If you were like me, then it wasn’t long ago that you were prophesying that “before long” we’d have implants or cameras on us at all times that recorded everything we see. Well, welcome to the the future. They’re not implants, and of course you look like a Cylon if you actually sported these suckers, but the spectacles pictured here are getting closer to the future of 24/7 coverage of human life.
There have certainly been a number of prototypes out there for a while, but it looks like they’re starting to hit their stride. IMHO the marketing vids for these guys are…er…ah…yeah. But the tech specs of these Immortal glasses are getting interesting:
_4GB storage space
_ Resolution 736×480 (Video)
_ 3 Mega Pixels
_ 25 frames per second
_ Two-button control for ease of use
_ Built in 500mAh battery (2.5 hours of running time) Voltage 5V DC
_Interchangeable lenses; polarized flame orange, polarized dark gray and clear.
On one hand, it’s clear that these glasses are pushing POV and helmet-cam to the next dimension. On the other hand, and perhaps more interesting is that we’re finally having to face the question: do we want our lives recorded all the time?
Personally, I’m …excited at the application of what becomes curated and shareable from all those bits and bytes, and it certainly could get really weird fascinating if when you begin to think of tapping into a live feed of from your Facebook friends. Imagine RSS-style video coming at you from my any number of your Facebook friends in real-time. Whoa.
Obviously, these aren’t the end-all-be-all. Look five years out and you’ll have a smaller, sleeker device that will hold days to weeks of footage, or just stream it, and have the battery to power it without recharging. I think the “real” problem as this becomes more viable will be making sequential sense from all the footage and “noise”.
I certainly wouldn’t want to be an editor tasked with putting days of footage from multiple sources from scratch. Maybe we’ll have software with some serious AI to go through, sync the footage, do facial recognition, split everything up into “shots” and “sequences”, rate the shots for steadiness, sound quality, composition and lighting, and then spit out a rough movie. That’d be cool. Who wants to code it?
Super cool, super bad.
Here’s the REAL problem; history and human nature tells me that our greatest discoveries become the source of our greatest troubles.
Splitting the atom anyone?… Yeah…
Whoa! I can see a big future in vids of stuff you really don’t want to be looking at…
The main problem I see with these is the 4gb of space before you have to back up. This is, about 25minutes of recording time? Is there an alarm? Do you need two pair so you can still record as you’re backing up? – this is if you’re recording your life of course. But, the amount of space on something like that would be more of a nuisance than anything. Great when you need both hands, or if you’re in tight spaces, which then brings the question of, how are they in low light?
If I were to get these, I would need to have two pair. At this point we’re looking at roughly $640 USD.
I just deleted my facebook. I have had enough of hearing every useless though my “Internet friends” have. If it advances to me having to actually watch Joe cook the scrambled eggs. Ugh. No thanks. There defintely are some cool applications for the glasses but for me, watching some guy brush his teeth is not one of them.
Just wanted to give you a virtual high five for this comment. Couldn’t agree more. I don’t think the majority of us have grasped the actual social changes coming about with the attempt
of emulating community online. Of course, there is such a thing as beneficial online community, but I think we need to rcognize and set boundaries for it. I know kids who have grown up with it and can’t remember the days before texting and Internet. Ate they aware of what they have been born into, or will they slap those glasses on their credit card and start “cooking scrambled eggs” live for their friends to watch?