen. Here's some good context: https://thinkingmachines.ai/blog/defeating-nondeterminism-in...
HN discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45200925
But 0 temp is much less "Creative" and may not be conducive to showing off the AI's latest tricks
> (I didn't have control over temperature settings.)
That's...interesting. You'd think they'd dial the temperature to 0 for you before the demo at least. Regardless, if the tech is good, I'd hope all the answers are at least decent and you could roll with it. If not....then maybe it needs to stay in R&D.
Reducing temperature to 0 doesn't make LLMs deterministic. There's still a bunch of other issues such as float math results depending on which order you perform mathematically commutative operations in.
I keep reading this but I don't get it: for the same input shouldn't the order of resulting operations be deterministic too?
It gets more complicated with things like batch processing. Depending on where in the stack your query gets placed, and how the underlying hardware works, and how the software stack was implemented, you might get small differences that get compounded over many token generations. (vLLM - a popular inference engine, has this problem as well).
Not necessarily. This is a good blog post from a few days about it: https://thinkingmachines.ai/blog/defeating-nondeterminism-in...
Previous discussion:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19567011
And a quora link (sorry):
https://www.quora.com/If-floating-point-addition-isnt-associ...
This one was also pretty bad: https://x.com/jason/status/1968496622884495847?s=46&t=9d1Ha4...
I think there’s some respect to give cause they’re doing it live and non-scripted.
Respect for trying it live now Apple just does pre-recorded with a ton of VFX.
Non-scripted? You must be kidding.
I take it they meant pre-recorded. It was definitely scripted and practiced.
It was the WiFi though
If you’ve ever used the current Meta Ray Ban and AI, this almost exactly happens when the connection is bad. Pure confusion but the AI still tries to give you an answer.
I bet the device hardware is small/cheap and susceptible to interference
I have the Meta glasses and I've never noticed this, and don't even understand why it could be the connection's fault. The AI gets your audio and your image, if it gives the wrong answer, it's because the AI went wrong. How would the bad connection ever affect it?
Exactly. Like... what are they even saying here - that if the connection drops then it falls back to a tiny "dropped on their head as a child" 4b parameter LLM embedded in the physical firmware and so that's why it is giving inane responses?
Mad props to the presenter for holding it together though.
The ai is in the cloud
Edit0: ie without internet access the ai is unable to produce an answer other than some prerecorded ones I guess
In the live showcase the presenter even mentions that the wifi must have been bad for the ai to repeat the answer
You're saying "you've already used the first two ingredients, so go ahead and add the sauce" is the prerecorded response when it doesn't have a connection?
No, that's the last queried answer. There is no ai in the glasses without a connection, so all it (edit1:it here being the program being run on the glasses, client to the ai between other things)can do (seemingly) is loop around and re-read the last queried answer, which was the mistaken "you've already...".
In the glasses is just a client to the ai. Like there is no ai in your phone when you talk to chatgpt, you are querying it and it will not keep talking to you if you cut off the wifi
The prerecorded responses I speculated about would have been things like "i'm having some connectivity problems, I'm unable to chat at this time, I'll let you know when I'm back." - the same kind of prerecorded things your earbuds tell you when they're low on power.
This can't possibly be the case, because the AI voice says slightly different things between the two attempts. The first time it says "you've already combined the base ingredients, so now grate a carrot to add to the sauce"; while the second time it says "you've already combined the base ingredients, so now grate the carrot* and gently combine it with the base sauce".
Unless you think they've added some inference logic on the device to slightly re-state the last answer they got from the cloud, it's clear that the glasses were connected and receiving the same useless answer from the cloud.
* side note, but it can also sound like "pear" to me this second time
Oh could very well be the case I've only listened once!
If you believe that they made the glasses repeat the last answer when they don't have connectivity, instead of saying "I don't have connectivity", I don't know what to tell you.
I own a pair of Meta glasses, and the response when they don't have connectivity is "this function is not available at this time".
Isn't this a very odd discussion to keep going? I'm not sure why you're being so confrontational as well. I see you have a lot of points, is that a way to drive engagement?
Are you a bot? Also "It must be the wifi" has got to be the lamest, unimaginative, predictable demo failure excuse I've ever heard, and you're trying to defend it.
yes, i am a bot, and i'm paid by meta to convice you to buy their glasses by telling you they are shit? what are you on about?
Edit0: and what are you even doing? Where do you think this is going?
the thing is, if it loses the connection, why on earth would the correct behaviour be to just keep repeating the last response? It should just straight up say, "Sorry I'm having trouble connecting". Even the best case scenario here suggests terrible product design.
Hard agree on terrible. I guess i'd have disabled the no connectivity message for the demo to give it a chance to reconnect gracefully/quickly if at all (by non stop querying even without wifi) but that's just guessing on my part. I think they're garbage and same for meta, if that needs saying
next time they need 1 public and 1 private router and shut the public off right before the demo.
Even if it’s small/cheap, if the item is scanned multiple times this will prevent any electrical infetterence.
I don’t even think that’s a word!
It’s the WiFi, ya sure.
Yeah I was also cringing at that cop out. It doesn’t appear connectivity related. Plus even if it was, it beautifully highlights the connectivity requirement which sucks for so many reasons.
This is why Jobs spent months prepping for each presentation.
But hey, at least it's not all faked
When I was at Meta (then facebook), people lived and died by the live demo creedo.
Pitches can be spun, data is cherry picked. But the proof is always in the pudding.
This is embarrassing for sure, but from the ashes of this failure we find the resolve to make the next version better.
Yep I hope that mindset never dies. Meta is one of the last engineering-first companies in big tech and willing to live demo something so obviously prone to mishaps is a great sign of it. It's not unlike SpaceX and being willing to iterate by crashing Starships for the world to see. You make mistakes and fix them, no big deal.
why did they choose to air this live?
For an internal team sure absolutely, but for public-facing work, prerecorded is the way to go
One of my internships was preparing Bill Gate's demo machines for CES. I setup custom machine images and ran through scripts to make sure everything went off w/o a hitch (I was doing just the demos for Tablet PC, each org presumably had their own team preparing the demos!)
Not doing it live would've been an embarrassment. I don't think the thought ever crossed anyone's mind, of course we'd do it live. Sure the machines were super customized, bare bones Windows installs stripped back to the minimum amount of software needed for just one demo, but at the end of the day it sure as hell was real software running up there on stage.
If it was pre-recorded we’d know it was staged and that assume they didn’t have a working product.
Their actual result was pretty bad, but, ya know, work in progress I guess.
Watch their big "Metaverse" presentation where its all vaporware and faked, presumably this is a cultural shift from that era.
The same unwarranted sense of confidence that tells them this product is worth making tells them that they can easily pull off a live demo. This is called "culture fit"
I saw Jobs give a demo of some NeXT technology and the system crashed and rebooted right in the middle of it. He just said “oops” and talked around it until the system came back up.
i love jobs but i do remember the “everybody please turn off your laptops” presentation.
live demonstrations are tough - i wish apple would go back to them.
Totally agree. Up until a few years ago failures during live demos on stage used to be a mark of authenticity, and companies playing recordings was always written off as exaggerated or fake. Now all of Apple's keynotes are prerecorded overproduced garbage.
Comment was deleted :(
"At least it's not faked" was my main reaction, too. Some other big-tech AI-related demos the last couple years have been caught being faked.
Zuckerberg handling it reasonably well was nice.
(Though the tone at the end of "we'll go check out what he made later" sounded dismissive. The blame-free post-mortem will include each of the personnel involved in the failure, in a series of one-on-one MMA sparring rounds. "I'm up there, launching a milestone in a trillion-dollar strategic push, and you left me @#$*&^ my @#*$&^@#( like a #@&#^@! I'll show you post-mortem!")
I appreciate the live demo but I'm suprised they didn't at least have a prerecorded backup. I wanted to see how video calls work!
Considering there's no camera pointing to your face they can't be all that interesting.
Hearing this AI-generated voice awakens some primal aggression in me.
I have mad respect to them for actually attempting this on the fly - especially a public company. Nothing really to gain versus a scripted demo, and absolutely everything to lose. Admirable.
Obviously scripted, just the LLM didn't follow its part of the script.
For those who didn't pick up on it, they were being sarcastic about the issue being wifi related haha
That was not sarcasm. They were being serious.
It didn't sound like sarcasm at all to me?
Comment was deleted :(
so when I talk but not to it, it may response like i accidentally say siri? Except is every time?
Typical Meta product. I used to believe and wasted money on multiple generations of Quest & Ray-bans. I expect this device to be unsupported at launch, just like Quest Pro was
The portal was like their best product and they just abandoned it.
Smart glasses featuring cameras, a control bracelet, and in-lens displays represent significant technological progress with particularly valuable applications for people with disabilities. The non screen version could be transformative for blind users, while the display equipped model offers great potential for the deaf community. However, there's a notable double standard in social acceptance: while these devices are welcomed when serving accessibility needs, they face resistance when used recreationally, reflecting society's discomfort with wearable recording technology in casual social settings.
Why does this read like AI slop?
I saw the keynote, and while everything about the glasses was more or less as expected, seeing Zuck easily navigate the interface and type 30 words per minute while barely moving his fingers was a true WTF moment. If they can actually make the neural interface work that well then Meta has won this round.
Exactly, felt like the wristband was the big thing. I don't want the glasses, but I'm somewhat curious if it'd be useful as an extra input device when using a computer.
they've been bragging about how good that neural wristband is for years. It's strange they haven't ventured to make a smartwatch with it. Maybe because Zuck has been so focused on AR/VR
One device at a time!
While I agree this is extremely impressive, when I'm out walking, I'm not going to be looking for a convenient flat surface I can rest my hand on so I can type a message. It seems useless in practice.
That's not a limitation - it works in the air, on your leg, other hand, etc.
Does it? Zuckerberg looks like he had to rest his hand on that desk to write, wouldn't he have written in the air if this weren't a limitation?
Doesn’t that make the wrist accessory the important part? The chunky glasses look like they’re still too early, not enough tech.
That's why they are sold as a pair. The glasses are simply a screen strapped to your face. How to control it was always the real problem to be solved (and no, voice was never the answer).
Meta sells your eyes and ears, not your fingers.
> still too early, not enough tech.
At one point I was tracking a company researching beaming images straight on your eye. I think they were MS related, but not sure. After a while they stopped updating, so I guess that went nowhere? It seemed really promising.
It's still certainly early adopter tech. We have the technology for stereo vision and augmented reality. It's just a matter of getting the display and battery and compute bill of materials in order now that they have the screen and a feasible input path.
i was disappointed they didn't say you could connect it to other devices too. I would buy it just as a bluetooth keyboard!
If it was going to blow up then why hasn't those laser beam projected keyboards blown up, or why have mechanical keyboards become so damn popular and not "keyboards on screens?"
This isn't going anywhere.
> why have mechanical keyboards become so damn popular and not "keyboards on screens?"
I mean... have you ever used a phone?
My phone has so far replaced zero of my keyboards.
The vast majority of the planet uses a touchscreen phone or tablet as their primary (and sometimes only) computing device. The tech audience on HN is very far removed from how the rest of the world uses technology.
there are only a few companies where very strong vision, long time horizon and pouring money into said projects come together.
NVIDIA, obviously and Meta are definitely on this list.
Yep "vision" because they are trying to sell you glasses. /s
But Meta's business is clearly getting more and more sweet data from its users. How anyone can not see past this being a surveillance tool for a vast amount of data is unbelievable to me.
the vision is not the glasses. the vision is a connected world.
maybe this is not something that you understand, especially if you're in the US, as there it's common to move farther than the distance between Madrid to Budapest, as an example, but for a lot of people I know, like me, who live more than a 1000km from their childhood friends and 3/4 of the family, any innovation that helps us meet more often and do more things together is welcome.
forget the glasses. it's a step in a direction. there will be many more steps. if you have not already, I urge you to watch Mark's interview at the Acquired event, he talks about his vision there.
do they need money to make all of this happen? of course. you can be part of this as well just by buying META stock.
in the EU I do not need to log in with my facebook account anyway.
From the EU, I really do not care for mr. Zuck. Fool me once, fool me twice, so to speak.
How does the finger thing work? What's he doing? I saw him tippy-tappy but it didn't seem like he's moving through some invisible keyboard.
It’s tracking the EMG signals that trigger your finger tendons. Doing that it knows how your fingers are moving.
It can therefore translate it to a handwritten stroke and then do classical handwriting to text conversion.
But I only type with my index fingers!
You've got to type with your shoulders if you want to avoid RSI!
He's scribbling with his finger.
Typing can also work, but handwriting is simply faster and easier to decode.
sEMG signals correlate with *muscle* activation. When your fingers move, the actuators are the muscles in your forearm, and the tendons relay the force on the joint. Placing the band higher up on the forearm would actually give you better signals, but a wrist placement is much more socially acceptable.
It was hard to see, but it looked like handwriting to me.
For marketing reasons, it needs to be something that people can pick up with absolutely minimal practice.
I doubt it has enough accuracy for a virtual keyboards (since keyboards require precise absolute input and it measures relative), besides, most people aren't experienced with single-hand typing.
A bespoke gesture based shorthand would be optimal, but then users would need to spend months learning this new shorthand.
But (almost) everyone already has experience with handwriting, which is a single hand relative input method. It's the easiest option for people to quickly pick up and enjoy.
Though, it's far from perfect, you can see he is struggling to trick his muscle memory into writing without a pen, and he needs to do it on a solid surface (I'm not sure if that's a technology limitation, or a muscle memory limitation).
Virtual keyboard is completely doable, but too slow.
yep. whatever else you say, Meta's willingness to throw some tech out there is thrilling from a geek / tech perspective.
I can’t find this demo. Am I blind??
https://www.facebook.com/Meta/videos/1927325824791552/
Skip to around 53:00
YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80s0chTOsK0
YouTube link with time mark: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80s0chTOsK0&t=3210
Zuckerberg's online actually quite slick @30 WPM. Brand concerns aside, its a good tech leap forward for this fidelity of communication using gestures(and costs will fall as apple, google, 3rd party get into this). You have to realize that there are only smart glasses in the market which are 1/2 way between smart and AR/VR and at the moment none have any AR/VR that are commercially at this price point or massively available like Orion. I still think the puck will make its usecase be more specialized and will be a hindrance to massive adoption, but things will get smaller and they have separated the power hungry screen made it way less power hungry as an interface goes and they will go after puck's size next.
I have been reading the book called Apple in China and hardware is so hard. 30 hours of battery with wireless communication (I wonder if this is BLE 6.0 alone) between the EMG + Wave guide tech is not easy.
This is the second long term bet by meta that is panning out, the first being investing in long horizon AI projects(pytorch and a bunch of AI models), though that org has had rough times it did yield something good.
It’s six hours battery, not thirty:
with up to six hours of mixed-use battery life and up to 30 hours of battery life total thanks to the portable (and collapsible!) charging case
I would also say several other less known software and data breakthroughs are probably going to also help this tech
1. A world wide localization map that can let the glasses SLAM system do useful things.
2. I believe the Puck runs on a custom OS. The glasses are probably on somekind of a real time Microcontroller driven thing(would be surprised if its much more than firmware, code wise) that needs to efficiently package sensor data and send it over BLE to the puck/wristband. I am not sure they have open sourced those two components.
I hope they open source both of those for public good.
I believe the wristband came from this acquisition: https://www.theverge.com/2019/9/23/20881032/facebook-ctrl-la...
Insanely cool, and awesome to see a viable wave guide device.
It's so cool that it might outweigh my reluctance to strap facebook to my face.
CTRL-Labs themselves acquired the wristband tech from North/Thalmic, who pivoted into smart glasses for a few years before being acquired by Google.
> In an interesting twist, CTRL-Labs purchased a series of patents earlier this year around the Myo armband, a gesture and motion control device developed by North, formerly known as Thalmic Labs. The Myo armband measured electromyography, or EEG, to translate muscle activity into gesture-related software inputs, but North moved on from the product and now makes a stylish pair of AR glasses known as Focals. It now appears the technology North developed may in some way make its way into a Focals competitor by way of CTRL-Labs.
That's not true. Thalmic did develop an sEMG band, but the tech developed here was created by Ctrl-labs and continued development within Meta.
> measured electromyography, or EEG
Should be EMG, but is it normal EMG or sEMG?
surface!
Yes, it seems that the gesture detection is based on the raw time-frequency sEMG signals with data and code for model implementation from the Nature paper available here [1],[2].
[1] sEMG data:
https://fb-ctrl-oss.s3.amazonaws.com/generic-neuromotor-inte...
[2] Code for exploring surface electromyography (sEMG) data and training models associated with Reality Labs' paper:
https://github.com/facebookresearch/generic-neuromotor-inter...
nope. the technology was invented by CTRL-labs, and at Meta after the acquisition.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09255-w
yes the Myo was a similar, earlier, and less capable technology also based on EMG sensing.
I had one of those Thalmic Myo armbands 12ish years ago. Used it a couple of times and then forgot about it. From memory, there were only a few gestures available to program, and anything I could think to sync them to was just as easily handled with keyboard shortcuts (show desktop, close window, change workspace, etc).
The technology was "invented" by CTRL-Labs like how OpenAI "invented" transformer-based language models.
Do you have any evidence or are you just going to go with repeating a bald-face lie?
Disney is about to have a serious talk with Facebook. Disney Research has had a prototype on gesture detection via wristband electric sensing tech since 2012: https://youtu.be/E4tYpXVTjxA?t=2m8s
not the same tech at all.
Cool tech, wrong company.
The tech is impressive, but people are already getting concerned about excessive screen time via zombie doomscrolling. Moving it from the pocket to literally in people's face will only worsen it.
And by Meta of all companies, with concerning privacy practices and of course motivated to hold your attention to serve you more ads.
Meta for a company meant to connect people is doing its darnest to reel us into a virtual world rather than the real one.
Imagine seeing everyone with glasses with suspicion because you don’t know if they’re filming you, reading notifications or actually conversing with you.
Neural band is huge, glad they're shipping it already rather than waiting (years?) for a production version of Orion (the full AR glasses they demo'd a year ago together with this neural band). TheVerge found the controls great, even tried an alpha of handwriting for text input: https://youtu.be/5cVGKvl7Oek
These glasses are just "annotated reality" rather than full AR, with just 1 small display; think Google Glass but 100x more discreet. So discreet input and output on a device with a camera.
I think the backlash against Google Glass was counterproductive - the product was intentionally made to be obvious that someone was wearing it. But because of the backlash, companies that want to do this kind of tech now have to hide it, such as this.
Let's forget that Google, just like Facebook, is an evil corporation with its main line of product being the sale of personal information, with absolutely no regards, except for when some country manages to slap their wrist.
So, it's quite a stretch to say "counterproductive", I'm for one very glad that happened. Sure, I love the tech and what really mind-blowing we could do with it (I was part of devs working with Gglasses) but I don't want these ruthless corps being the ones owning the output.
I'll wait until it is open, with self-hosted infra, and until then, I'll politely ask to remove the glasses if someone is talking to me.
Anyone using Meta Ray-Bans should be aware that your data is collected and used for AI training. There is no opt-out unless you're from EU. Also, the old Meta View companion app one day was renamed into the Meta AI app and started to provide ChatGPT like functionality.
1) “Meta AI with camera use is always enabled on your glasses unless you turn off ‘Hey Meta", which basically makes glasses defunct.
2) “voice transcripts and stored audio recordings are otherwise stored for up to one year to help improve Meta’s products.”
[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/658602/meta-ray-ban-privacy-po...
Incredibile how people can still discuss the pure tech when it's tainted with Meta's touch.
How much can they do before some people think twice? Or are they all employees?
> you can accomplish everyday tasks—like checking messages, previewing photos, and collaborating with visual Meta AI prompts — all without needing to pull out your phone.
Why do I need to pay $800 for this? I already paid a grand to have a phone disrupt my every waking moment!
Sorry, is "collaborating with visual Meta AI prompts" just a casual everyday task we're all doing? I must be missing out!
A Ray Ban sunglasses can run up to $500 already.
They go up to $4,500 (solid gold), but they start at $81 on their website.
Love me some luxottica monopoly pricing!
There's no monopoly. You can buy identical glasses on the side of the street for $10. Except you aren't going to get the RayBan logo, and that's what people are paying for.
> You can buy identical glasses on the side of the street for $10. Except you aren't going to get the RayBan logo
That's funny because the ones sold on my street are $10 and they definitely have the rayban logo
It’s usually the build quality which is usually noticeable by other people looking at it and how they’ll break in a week from light wear
The main reason I avoid cheap sunglasses is that if they only dim in the visible spectrum, your pupil dilates and lets in more UV light than it would have otherwise, damaging the retina. Not that the full spectrum protection explains away the entire premium, but it is a reason not to go for bottom of the barrel ones sold on street corners.
Common glass absorbs most of the UV light, and your lens and cornea absorb the rest. If UV light did hit your retina, you'd actually notice it - people who lack a cornea and/or lens can actually notice UV light, which is why artificial lenses like you'd get after in cataract surgery are now made of UV-absorbant materials.
So unless you have a rare medical condition AND you're buying plastic lens glasses, I think you're worrying for nothing.
All that is true except almost no sunglasses made with the glass lenses. It’s almost all plastic with UV shielding layer.
Technically not a monopoly but colloquially I disagree.
They account for 30% of the global market. They own key brands, license key premium names, and control key distributors like sunglass hut and LensCrafters.
Their cost to manufacture vs sale price shows a clear ability to price like a monopoly. As does their ability to box out competitors.
The $10 look alikes are not identical. They generally are cheaper materials, not polarized or coated, etc.
True for the $10 ones. But you can get very nice sunglasses with coating and polarizing lenses for way less than RayBan. RayBans are nice glasses too but you are mostly paying for the name.
> Their cost to manufacture vs sale price shows a clear ability to price like a monopoly
Again, you are getting confused by branding vs monopoly. They sell luxury goods and can mark them at wild premiums, same as Hermès and Ferrari. None of them are monopolies. Very far from it.
No I’m not. Hermes and Ferrari are one off brands not massive conglomerations of multiple brands. LVMH is also monopoly-like. Ferrari is not even close to 1% of global auto sales, they aren’t moving the market the way Luxottica can. Sure Ferrari has luxury pricing but it’s not boxing you out at Sephora.
>Their cost to manufacture vs sale price shows a clear ability to price like a monopoly.
No, it doesn't. It shows there exists demand for their products at that price point.
>As does their ability to box out competitors.
They have none. Anyone can go to various websites and order cheaper sunglasses that work just as well, or go to Costco and buy them for $25.
this include the band which is also pushing the envelope of HCI mark writing clip https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxfmPX0hba7ulSVL2MyVaS60I0IPm-CQU...
Comment was deleted :(
Now you can wear clothes without pockets.
"We appreciate your honesty! While our data shows a few unoptimized pauses, those afternoon naps, we’re happy to confirm your six-hour rest cycle remains respected. This isn’t just a device; it’s your partner in reclaiming every waking moment with seamless efficiency."
I have the previous generation Meta Ray-Ban glasses and they're great, but I wish I could use the underlying tech for... something more useful. It has no API, no extensibility options, nada. I--and my friends--don't use Messenger, Facebook, etc. I fear it'll be the same w/ the Ray-Ban Display, so I doubt I will be upgrading. Such a shame.
they demoed a spotify widget; will there be an sdk?
I've been using the RayBan Meta glasses for a while now, and the main reason I like them is because they do not have a display (https://balanarayan.com/2024/12/31/ray-ban-meta-long-term-re...). Another screen to glare at is the last thing I need, but I can imagine there are people who want one of this.
I use them for taking videos when I'm out and for listening to music without putting on headphones or earphones. While it is not the best at anything, it is definitely capable of doing a lot of things well enough and that is what matters a lot of times.
Same, but I would love to have map navigation displayed occasionally. I use bicycle in the city a lot and so many times I had to pull the phone (+unlock with face ID) while cycling, just to see the directions, and it's both frustrating and dangerous.
As many others have said, I also have no interest in buying a Meta device, but I’m glad that they’re at least pushing this space forward and hopefully other companies will start doing more R&D.
I had an Oculus CV1 in 2019 but sold it when it became mandatory to migrate to a Meta account.
I'd be the first one to buy these if they weren't made by Meta. I've wanted a pair of smartglasses for a very long time, and these seem like the first viable pair in terms of capabilities - aside from the thickness, which I can live with.
Unfortunately, Meta, and Zuckerberg, have been involved in far too much malfeasance. I just can't ethically justify buying a product from them again. I'm hoping that viable competitors become available, but it's going to be hard to compete with Meta's investment, especially on the HCI front.
Fwiw i don’t have a facebook/instagram account (have whatsapp) and am still able to use all functionality in my Meta Rayban glasses.
I struggled with this question too. Unfortunately our current system doesn’t make it easy for startups to build this stuff at scale without being gobbled up (the FTC under Lina Khan seemed to want to change that but oh well) so Im resigned to using Big Tech products if they’re the only option.
It's a tough needle to thread. I mentor a high school robotics team that's using a Quest 3S as odometry. You'd be astonished at how well a Quest keeps up while both spinning around and moving laterally at 12mph. Imagine an IMU that never, ever drifts no matter how much you whip it around. And you can just buy this thing from the local Best Buy! And it's cheap!
And yet, Meta is squeezing every cent they can out of our attention spans, and knowingly tearing apart the fabric of our society in the process. Do I discourage the kids from doing amazing stuff with Meta's gadgets? I don't think so. They're not my kids. It's not really my place to be having those conversations with them.
> Fwiw i don’t have a facebook/instagram account (have whatsapp) and am still able to use all functionality in my Meta Rayban glasses.
That was the promise when I originally bought the Quest 2, but a year later they forcibly tied those accounts to Meta accounts and through that, facebook accounts. Now I can't use my Quest 2 because it is locked into an account verification screen, demanding that I upload a photograph of my drivers license to access the games I already purchased from the quest store.
Meta cannot be trusted.
That was the promise with the original Rift, not the Quest. The Quest2 required a Facebook account from day one and never worked with an Oculus account, unlike Quest1. They relaxed the requirement in 2022 to only require a Meta account and converted all old accounts to Meta accounts later on (and if you didn't login to 'ok' that change they deleted your account completely including all the games).
If you created the account early in the Quest2's life, or hit the wrong button in the UI, your Meta account will end up linked to your Facebook account.
You might be able to unlink the Facebook account from your Meta account at https://accountscenter.meta.com/accounts, though I don't know if you can still reach the page.
I saw a review on these glasses on YouTube end for the first time I feel like: Okay now we're actually approaching something interesting. This is the first point where I feel like there is some glasses that I actually would want to wear almost. I probably still won't buy these because it's still the first generation of these types of glasses but I think it's promising in the sense that you know in a few years we probably will have some things that are really really good.
so, everybody wearing this in europe will hand out 'may i take photographs of you or your property'-forms + 'do you agree to Facebook's TOS, as your photographs will be uploaded to and processed by them'-forms prior to using this in public? just like owners of all the rolling surveillance stations (some still call them EV) do?
spy state actor's wet dream comes even more true with this, even more than with already overly de-privaciced public spaces.
Very interesting.
And also, I hereby ban them in our office. Thou shalt not wear spyware while looking at the screens that contain our company IP.
Do you also ban cellphones in your office? And email? Text messaging?
If an employee wants to steal your IP, they will.
I'm not unreasonably worried about my coworkers, compared to a software-controlled camera they'd be wearing on their heads and pointing at our code, internal docs, customer information, etc.
And yes, if someone made a habit of pointing their cellphone camera at the screen all day, I would ask them to please knock it off.
I don't trust Facebook installing cameras in our workspace, or trust that they couldn't be compromised by another party who might want to watch what we're doing.
Indeed. Time and time again Facebook/Meta has secretly or openly breached privacy boundaries for their own gain. They cannot be trusted with user data.
Yes. I work on a trading floor. Personal tech is a big issue in the world of private equity, investment banking, capital markets, law, medicine, proprietary research, coding, national defense, homeland security, most government roles, law enforcement, and may other professions. An employee may try to steal IP, but in the case of regulated industries, they can wind up in jail very quickly for doing so. This is no joke, and there is no room for sloppy move-fast-and-break-things jackassery.
Fortunately this is no longer true in most US government roles.
RU kidding? You don't think a monitoring for loyalty is happening right now?
at a company I used to work at, yes, very much so. our personal devices were checked into a locker with security before entering the secured part of the building. you were free to come back out to use it when you needed during the day. the USB ports to our workstations were covered with epoxy. the desktops didn't actually connect to the internet, so email/etc used a remote citrix connection to isolate networks. any network transfer over a set size would send notices. to be honest, it was glorious to be without the device. the shit part was everyday when leaving the office you had to have your bags searched.
You have more control, in theory, on a cellphone, and so do people around you. With the glasses you really have no way to say if they are listening or watching what you see. The phone has most of the time the sensors partially blocked by a bag or a pocket so it really can't be compared with eyewear.
So, no smartphones in your office?
Edit: Lmao, fake downvotes while another comment which is essentially the same gets upvoted. The veil has been lifted :D.
I refuse to buy hardware from Meta again. I bought two Portal TV from them and it discontinued and not supported within two years. Now I have two junks in my drawer. :(
cries in Oculus Go :(
> released on May 1, 2018 to generally positive reviews. By July 2019, the Go was estimated to have sold over two million units. On June 23, 2020, Facebook Technologies announced it would be ending the sales of the Oculus Go later that year
Comment was deleted :(
ending sales is not the same as ending support; use the correct dates!
The Oculus Go was discontinued June 2020, the shop was locked down for any further updates or new games December 2020, that's just six months apart. They did "support" it with security updates until 2022, but it's pretty dead when no new games can be sold.
I used the correct dates, at least the text is copied/pasted from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oculus_Go
At least they released an update in 2021 that allows people to "root" the device so it won't rely on the cloud services anymore -- a pretty rare occurrence for abandoned products!
John Carmack was the driving force behind this!
I like the look of the Oakleys better than the Raybans. I get why they want to make their glasses look like Rayban Wayfarers, because they're the most neutral inconspicuous glasses frame style of the last 25 years, but, IMO, they missed the mark pretty bad, and they look pretty conspicuous and pretty bad.
You won't blend in wearing the Oakleys, but they look like what they are, which is an insane mirrorshades cyberpunk HUD, and if the wearer can own that they could actually look kind of sick.
Of course, I'm technically underwhelmed and unimpressed by what I've seen of the actual technology, but that's hardly the most important thing.
What do people think about the (almost hidden) cameras in glasses?
With traditional cameras, feature phones, and smartphones, if someone wanted to be creepy with the camera, they'd have to point the device at someone, which tended to look exactly like they are using the camera.
(IIUC, some countries even required a shutter sound, for anti-creepy reasons, when the pointing of the phone wasn't enough warning.)
Now, the wearer of the glasses spy camera just has to look in the general direction that creepiness should be sprayed.
The creepiness isn't even that of the wearer; it could also be that of the tech company.
Is this going to end up another Google "Glassholes" situation, with the wearers shunned?
There's a pretty bright light that turns on when the camera is recording, and if you try and cover the light the camera won't work. Their existing glasses are pretty popular and there haven't been big compaints about it. If you really wanted to do secret recordings there are plenty of better and cheaper glasses in the market for it.
I'm really not a fan of them. There's already too much recording going on on a daily basis. I would personally avoid anyone wearing these. They say the mandatory LED activation prevents the issue, but I still don't trust it, and find it very off putting either way.
They've had the camera glasses part for a few years now.
But currently not very popular.
there are millions in the wild ... so maybe not super popular but it's above penetration of anything you would call a niche product
Millions in the wild, but mostly sitting in a drawer.
https://www.wsj.com/tech/personal-tech/metas-ray-ban-smart-g...
That's about gen 1, gen 2 is vastly more successful
Is it? I've seen zero people wearing them in central london.
Many years ago there was some summer camp and the staff organized a game "take a picture of your team leader without having them realize you're taking a picture". I completely obliterated the game by downloading an app that allowed me to record "in the background". I got a few good shots by showing a funny picture to people while having the front-facing camera on. Then I got other shots by turning on the back camera, locking the phone, and then just casually holding it in my hand like any other locked phone and waving it around.
The point is, if you want to secretly record, it's already trivial to do it.
So, your point is: "things are already bad now, no harm in making it worse"?
Imagine talking to a "glasshole" for the first time. The "glasshole" is being able to do facial recognition while talking to you, and see a ton if info about you before you've been able to introduce yourself. What could possibly go wrong?
I won’t buy another Meta device. Bought the Quest 3 and now they keep installing games and apps on the device that I cannot remove to promote things. I don’t want any of that. Will most likely be replacing it with the Valve Deckard/Frame device as soon as possible.
The biggest thing stopping me from getting these is knowing that a derivative of Meta's Orion AR prototype will release to manufacturing in the next few years, and this just feels like a stop-gap.
But the wrist/hand control is the thing that impressed me the most in today's release. I'd hope for this to go far beyond just the glasses.
Every piece of tech has a better version a year or two away. If you keep waiting then you are never going to buy anything.
I can end up buying from a non-evil company?
The nice thing about AR/VR is that a better version will always come out in a couple of years so you can always wait. I love VR as a concept and some years late I bought a Valve Index and am considering a Bigscreen 2 but really the best thing to do is always wait.
> knowing that a derivative of Meta's Orion AR prototype will release to manufacturing in the next few years
You actually know that? how? Just the leaked road map or something more concrete?
Well, Apple might be Cooked (pun very much intended). Tim is apparently very focused on AI glasses, but here is Meta with display-enabled glasses a year before Apple is planning to release anything.
Source: https://www.macrumors.com/2025/05/21/apple-smart-glasses-eve... or some other Mark Gurman leak
If Apple launches a similar product it already comes with a huge brand advantage, although Tim Cook has been working to squander that reputation recently. Regardless, an Apple version would like be local-first and come with stronger privacy controls than anything Meta releases, and that alone is a huge advantage for glasses that will be worn into the bathroom.
We all love to say this, but everyone forgets: Apple has never beaten competitors by being the first – they’ve beaten them by being the best.
Personal computers? Apple wasn’t first. Smartphones with screens? Apple wasn’t first. Tablets? Not first by a mile. True Wireless Earbuds? Nope, not at all first. Smartwatches? Hell no, not first.
And yet, Apple’s a category leader in every single one of these areas.
I don’t think it matters if Meta releases something first; Apple wins by doing it way better. Arguably, Vision Pro was way too early, even though it’s an incredible experience.
I think it's a "yes but" here. AI is the first transition point since the smartphone. Apple knows how to make hardware, and knows how to make software. I am extremely unconvinced Apple has a clue about what to do with AI.
You can't just jump in, the lead up to getting this stuff going is a 5 year+ horizon, and Google, Meta, OpenAI and Anthropic are still moving exceptionally fast. Apple has shown they are nowhere near. They missed the boat on buying Anthropic, OpenAI was never going to sell with Musk behind it. There's no path forward for them, let alone catching up.
They also don’t own a search engine, yet google pays them $20B annually
To be fair, Meta is also not the first company to launch smart glasses with a display.
But the reality of it is that it's probably still to early to say if these devices will have mainstream appeal. I see a lot of people saying "well, i no longer need to take the phone out my pocket", but that has been the case for a couple of years with smartwatches, for example, and it has not meaningfully changed our dependency from the smartphone or the smartphone market dynamics that much.
What does wins even mean, then? Apple doesn't dominate a market. They make competitive hardware that integrates well with its ecosystem. If there's a market for smart glasses they'll probably use the same strategy.
Wat. Vision Pro was a complete flop, Airpods aren't the best on the market, Apple Watch isn't the best on the market
VR in general was a flop. Airpods and Apple watch I'm fairly sure are way ahead of the rest in sales. Airpods on their own are bigger than most tech companies in sales.
Ya sure, they have more sales volume. Doesn't mean they're better. Toyota tells more cars than Rolls Royce.
Top-shelf wireless earbuds aren't from Apple. Same for smart watches.
"better" is subjective. Competitors might offer advantages in a narrow scope, but clearly as an overall package, consumers think the Apple product is best since they choose to buy them over the alternatives.
You are absolutely right. The average consumer is super smart. Has great taste. Definitely knows what's best.
Sells like a Toyota for the price of a Rolls Royce, kind of a win to me? And with a much better brand than Google or Facebook.
i love love my airpods pro. curious what is better than those?
No- they beat them by squatting on the most generic logical human friendly style so that other companies can't copy the most natural conception. They're copyright colonialists.
People keep saying this, but it is absolutely not true.
Apple was first to the personal computer. First to the smartphone. First to the tablet. First to wireless earbuds. The vast majority of the company's revenue comes from segments where they had a multi-year head start over their competitors.
In fact products where they play catch up are more prone to failing (Vision Pro, Airpods Max, Homepod, Maps, MobileMe, Ping, Music Connect, AirPower, Airport).
Not the first to personal computer. maybe first mass produced with a GUI with Lisa. We can always narrow a definition and find a first. Not first to the smartphone, but first to combine desktop quality browsing with mobile touch screen etc.
I don't remember about the rest, but we definitely had smartphones long before the iPhone.
They were first in phone with touch interface and no keyboard. In terms of other capabilities/apps there were other phones much more powerful and capable.
Edit: even for touch LG Prada was first.
They absolutely were not first to the smart phone, that was blackberry. It's just that blackberry sucked. They were first to PC but I don't think they were first to laptop.
Sure you can go back well before blackberry to find even earlier versions of the smartphone but the type we all use today was introduced by Apple.
They just removed the physical keyboard. Pretty much everything else about a modern phone was either added in later years or already existed. The first iphone was extremely basic.
...what?
Aside from maybe the personal computer, they were not the first to any of those. BlackBerry/Palm/Windows Mobile devices all existed prior to the iPhone; the LG Prada was announced prior to the iPhone and had a similar form factor. Many tablet PCs existed before the iPad. Many Bluetooth earbuds existed prior to the AirPods.
They did a much better job of integrating each of these into a cohesive experience, but they absolutely had predecessors in each category.
Maybe we should really think twice when purchasing new amazing gadgets. It can be this, a drone, a phone or anything that comes to your mind.
The default has become to get consumers locked in as much as possible, be for your data or money exploitation or both (check the Slack thread for a non the non-profit HackClub).
If you pay 800 dollars for this device and a year after they ask you for your driver's license (as for the top comment). Are you willing to waste those 800 dollars you payed for it or will you upload any sensitive docs demanded from them? Or if they decide to phase it out early because there is no real adoption, will you get your money back? Will they make the device open so it can still be used by their "owners"?
So the way I see it: you give big money to already super rich companies. You also give them your data. You are forced to comply their rules and in even in any of those cases when they decide you shouldn't use it anymore they deprecate it and keep the device close. No, thanks.
The bottom line is this: do extensive research before making a single penny leave your wallet to try to minimize getting fucked up as much as you can.
We should educate as many people surrounding us as possible so they can make good or informed purchase decisions as well.
This should also be taught to children so from an early age they can understand very well that privacy and data has proven to be extremely profitable to virtually any company out there.
I'm not sure I'll ever get over my concerns about making people around me uncomfortable to ever don one myself, but I hear the non-display ones are breakthrough assistive devices for impaired folks and this one might be too with the captioning.
I wonder how the etiquette will evolve for people with legitimate needs to use them in polite company.
I do see them being recognized more and sometimes banned (eg i saw a video of a strip club stopping someone with those glasses from entering). But otherwise… meh? We already know everyone around us is carrying incredibly high powered cameras in their pockets.
> designed to help you look up and stay present. With a quick glance at the in-lens display
Right… so having notifications in your face ALL DAY is going to _help_ you stay connected to the real world.
The best part of this tech is the being recorded by random strangers without you noticing. I can’t wait to learn about who and what gets access to this data. Let’s go surveillance state!
I really like the product, but the fact it's tied to having a meta account makes it a no go for me, won't test it.
Privacy and vendor lock-in concerns aside, these glasses are ugly. They look like generic nerd stereotype glasses from an 80's movie.
Seems a bit "privacy eroding." Like Google Glass, but chonkeyer.
I wonder if they plan to use the glasses as some rudimentary EEG device to read intent or emotions
> …based on data from nearly 200,000 consenting research participants…
They had to clarify it was “consenting” since it’s the opposite of their normal default.
(You also have to wonder how consensual it really was.)
This is beginning to mirror the evolution of the Smart Phone.
The Apple Vision Pro is AR glasses at the Apple Newton evolutionary stage, an early smart PDA (Yes I'm the sucker that bought both at their respective launch, 3 decades apart).
The Meta Ray-Ban Display is AR glasses at the Windows Mobile/Blackberry stage.
Apple will likely swoop in and launch the final refined version of the AR glasses (thin, 8 hour battery, eye gaze control, retina based authentication, tethered to the iPhone, Apple AI, etc), when the tech is available at a decent price point for mainstream launch.
And yes, being the unrepentant Apple FanBoi, will be buying the Apple iGlass at the launch.
Apple is very well positioned since they also sell you a super computer in your pocket.
One of my biggest annoyances is the OS on the Ray Ban Metas. If they just served as dumb I/O they'd be an incredible product and everything else about them, e.g. battery life, weight etc, would be so much better.
I really hope that Apple is working on this. It seems like they have at least some of the framework through the Vision; if they fire that team/abandom this software its gonna be a huge mistake.
Apple really plays the long game. More than 10 years ago, on a now defunct website for AAPL investors, there was an Apple employee who inadvertently blurted out about how his work at Apple was related to researching saccades & micro-saccades, the small rapid eye movements of the eye, as it never stays completely still, even during “fixation".
Apparently eye tracking must distinguish meaningful gaze from the natural jitters. I was thinking at that time, as an AAPL investor, that Apple seems to be wasting money on worthless R&D endeavors.
It only became apparent to me, much later with the launch of the Apple Vision Pro, how his seminal research on saccades contributed to the design and realization of the AVP.
I like the glasses path, well I do wear glasses, but some elements remain unclear to me:
- are prescription glasses available for display ? I guess not ? - these glasses need to be online, I guess they do so with a phone and bluetooth connection nearby ? So that's the glasses, the band and the phone, oh and the glasses case, seems a lot to carry. - pedestrian navigation seems to be rolled out per city, so it's not like having gmaps available right out of the box.
Can’t wait to see Apple’s response. Only reason I’m not buying one of these September 30th is I know apple will release something better.
Well that and it being a meta product.
Whether you like Meta or not, the success of their glasses line means Apple and other companies will respond.
Didn't Google Glass do the exact same thing and failed? Not because of the technology issues, but social issues.
People nowadays want to disconnect from technology more, not to have it even closer.
Google Glass looked unusual and was nerd-coded. Social norms are extremely strong. The only way something that looks like Google Glass would take off is if the tech is established with the well-to-do having elegant devices, and then something like Google Glass becomes working-class-coded.
Their problem was that they didn't look like normal sunglasses, so people were immediately intrigued/suspicious of them. Although these have the little light if you're recording, the amount of instagram videos where creators are using these and the random people they're directly talking to don't notice, should tell you all.
The rise of smart accessories (especially watches) should tell you that a lot of people don't want to disconnect
Google Glass launched too early, when people cared more about privacy.
Bet you GG though actually treated your PII with respect
For all my numerous complaints about Google
I don’t see how this is any more socially acceptable than walking around with your camera on filming everyone all the time.
The fact that it’s FB that can see through your eyes doesn’t make this any better.
What's with the trend in photography with lighting the subject's face in chunks? I know they're trying to drive your attention towards the wrist and the eyeglasses, but having half the face be blocked out by a flag or masked in post is super distracting.
This is very cool; It seems likely to be the next step in human computer interaction. I could see Meta (or someone else) adding cellular features and a small screen to the wristband and getting rid of a phone entirely.
Tested has a hands on plus interview with Boz (their CTO) https://youtu.be/1jDorDsi9JM?si=O1_g9Z-rgGjyVER3
Some very negative comments here... Regardless of personal thoughts about Meta and AR tech, it's undeniable that these are interesting and have some cool tech.
The live captioning with directional audio seems like it could be a huge win for people who are hard of hearing, especially given the display is invisible so is much more natural to use in real life than say a smart phone or a VR headset with passthrough.
Another thing that's cool is the neural band. It looks like it's a more robust and flexible implementation of what Apple is doing with hand tracking.
But generally the idea that you can interact with the glasses silently with your hands to your side while wearing what effectively looks like a normal pair of glasses is incredible. I think this this is the first time we've seen an implementation of AR in which a large group of people could see value in it.
Also the fact Meta was first to market with a solid implementation of AR and not Apple or Google is also notable. I think I would have doubted their ability to pull something like this off a few years ago.
Yeah, I've been deaf for over 40 years now and captioning glasses are something that I've wanted ever since I was a kid. I'm not a particularly big fan of Meta and I have some serious reservations around privacy that need to be satisfied, but at the same time it's really exciting to see this going from "pie in the sky thing I dreamed about having when I was ten" to "actual existing product."
There's a few other companies/startups working on this too, but a lot of the glasses they're producing are very ugly. There's a couple that didn't look bad, but from what I'm seeing Meta's are a combination of the best-looking ones and best display so far, and I'll be very curious to see the reviews.
Not a big fan of Meta but got to admit the tech is interesting. Can't wait to see the competition on this market.
The very first thing I though was: "yeah, they're gonna shovel advertising directly into my retina"
Really excited about these types of products. Would never trust anything with Meta, but I appreciate them trying to contribute a product. Unfortunately, it’s a dead end. Mark’s always regretted missing mobile - and thus being the app rather than the platform - and here it’s no different.
AI Glasses With an EMG Wristband available Sept 30 for $799
Is there a way to just use this as a computer monitor? That’s what the Viture glasses are and it’s great to have a portable monitor that focuses at a longer distance.
Is it weird I went through the complete landing page and still did not get what actually the features are
The evolution of smart glasses has totally passed me by since the Google Glass thing. Whenever I heard about them I just thought they were still in the "gimmick" stage. But last week I heard about Meta glasses for the first time and realized that people actually seem to use them, in a practical way?
If these things are now to the point of realistic adoption, I'd be interested in getting a pair, specifically to record and get on demand info/maps/AI integration maybe on runs, hikes, and other adventure/exploration-type settings... and recording my cats... But now a whole can of questions is opened:
- What products are developed enough this area that are worth choosing between?
- Don't trust meta due to privacy and data exploitation concerns. Are any other products on the same level in terms of hardware + software quality, or is it just going to have to be a compromise (or waiting until something else is good enough?)
- Responsiveness/UX/photo/video quality etc...
Part of me kind of wishes I was still ignorant to the advancements of these so I could keep ignoring them as a gimmick and not be tempted to dive into researching the product category...
I got so excited watching these videos and going through the product page. I completely ignored the price tag without putting any resistance and I thought to myself: I'VE GOT TO HAVE THIS!
Not only that... I started to think about ways I could use this!! I pictured myself using them... I visualized it all, and then remembered when I felt this way when the Ipod was released, and then again, when the first Pebble watch was launched or maybe even, the first kindle.
Although there's going to be some strong competition in the next 1-2 years with Apple, as we all know, the "thin phone" is nothing about the phone, and all about their pathway towards wearables...
I must have this. This is a game changer. WOW!
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You seem to be based in Europe. Do you not realize that using these glasses in public will violate the GDPR, making this gadget useless?
who ever's downvoting my comment... You're literally trying to shut up the positive review due to your lack of empathy? WTF? This is my preference, I'm an expert in tech and I don't hold your negative views... Stop trying to control the narrative.
Is anyone else seeing concerns about where this technology is heading --
(A) Are we going to consume food prepared by a human so incompetent that he needs Live AI to tell him what ingredient to put and how much ... and that too an AI so unreliable that it can't tell whether the bowl is empty, let alone what ingredients are in it.[1]
In what world is this a sane marketing proposition?
(B) Distracted driving due to smartphones is at least detectable -- how do we escape distracted driving because of smart glasses?
When people eventually crash cars or walk into traffic or fall into pits -- no tech company will so much as acknowledge that the tech they are pushing so hard might have something to do with it.
Who should take the lead on saying: wait a minute we need some common sense boundaries around this ... some ground rules around responsible use of technology.
[1] Failed demo of Live AI - https://x.com/ns123abc/status/1968469616545452055
> Are we going to consume food prepared by a human so incompetent that he needs Live AI to tell him what ingredient to put and how much
Yes, I have cookbooks full of recipes I follow.
> When people eventually crash cars or walk into traffic or fall into pits -- no tech company will so much as acknowledge that the tech they are pushing so hard might have something to do with it.
Adults have agency and I expect them to be held accountable for their actions; not use technology as a scapegoat. If someone drives drunk it's not the alcohol at fault.
Dont worry. The market decides what we want and we just wont go for it
Already banned (no pun intended) in many places because of the intrusive camera.
Use cases: 1: FPV "how-to" videos are marginally easier to make, though GoPro remains a thing...
2: Users get to look like the nerd emoji
3: The rest seems like creepy-spying-on-friends-or-strangers kinds of things. Any constructive suggestions? I'm willing to be enlightened...
4. On-foot navigation without having to glance down at the phone or watch
5. Being able to converse with friends in loud places (e.g. restaurants have become louder and louder over the years due to bad acoustic design)
I tried to record every day things with my action cam and I always feel like a weirdo with a box hanging off, I think these would help me not care about that as much,
Out of curiosity, for what purpose? Do you go back and watch your videos of everyday things? Share them with friends? With photography (and most visual media) the secret seems to be to take many many photos, or draw many many pictures, or shoot tons of video, and then curate and edit meticulously to find just the very best parts. Do you really get much value out of recording lots of day to day video? Is this part of some kind of art project?
At the surface they seem like I’m recording for my parents (we live very far from each other). Deep down I would like to get YouTube income eventually.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCDWKdmwhUI
regina dugan's f8 keynote 8 years ago
where they announced they were working on a 'haptic vocabulary' for a skin interface as well as noninvasive brain scanning technologyu\
How does anybody see anything if they ban rays?
It's hard to imagine using these for more than 30 minutes in my day. If I'm at work, whatever these can display I'd rather have on my monitor. When I'm socializing, I wouldn't want random popups or notifications, and I certainly wouldn't want whoever I was with to be looking at them either. So that leaves some pretty narrow use cases such as the cooking example in meta's demo, which might be interesting if it actually works well (the demo did not inspire confidence). So I'd end up using this maybe 30 minutes, every 3 or 4 days? Most of the time I know what I'm doing with my ingredients and don't particularly need AI assistance to combine noodles w/ sauce or whatever I'm doing. That's a very, very hard sell.
What are the privacy guarantees for passerbys (non-wearers).
You can sue the wearers for reparations and to work with Meta to delete your data, perhaps
Zero… you can and will be filmed without your knowledge or consent and your private conversations will be used to train ever more invasive AI systems and profiles of you will be sold to advertisers and governments all over the world.
I strongly recommend making owners of these things feel incredibly unsafe and uncomfortable in social situations. I wouldn’t hesitate to break a pair when I get the opportunity personally.
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I think the tech is really cool. But I was actually hoping for a device that does the whole "phone strapped to my face" thing without actually looking like one. I mean if I'm already staring at my screen, why not make it easier?
Pretty cool hardware. Count me in if and when it supports interesting software.
There's the rub isn't it? We've been doing AR for over ten years at this point and I can't name a single blockbuster app besides Pokemon Go.
I can’t believe they believe this is what people want. Why isn’t Zuckerberg doing the demo in the metaverse? Ha
I continue to be amazed by people rushing to give away even more of their personal data to a large corporation, especially one with Meta's privacy-challenged history.
Meta is the second last company I trust to put an wearable on my face.
I wonder if these are also available in prescription form? I imagine this would be harder due to the light guide in the lens
They are (only within +/- 4 though)
Oh that wouldn't be a problem but I would need astigmatism correction. They might not have that.
And progressive lenses. There’s still a long way to go.
Interesting tech, but the item is completely without any attractive style. Look up "army birth control glasses"
(Sorry about the google search link. Apple and Google go out of their way to hide the url when doing searches on Google from mobile Safari.)
https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=046dc2c9c0fa6748&udm=2...
This is what no one else can seem to understand. The iPad was created in Apple's labs before the iPhone. But Jobs and other staff made the decision to wait several years to launch the phone until the tech caught up to the ambition. They had a certain ascetic they wanted in addition to the hardware and it required time.
In this case, it looks like opposite. The tech is finally getting there, but the design team has no sense of making a daily wear product that people should reasonably want to wear. If I imagine a large population of people wearing these daily, it's going to look like middle and high school students from the 70s and 80s in yearbook photos.
What's awful is that I'm one of the most fashion ignorant people I know. I wear the same type of shirts and shoes because they're comfortable not stylish. And my glasses are as minimal frame as possible because I don't want a large mass of matter sitting on my face. Even that being said, this product just reminds me of my buddy's army photo of him wearing the Army issued glasses. Not good.
>Apple and Google go out of their way to hide the url when doing searches on Google from mobile Safari.
What? It's only 2 clicks away. You can click the copy button after hitting the share button. /s
Yup. I can go to any other of billions of domains in the world and just see the url, but because Google and Apple have a special compensatory friendship we can't do that.
I use Kagi so I don’t get the search terms in my address bar, I get the full url like you would any other site, and I find it very annoying. Well, I did, I’m used to it now but it is definitely a step backwards imo.
I could not be less interested. As the world determine their relationship with their phone needs distance, Zuck has decided everyone wants a phone on their face. Doubt it.
I don't think I can state this hard enough, but there is no tech cool enough that would make me comfortable allowing meta to see through my eyes.
Just never in a million years.
Google Glass again ...
My neighbour is gonna buy this one as well and I bet it’s going to end up in the same junk drawer as the last one.
It seems like a pattern that Meta hardware usually sells relatively well, but then struggles with user retention. It happened with the Quest and so far it's happening with the glasses too. People like the idea of the products much more than the reality of actually using them.
https://www.theverge.com/2023/8/3/23818462/meta-ray-ban-stor...
Good point.
OTOH, for me the Quest killer app is Ace. I can practice pistol shooting any time I want, which keeps me using the headset every day. For the glasses, the killer app might be translation. Now, I couldn't say if that will 'translate' into widespread user retention, or — like Ace — only really keep a smaller community engaged (I don't think most users need translation services on a regular basis).
It's not so much the hardware, it's the lack of software to use with the hardware. Nobody wants to wait until real hardware exists and risk losing consumer interest, yet they risk losing consumer interest with these half baked products. Sibling comment claims a killer app, but there hasn't truly been a killer app that makes people willing to use the product all the time. The new wears off, and then the use just craters.
I think continuing to go for the classic Ray-Ban look is a mistake. I don't think this product is enticing to the Ray-Ban crowd at this point. Ray-Bans are for looking effortlessly cool, not maybe secretly filming people, it's a wolf in sheep's (bulging) clothing. I would go for more steampunk goggles. Get nerds and hobbyists really excited about it. Create a new lane.
I don't think these look like classic Ray-Bans. It looks like someone selected Wayfarers and then ran stroke path 30px. They're basically the clip art version of Ray-Bans.
Ray-Buns.
Why are Ray-Ban doing this, is Meta paying them a boatload?
I'm not negative on the Meta glasses, I think a device like this is the future, even still this hurts Ray-Bans reputation in my eyes.
It's like if Rolex made a smart watch, the tech just doesn't mesh well with a "luxury" brand.
A version that is just plainly nerdy (and more comfortable) might not be a bad idea; maybe call it the developer version or something to avoid any association with fashion or luxury.
> Meta Ray-Ban Display is part of our vision to build the next computing platform that puts people at the center so they can be more present, connected, and empowered in the world.
Err what? How do glasses that let you procrastinate when physically connecting to people help that?!
Also the video demo has no sound and one of the examples genuinely looked like the wearer was having a text a convo with someone whilst sat across from people at dinner…
Seems like Apple should get the wristband tech so people can type on their watches.
I would give up some privacy in order to get some cool future tech; honestly I’m so in love with sci fi that I’m pretty excited to be fully connected to my own ai 24/7 like how iron man did it.
This is getting closer to the ideal product, but I’m gonna wait for the one from Apple that I know it will be well-tested and integrate with my device. I’m sure it’s coming in the next few years. I can only imagine the pain that will come with trying to get the half-baked Meta ecosystem to cooperate with my iPhone.
What is it with the Meta site disabling the back button on the browser?
I can understand why apps like Instagram - when used in the browser - wouldn't be compatible. But this product release page? What's going on here? Why?
Still no way to replace battery, so in 3 years tops this thing is e-waste.
That is also true of most smartphones. Smartphone batteries can be replaced, but specialty equipment and training is required. It's the same problem here, but much worse: they have to pack a significant amount of hardware into the space available. Even if they wanted to, it's unlikely that they could offer user-serviceable batteries.
TWS are better comparison. Smartphone battery need to be changed in 3-5 years and should cost < $50. People throw them away because new one is better and they have money.
Someone help me understand why the Ray-Ban branding? Meta should be able to make the frames themselves. Ray-Ban doesn't seem to be a strong enough brand that Meta couldn't go it solo and build a glasses brand themselves.
if there is a custom os for these i d buy them. i am not running meta os
I'm sorry but these all look terrible still. Ya'll look like dorks walking around on with them on. It's such a privacy invasion too. So many people are just going to get punched in the face, literally.
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I’m 99% sure that EMG band is collecting several biomarkers and sending them all to facebook headquarters, get ready to get mattress ads when your HRV goes down.
Fight the future !
It's fine. I still don't have a need for this in my life, and it's impractical as a replacement (good luck keeping them on once you start sweating) - you're still going to need your phone.
So that means this is just adding 2 more gadgets, both of which I now need to wear?
Nah. Not happening.
Neat gestures though.
> So that means this is just adding 2 more gadgets
Yeah, I see where this is going. (And here I am wanting less gadgets.)
You'll still need to have a phone, yes, but if the glasses reduce the number of times you pull it out of your pocket then I'd consider them worthwhile. Same as a smartwatch.
Finally the Joo-Janta peril sensitive sunglasses I always wanted
"Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses are designed to help you look up and stay present. With a quick glance at the in-lens display, you can accomplish everyday tasks—like checking messages, previewing photos, and collaborating with visual Meta AI prompts — all without needing to pull out your phone. It’s technology that keeps you tuned in to the world around you, not distracted from it."
WHAT IN THE HOLY FUCK DID I JUST READ
"Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses are designed to help you look up and stay present."
Didnt that stupid AI pin have the same tagline?
Looks like there were some bloopers during the demo: https://x.com/nearcyan/status/1968473003592990847
Huge respect to Zuck and co; I much rather authentic demos where stuff goes pear than some glossy marketing spiel by a non-technical exec.
Also, I didn't know this demo was taking place until afterwards, meta really should do more to publicise their demos, especially given they're actually making cool new stuff, unlike a lot of other big tech companies who are more about rent-seeking, advertising and enshitifying than inventing.
Incredibly cool!
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Meta really desperately wants to own a platform so they can avoid paying the Apple tax and the Google tax and directly plumb a vision to ads pipeline.
Just imagine the dollars in front of those glasses… if it only darned worked.
I really hope they don’t though because it’s beyond dystopian to own such a billboard company with a sick twist.
The camera access is limited to Meta, no 3rd party developers. For privacy reasons. Meta ♥ privacy
CapitalOne Meta Ray-Ban Display, brought to you by Costco.
Im sold, but it appears there isn’t a single place in my major metro of 7 million that will offer in store demo and purchase? Do they not want my money?!
$799 for this ?
They keep pushing this useless augmented reality to the sunglasses sometimes without sometimes with vr, ai, whatever new hype is there, it all failed, this one will fail too, there simply is no use.
Nope. I like the idea, but that is just still way too bulky, and just the fact that this is meta makes me want to steer clear.
I was a bit disappointed to see it was a single display and no mention of AR. Even if it wasn't stereoscopic you could still have world locked visuals.
But I realized this is a pretty clever move. Only allowing a fixed, inset screen really hides any issues with display field of view.
Can I hack it? Can I load whatever OS and software I wish to run on it?
No? Then no thank you.
At first I was shocked by the price, but now I just sort of want it. If they opened the OS it would be AMAZING.
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nobody is gonna use this, it's the Humane device except on a glasses.
So this is like Alexa in glasses with a band that lets you do things without speaking? Sounds like a cool technology. I can see how it is useful for sport (bike riding, running, etc; hopefully people don't use it while driving), but to be honest, not something I'm too excited about buying. It feels more of the same.
As a theoretical matter, this is some nifty stuff. Hats off to everyone involved, as a simple matter of engineering.
As a practical matter, this feels too Orwellian. I don't want necessarily want to emit that much information (he said, looking at his Galaxy smart phone and watch) all the time.
Possibly I'm trending Luddite in my dotage.
I feel like this and this (https://www.visor.com/) are going to converge into the same thing. If you really think about it, the average person will only ever use AR glasses for hands free camera, mic/headphone, and to see notifications. If they get really good, then a map overlay of the world. But real productivity will require it to start converging into a bigger visor type headset that is definitely not the same bulky VR form factor. The bulky VR form factor is DOA ergonomically for productivity imho.
Lastly, I don't put it past humanity to actually be interested in seeing ad overlays throughout the world because it's just ... cool, at least at first.
Killer feature for me:
I'd like to see that 3D marker in the world that I need to walk towards like a video game.
Visor is largely vaporware (to put it mildly). It’s the form factor Apple is aiming with version 2 or 3 of Vision Pro
It’s a very different experience to passthrough, no matter how small you make the glasses, so I’m not sure there’s a clear path to convergence
>The only wave guide device out there with > 42 pixels per degree (ppd) is a giant headset that isn’t sold commercially anymore.
Magic Leap.
Are you countering that's the name of a device that does this, or the name of the device that isn't sold any more? I didn't think ML ever made it to anything viable. They just gave great demo
The Magic Leap 1 and 2 were commercially available to some degree, but they were not successful. I can't speak to their PPD, but I can't imagine it was that amazing.
The HoloLens devices might be another set of candidates.
The Magic Leap was around 30 pixels per degree when it was still sold. https://kguttag.com/2022/01/31/magic-leap-2-at-spie-ar-vr-mr...
I'm getting Macworld 2007 vibes
I am getting Phillips CDI vibes. It takes me back to a mid 90s infomercial where products will built by marketing departments and companies with cash to splash. There is just no bottom up cool factor. At all.
reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhZdWvnF3do
What's this 30 minute ad?! Who was the intended audience!
> There is just no bottom up cool factor. At all.
That's just like, your opinion, man.
The wrist thing is kind of cool but he has to set his arm down to type 30wpm so maybe in a few iterations it’ll be more compelling.
The glasses seem pointless to me for now. I’m surprised he didn’t add a booty zoom in view. We thought of that idea way back in middle school. Seems like something he’d vibe with.
Did you watch the video link and compare? Curious what you think? Or are you just trolling? I bring substance and you bring negging
I grew up on the internet, I know what the CD-i is. Smart glasses are cool. For $800, I'd get one tomorrow if someone had a reproducible jailbreak. I own an Oculus Quest that was worth every dime.
Too often HN threads devolve into the same tired comparisons about laserdisks and Palm Pilots. The only precedent we have for a product like this failing is Vision Pro, and this is nothing like that. Your comment was jumping to a conclusion that I think many would disagree with.
Even if it doesn't get a jailbreak it will still be a gamechanger. It's far more of an open platform than iOS ever was. Sideloading Android apps on the Meta Quest doesn't require any hax, I imagine it will be the same on the Meta Display. An SSH client on this thing will be a huge boost in productivity for me. Can just randomly sit on a park bench and write some code w/ my pocket bluetooth keyboard. This will reduce 90% of my need to bring my laptop out of the house.
gods the frames are always so thick and ugly...
It's weird that they give a figure for PPV but not FOV. That tells me that the FOV must be pretty terrible
The Verge's article says it's 600x600 over a 20 degree FOV.
Pretty disappointed that prescription is limited to -4/+4!
It's cool in theory, but frankly my mental health is significantly improved if I don't stare at a screen all day.
considering meta is short for metadata, this opens up whole new avenues of data harvesting
yeah so if you need info on people at Harvard just ask
i have over 4000 emails, sns...
"what? how'd you manage that one?"
people just submitted it, i don't know why. they "trust me". dumb fucks
Pre-release discussion yesterday:
Meta RayBan AR glasses shows Lumus waveguide structures in leaked video - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45266215 - Sept 2025 (124 comments)
Updated, thanks!
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Please don't do this. It's unfair on people who are commenting authentically, which almost everyone turns out to be when we dig into the data. The guidelines ask:
Please don't post insinuations about astroturfing, shilling, brigading, foreign agents, and the like. It degrades discussion and is usually mistaken. If you're worried about abuse, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll look at the data.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45284046 and marked it off topic.
[flagged]
> Why do you lie? Clearly this is not the case if you look at the user's submission and comment history
Do you think someone's comment history link is an obscure secret no one can access?
> Clearly this is not the case (..)
Oh really? Please explain in your own words why you believe this is not the case.
> Please explain in your own words why you believe this is not the case.
It wasn’t 2023: Last post 11 months ago, last comment 8 months ago, which is a typical level of lurking
It’s unclear to me what you are even accusing them of, could you clarify?
This is very impressive for a first version of the AI glasses from Meta.
Zuck really has cracked this one.
To Downvoters:
Give credit where credit is due.
I think you are going to realize in a few years why tens of billions was poured into Reality Labs and Oculus.
Version 2 or 3 of these glasses is going to set Meta ahead of the rest (except at least Apple).
Really needs the cigar and greasepaint mustache
Just in case someone is working on this type of thing. I will easily pay $1000 for an open source glasses thingy that has a monochrome laser display projecting directly onto my retina. IIRC Bosch and Intel have tried this before and the prototypes never went anywhere so there's probably a really good hardware reason why it's not happening but I want that more than any other hardware, it doesn't even have to be both eyes.
(admittedly with the recent Android news perhaps non-exploitative mobile computing is about to be dead and buried but shit, I'd lug around a backpack module everywhere running linux if it came to that)
Old Microvision Nomad units from around 2004 pop up on eBay from time to time. I have one; it's a monocular red laser retinal projection display, with a permanently attached computing unit running an ancient version of Windows CE. It's bulky, finicky, and nowhere near open source; there's hardly any documentation for it, but it does work somewhat. I haven't done anything interesting with it yet, because it doesn't have a IMU, and integrating one with it has been difficult.
Microsoft Hololens 2 also used Microvision-derived laser retinal projection technology. I don't have one, so I can't say how well it really works, but Microsoft seems to have given up on it as well.
If you relax your requirements and allow for a green holographic waveguide display, there are a few other options, but still nothing open source that I'm aware of.
Apple is rumoured to have tried this and caused eye damage as a result: https://macdailynews.com/2017/04/20/leaked-document-details-...
It's quite difficult to do that safely, as it turns out! I would love a virtual retinal display, but I assume there's a good reason that nobody has managed to ship one in the last two decades.
Microvision Nomad was indeed two decades ago, but Microsoft Hololens 2 also used laser retinal projection.
Meta's probably losing tons of cash on this one at $799. Realistic retail price for what they're shipping is likely couple times over that. No way they're even fully covering the hardware cost with this price.
You think its more expensive that Apple Vision Pro? [0]
Estimates for that are around $1500.
[0] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/apple-vision-pros-co...
yeah, yeah probably. AVP uses less hardcore displays and accompanying optics. Fundamentally they're fancier Apple Watch displays, though it has more by mass. The front-back aligned polarizers for VR pancakes might be a bit complicated, but the lenses itself are rotationally symmetric. This one uses LCoS which will require front illumination combiner prisms, and also the big flat lens thing is probably built using lithography of some kind. I reckon it might not be holographic but something equally exotic like strategically laid out micro wedges suspended in the transparent stuff.
The earlier Meta prototype was quoted on media articles as costing over $10k or something and used transparent SiC for lenses, and they said work is ongoing to find a cheaper material. I don't think they meant the lens cost $9.75k and the rest $0.25k by that.
No display but perhaps you can support these guys and hope they get there:
https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-promotes-stickers-for-sec...
Why they shouldn't be allowed ---
1.The glasses have cameras and microphones capable of recording people nearby often without their knowledge (e.g. the recording indicator can be subtle or blocked, “GhostDot” stickers are being sold to block the LED indicator light so others won’t see when recording is happening)
2. As I remember Meta has changed its privacy policy so that voice recordings are stored in the cloud (up to one year) and “Hey Meta” voice-activation with camera may be enabled by default, meaning more frequent analysis of what the camera sees to train AI models.
3.The possibility that anytime someone might be recording you wearing glasses that look like ordinary sunglasses can create a chilling effect: people may feel uneasy, censor themselves, avoid public spaces, etc.
> e.g. the recording indicator can be subtle or blocked
if they are like the previous ones they have hardware level detection and decativation of the camera if the indicator light is blocked
the fact that surveillance capitalism, or we should rather say surveillance oligarchy, is here does not mean we have to support it going forward, it can only be worse if nobody reacts
As opposed to now? Everywhere you go in public, people are holding their phone up watching tiktok or such. There's no recording indicator on phones, they could be recording you.
Heck, go to a tourist location, like a famous area of london or tokyo or new york, and there'll be dozens of wannabe influencers holding up gopros on selfie sticks.
It's too late. It's already happening. If it has a chilling effect, we're already chilled.
> wannabe influencers holding up gopros on selfie sticks
I think there's a huge difference in how one perceives these as a privacy/self-censoring risk. Yes, a bunch of tourists with their gopros might catch me in the background, but I think it's reasonable to assume that their intended target is themselves, and catching me in the background is incidental. If someone is recording with their glasses, basically by definition their target is not themselves (though perhaps a companion?), and it's more likely that I am their target.
Holding a phone in front of your face in public is so normalized at this point that targeted recording is not a matter of hardware, but of someone wanting to do it.
As you point out, most influencer-types aren't aimed at you.
That generalizes pretty well, with or without glasses, no one cares about recording you, other than incidentally as part of the background
If someone does want to target recording you, i.e. you're a semi-famous idol or such, they'll just pretend to watch tiktoks on their phone and record without an indicator, right? At least the glasses have an indicator, unlike phones.
I think the angle that a phone is held at is a reliable determinant of intent. People look down at their phones to read the screen. People hold their phones up vertically to record. The difference seems immediately apparent to me.
I understand the existential problem that Meta faces here, but those forces have created a worse product.
As a Meta Ray Ban owner my biggest takeaway is that these glasses shouldn't have a CPU. They should be a dumb camera, mic, and speakers for my phone.
Interacting with Gemini on my phone would be the ideal product here, but of course that means Meta doesn't reap any of the data rewards.
So of course, since they don't make the phone in your pocket, they're strapping a device to your head and everyone pays the price of a big battery, CPU, and RAM in a sunglass form factor.
They're a remarkable product, but again, "dumb" glasses that just serve the I/O directly to your phone would be an incredible product. I wish Google or someone else would make them.
There’s a Chinese AI glasses brands (Solos) that integrates with ChatGPT and I’m wondering if simply being paired with a better AI model will make it significantly more useful. One thing Meta seems to be completely ignoring up until now is Asians and Asian markets (lack of low bridge fit models, lack of translation features for any Asian languages despite ChatGPT being state of the art at it).
I’m almost certain there are low bridge fit Meta Ray-Ban glasses.
Amazingly, I agree with you. But the average HN user does not understand the market and regular users' demands. It's been repeatedly demonstrated in the past too.
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