• Lung@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    Man wears largest sunglasses, thinks you may want to crush your ears for 2100 also

  • Bubs@lemmy.zip
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    4 hours ago

    Copy of the article since the site requires you to disable your ad blocker (reader mode worked at least)

    Snap’s long-awaited AR glasses, Specs, didn’t have the best debut.

    The company’s stock hasn’t been on the healthiest trajectory lately. It’s dropped 30% over the past year. Following Specs’ launch, it sank more than 5% — falling from $5.86 a share on Tuesday to a low of $4.83 on Wednesday morning. As of this writing, the stock still hasn’t recovered the position it held prior to the announcement.

    The big concern surrounding Snap’s new smart glasses — which the company has been working on for over a decade — is the cost: The company maintains they will retail at nearly $2,200 apiece.

    It’s worthy of note that Snap’s core user demographic — teenagers — are not typically equipped with that kind of pocket change, leading onlookers to question the profitability path for the new product.

    Snap’s CEO, Evan Spiegel, did an interview with CNBC on Tuesday (during which he sported the new glasses) and, when questioned about the hefty price, responded: “The most important way to think of Specs is as a computer, and so they’re comparably priced to other high-end computers or high-end laptops.”

    Spiegel further justified the cost by saying that Specs occupies a unique space in the AR market between glasses like Meta’s Ray-Bans — which cost a lot less but provide significantly less compute power — and bulkier headsets like the Apple Vision Pro, which are powerful but very expensive.

    Spiegel said his product was both “highly wearable but also incredibly capable for immersive computing.”

  • ToiletFlushShowerScream@piefed.world
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    4 hours ago

    Whoa! They look like a very long line of obviously bad decisions. Unwearable. Not even ironically ugly. Like a CEO designed it himself surrounded by a vacuum of yes men.

  • Assassassin@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    5 hours ago

    It’s so funny to watch all of these tech companies try to make Google glass again like the concept didn’t fall flat on its face a decade ago.

    Only a small handful of people are interested in the idea, and the general public hates them.

    • atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works
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      55 minutes ago

      Google Glass was like the 3rd time this tech has fallen on its face. I mentioned this before recently but I can remember when Sony had some that used a CD-ROM Walkman for the HUD data. They were going to be on the face of every engine mechanic by the end of the 90s…

    • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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      2 hours ago

      You clearly don’t understand. Google glasses didn’t have Augmented reality.
      With these AR glasses you can have fluffy fur balls in different colors that jump around you everywhere you go.
      If that isn’t worth $2200 to look like an idiot, IDK what is?

    • magnue@lemmy.world
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      2 hours ago

      For it to be desirable, the form factor needs to be indistinguishable from normal sunglasses or specs. With current technology it’s not even close to being achievable. The battery tech just isn’t there for starters. I have no idea why big tech thought this was just around the corner and thought just throwing money at an impossible problem would just make it possible.

      • Assassassin@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        43 minutes ago

        No, people still like a lot of things that they can’t afford. People hate these things because they are a privacy nightmare with minimal practical application.

        • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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          2 hours ago

          Not true, lot’s of people can easily afford these.
          And a shitload of people can if they really want them.
          The rest can pay over multiple years, in easy to afford monthly payments. /s
          Meaning the people that can’t really afford them, can buy them anyway and pay twice the price with interest.

  • Miller@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    Look how out of touch we are with ordinary people but it’s ok because you have also never heard of us.

  • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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    2 hours ago

    Considering how cool 😎 they look, $2200 is a steal!
    Now you are not wearing the glasses, the glasses are wearing you. 🤣🤣🤣

  • MrJameGumb@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    I don’t even get why companies are still pushing smart glasses. There’s no legitimate use for them on the consumer market. There’s already legislation being put into place to restrict what they can do because people immediately started using them for criminal activity. They’re just an obnoxious annoyance to everyone who isn’t wearing them 99% of the time.

    • Chronographs@lemmy.zip
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      4 hours ago

      I’d be interested in them for like hud reasons but I wouldn’t want a camera or mic in them which is what they seem to think people want.

      • zarathustrad@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        Just a wireless HUD, with eye tracking, and agnostic to connected tech. (Camera is needed for this, but needs a manual kill switch on the device)

        That is all that is needed from the glasses.

        Wearable tech is going to need to be modular, replaceable, and reparable…

        All things big tech companies hate right now.

      • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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        3 hours ago

        It requires a camera to do any remotely useful HUD stuff. If you want automatic translation, or in-world displays, it needs to see the world.

        • atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works
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          58 minutes ago

          Smartwatches don’t have cameras for the most part, smartglasses don’t need them either. Also a camera isn’t required for audio translation.

          • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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            11 minutes ago

            I meant text translation obviously. You don’t need glasses for audio.

            And yeah, smartwatches don’t have cameras. They aren’t doing anything that needs them. AR, by definition, requires it to know about its environment. It needs a camera at minimum. You could have just smart glasses that can display texts or something, but AR needs cameras.

    • Grimy@lemmy.world
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      2 hours ago

      There was barely a legitimate use for smart phones at the time either. Times are changing and they are betting on smart glasses being the next big thing. I tend to agree with them to an extent but the current implementation leaves to be desired. There are still clearly some large hurdles.

  • brap@lemmy.world
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    4 hours ago

    They look fucking stupid. It looks like when my toddler wears my sunnies, but even worse.

  • paraphrand@lemmy.world
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    4 hours ago

    Getting over the aesthetics hurdle is going to be so difficult for AR glasses.

    Everyone keeps saying VR isn’t what people want, they want AR glasses.

    But then the first AR glasses are not exceptionally thin and small. So it’s revealed that people were saying they actually wanted something seemingly impossible instead.

    I have faith that the industry could get to “small enough” eventually. But I don’t know if the market will give them the runway they need to get there. Anyone paying attention knows what they are showing is a major improvement on previous AR devices in size and weight. But your average person looks at it and laughs at how big it is.

    I wonder if the industry has the fortitude to keep pressing forward. Because if AR glasses did work as people dream they can, in the form factor they expect, then everyone will want them. Even if we have to set up strict laws around them.

  • Zahille7@lemmy.world
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    4 hours ago

    I remember when Snapchat first tried to make glasses that would’ve been tied to Snapchat - and not much else.

    From what I remember, they looked utterly ridiculous: bright yellow thick frames, almost circular lenses and a big camera right between them that could take pictures and automatically add them to your snap story.

    It didn’t gain the traction I think they were wanting at the time.