Entries by Christian Babski

Via Internet Census 2012

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Abstract While playing around with the Nmap Scripting Engine (NSE) we discovered an amazing number of open embedded devices on the Internet. Many of them are based on Linux and allow login to standard BusyBox with empty or default credentials. We used these devices to build a distributed port scanner to scan all IPv4 addresses. These scans include service probes for the most common ports, ICMP ping, reverse DNS and SYN scans. We analyzed some of the data to get an estimation of the IP address usage.

All data gathered during our research is released into the public domain for further study. 

The full study

Via Telekomunnisten

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In his March 16, 2013 opinion column on CNN.com, Bruce Schneier called the Internet a “surveillance state”. In the piece, Schneier complains that the Internet now serves as a platform which enables massive and pervasive surveillance by the state.  State sponsored and ordained surveillance, however, is not synonymous with the Internet.  Schneier’s use of the word ‘state’ is ill-advised, his goading conclusion thereby misses the mark.

The Internet is not a State.  States can do something to limit the invasiveness of web-based services used in the public and private sectors alike, but they won’t, because any vision of infinite prosperity based on digital-age intellectual property rights and patents relies on the current content-control model of value extraction (of which Internet use, more accurately web use, is the most mass-culture manifestation) not only persisting but becoming ever more prevalent.

Web-based service providers such as Facebook and Google are not the Internet, but rather are web-based platforms built on the Internet.  The superior user-experience of such services accrues a dedicated user base for basic communication functionalities. The design idiosyncrasies of these platforms define popular culture. However just because certain service providers  have become dominant does not mean that the techniques or strategies they employ are fundamentally superior. These have become dominant because they have evolved a business model which ensures a generous ROI. Without exception, the leading platforms ensure value for their investors by trading in user data.

There are myriad ways to use the Internet, there are myriad different paradigms for Internet-enabled communication, collaboration and other social activities which can and are being explored. Whether or not they can “compete” with the Googles and Facebooks, depends today entirely on whether they can produce sufficient “surplus value” to satisfy investors, thereby to attract sufficient funding to produce superior user experience.  In all the world wide web there is not a model for this which is not centered on the harvesting and analysis of user data.

Since much of the world already finds itself on the ‘client’ side of automated services for much of their waking life, the competition is on to deliver the “highest quality” of such service, anticipating client’s predilections and desires. In other words, as everybody knows, the old customer service saw recurs, “please excuse the inconvenience, we are … to serve you better”. The qualms one has about permitting unmitigated and unmonitored access to one’s social life are discounted as a mere inconvenience one must endure so that the machines can “serve us better”.

The state likewise asks us to put up with the invasion of privacy in order to provide us with such things as “security” and “democracy”. If we look closely at those two commodities we are being offered in exchange for our private sphere, we may not be so sure of the fairness of the deal. “Security” for one, may come in myriad forms, but the form of “security” which is offered to us is one determined through lobbying by security companies, which, no surprise, promise to offer us better service the more we open up our lives to data collection.

The Internet is not a ‘state’, it can be ruled over by states, but in principle, it belongs to all humanity. The Internet is not an ephemeral service, it is a network of very real, material computers which are located indisputably in specific real material buildings at specific real material locations, under nominally specific local, regional, national and international jurisdictions, right now. There is nothing fundamentally abstract about the Internet, it is as hard to fathom as the electricity grid on which it is practically dependent.

States can produce and maintain infrastructure like electricity grids and networked computers connected in the Internet. They can, but, today, the tendency is for states to delegate private entities to do this. This is said to be more efficient. Popular dictum is that the price to pay for such services is privacy. States have traditionally been moderate in exacting that price for fear of incurring the wrath of the populace. Private entities which belong to no particular state, when and if they incur such wrath, pretend it is up to the state to moderate their behaviour. Privately, the actors for state are discouraged to regulate for fear of inhibiting “prosperity”.

Therefore, states are increasingly impotent to rule over the Internet. The Internet has become a surveillance system used by private companies and their clients, the states, alike “to serve you better”. Behind this innocuous promise, the knowledge about private citizens is used to hone customized media designed to compel users to purchase anything from clothes to security to ideology. The big-data industries will build the patented processes which transform data mined from users into patented automated services. This is advertised as the keystone of the 21st century economy. In the perpetual panic of austerity finance capitalism, who would dare embolden the state to emperil the perceived slim auspices of escape from financial ruin the surveillance/data-collection industry-driven economy offers us?

But the Internet is not a surveillance state. The Internet, as described in the article, has come to be used as a most efficient technology for pervasive data surveillance. States use surveillance technologies when they are available to the degree that the laws permit. Today’s laws permit private companies to do things with surveillance data the state traditionally cannot without going through lengthy legislative approval processes. It is through the obligation to produce profits that private companies have been permitted to transgress legal limits on invasion of privacy. The private companies have thus played a vanguard role in loosening up legal restrictions protecting individual privacy.

Surveillance at work has long been accepted as integral to taylorist notions of efficiency and productivity. Now that the work place has extended to be almost indistinguishable with daily life, the fact that surveillance has followed along seems unsurprising. While mobile computer were advertised to liberate us from the cubicle, it  has made for an environment where one’s employment is perpetual, again, it is no surprise then that surveillance technologies have followed.

As business rationale and strategies evolve, as the boundaries between work time and leisure time dissolves, enterprise ethics entrench themselves in every aspect of social life, and surveillance has followed, if only so that the instruments on which one coordinate’s one work-leisure hybridity can “serve you better”. So the prevalence of surveillance is a consequence of the interspersal of productive labour time in life time. Ironically the call from the left to integrate and acknowledge so-called affective labour will have as the main notable outcome that these activities will become subject to data-acquisition monetization and surveillance.

Bifo noted in a recent speech that in 1977 he was (radically) militating against the traditional career-work regime, where people spent their entire adult lives working for a particular company.  Now it is not without some bitterness that he notes, bursting the worker out of the workplace has resulted in today’s worker having to work for numerous companies all the time.

The government’s own performance is measured through massive-scale data acquisition. This data-acquisition is indistinguishable from surveillance, the surveillance permits the government to detect, intervene with, and if necessary terminate its own practices which are determined to be inefficient, or counter-productive. Therefore the government, in order to prove to the citizens that it is doing a good job, exploits all the opportunities for surveillance opened up by vanguardist capital.

But the Internet is just a network of computers, which provides functionalities. It is not a state. The state could, in principle, elect not to use the Internet for surveillance, and could restrict the data-collection activities of private service providers. I have outlined above why this is unlikely, but it is possible. Private capital would likely take revenge on such a government, and the citizens would likely come to disdain its decision. Under global capital there really is little alternative for states to “keeping up with the Joneses’” surveillance service industry. Massive pervasive surveillance is understood simply as a precondition to prosperity.

“Welcome to an Internet without privacy, and we’ve ended up here with hardly a fight.”-Bruce Schneier

One wonders who Bruce Schneier refers to with the pronoun “we” in his parting shot.  Certainly prominent organisations such as EFF in the USA and Open Rights Group in the UK have been working for years to help web users appreciate and understand the latest online privacy concerns, among other burning issues of the digital age. And there are thousands of initiatives around the world working to criticize and raise concerns about the egregious asymmetries of power on the web. High-profile conferences and actions are organised, excellently researched publications are made available, yet these initiatives get only muted coverage in the mass media.

The problem is not for lack of trying, besides whatever bias the corporate-controlled mass media outlets may exercise, it is also  due to the fact that these critical organizations rely on people to contribute voluntarily, in their spare time. In other words, dissent, alternative viewpoints, proposals and even services cannot compete. The industry or economy which sees its success as contingent on ever more pervasive data-collection from individuals is unlikely to finance critical initiatives to the extent that these might hire more paid staff, and thereby make their contributions more attractive, accessible and appreciated.   The state may step in here and subsidize such critical organizations to some degree, but only under severe admonishment from the dominant web-service industries.

Networked-service and networked-content businesses with their increasingly data-acquisition-oriented profit models have become extremely important and influential in national economies. If Bruce Schneier is sincere about protecting online privacy, he had better look not to the state, but to the capitalist conditions of the production of web services which compel corporations to develop, implement and constantly improve the invasive practices that offend his sensibility.

Via Slash Gear

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A group of German researchers announced this week that they have completed sequencing of a Neanderthal genome. The scientists say that the high-quality sequencing will be made available online for other researchers and scientists to study. The researchers were able to produce the genome using a toe bone found in a Siberian cave.

This published genome is said to be far more detailed than a previous “draft” Neanderthal genome was sequenced three years ago by the same team. The group of researchers operate from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. The researchers say that the new genome allows individual inherited traits from the Neanderthal’s mother and father to be distinguished.

In the future, the scientists hope to compare their new genome sequence to that of other Neanderthals as well as comparing the genome to another extinct human species with remains that were found in the same Siberian cave. The other remains are of an extinct human species called Denisovan. Certainly some researchers will compare this new genome to that of humans.

The group of researchers intends to publish a scientific paper based on new knowledge gained from studying the detailed genome. Specifically the researchers plan to refine knowledge having to do with genetic changes that occur in the genomes of modern humans after they parted ways with Neanderthals and Denisovians.

Via Rob Miles

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Via TechCrunch

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At SXSW this afternoon, Google provided developers with a first glance at the Google Glass Mirror API, the main interface between Google Glass, Google’s servers and the apps that developers will write for them. In addition, Google showed off a first round of applications that work on Glass, including how Gmail works on the device, as well as integrations from companies like the New York Times, Evernote, Path and others.

The Mirror API is essentially a REST API, which should make developing for it very easy for most developers. The Glass device essentially talks to Google’s servers and the developers’ applications then get the data from there and also push it to Glass through Google’s APIs. All of this data is then presented on Glass through what Google calls “timeline cards.” These cards can include text, images, rich HTML and video. Besides single cards, Google also lets developers use what it calls bundles, which are basically sets of cards that users can navigate using their voice or the touchpad on the side of Glass.

It looks like sharing to Google+ is a built-in feature of the Mirror API, but as Google’s Timothy Jordan noted in today’s presentation, developers can always add their own sharing options, as well. Other built-in features seem to include voice recognition, access to the camera and a text-to-speech engine.

Glass Rules

Because Glass is a new and unique form factor, Jordan also noted, Google is setting a few rules for Glass apps. They shouldn’t, for example, show full news stories but only headlines, as everything else would be too distracting. For longer stories, developers can always just use Glass to read text to users.

Essentially, developers should make sure that they don’t annoy users with too many notifications, and the data they send to Glass should always be relevant. Developers should also make sure that everything that happens on Glass should be something the user expects, said Jordan. Glass isn’t the kind of device, he said, where a push notification about an update to your app makes sense.

Using Glass With Gmail, Evernote, Path and Others

As part of today’s presentation, Jordan also detailed some Glass apps Google has been working on itself, and apps that some of its partners have created. The New York Times app, for example, shows headlines and then lets you listen to a summary of the article by telling Glass to “read aloud.” Google’s own Gmail app uses voice recognition to answer emails (and it obviously shows you incoming mail, as well). Evernote’s Skitch can be used to take and share photos, and Jordan also showed a demo of social network Path running on Glass to share your location.

So far, there is no additional information about the Mirror API on any of Google’s usual sites, but we expect the company to release more information shortly and will update this post once we hear more.

Via BBC

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A new robot unveiled this week highlights the psychological and technical challenges of designing a humanoid that people actually want to have around.

Like all little boys, Roboy likes to show off.

He can say a few words. He can shake hands and wave. He is learning to ride a tricycle. And - every parent's pride and joy - he has a functioning musculoskeletal anatomy.

But when Roboy is unveiled this Saturday at the Robots on Tour event in Zurich, he will be hoping to charm the crowd as well as wow them with his skills.

"One of the goals is for Roboy to be a messenger of a new generation of robots that will interact with humans in a friendly way," says Rolf Pfeifer from the University of Zurich - Roboy's parent-in-chief.

As manufacturers get ready to market robots for the home it has become essential for them to overcome the public's suspicion of them. But designing a robot that is fun to be with - as well as useful and safe - is quite difficult.

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The uncanny valley: three theories

Researchers have speculated about why we might feel uneasy in the presence of realistic robots.

• They remind us of corpses or zombies
• They look unwell
• They do not look and behave as expected

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Roboy's main technical innovation is a tendon-driven design that mimics the human muscular system. Instead of whirring motors in the joints like most robots, he has around 70 imitation muscles, each containing motors that wind interconnecting tendons. Consequently, his movements will be much smoother and less robotic.

But although the technical team was inspired by human beings, it chose not to create a robot that actually looked like one. Instead of a skin-like covering, Roboy has a shiny white casing that proudly reveals his electronic innards.

Behind this design is a long-standing hypothesis about how people feel in the presence of robots.

In 1970, the Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori speculated that the more lifelike robots become, the more human beings feel familiarity and empathy with them - but that a robot too similar to a human provokes feelings of revulsion.

Mori called this sudden dip in human beings' comfort levels the "uncanny valley".

"There are quite a number of studies that suggest that as long as people can clearly see that the robot is a machine, even if they project their feelings into it, then they feel comfortable," says Pfeifer.

Roboy was styled as a boy - albeit quite a brawny one - to lower his perceived threat levels to humans. His winsome smile - on a face picked by Facebook users from a selection - hasn't hurt the team in their search for corporate sponsorship, either.

But the image problem of robots is not just about the way they look. An EU-wide survey last year found that although most Europeans have a positive view of robots, they feel they should know their place.

Eighty-eight per cent of respondents agreed with the statement that robots are "necessary as they can do jobs that are too hard or dangerous for people", such as space exploration, warfare and manufacturing. But 60% thought that robots had no place in the care of children, elderly people and those with disabilities.

The computer scientist and psychologist Noel Sharkey has, however, found 14 companies in Japan and South Korea that are in the process of developing childcare robots.

South Korea has already tried out robot prison guards, and three years ago launched a plan to deploy more than 8,000 English-language teachers in kindergartens.

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A robot buddy?

• In the film Robot and Frank, set in the near-future, ageing burglar Frank is provided with a robot companion to be a helper and nurse when he develops dementia
• The story plays out rather like a futuristic buddy movie - although he is initially hostile to the robot, Frank is soon programming him to help him in his schemes, which are not entirely legal

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Cute, toy-like robots are already available for the home.

Take the Hello Kitty robot, which has been on the market for several years and is still available for around $3,000 (£2,000). Although it can't walk, it can move its head and arms. It also has facial recognition software that allows it to call children by name and engage them in rudimentary conversation.

A tongue-in-cheek customer review of the catbot on Amazon reveals a certain amount of scepticism.

"Hello Kitty Robo me was babysit," reads the review.

"Love me hello kitty robo, thank robo for make me talk good... Use lots battery though, also only for rich baby, not for no money people."

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Asimo

At just 130cm high, Honda's Asimo jogs around on bended knee like a mechanical version of Dobby, the house elf from Harry Potter. He can run, climb up and down stairs and pour a bottle of liquid in a cup.

Since 1986, Honda have been working on humanoids with the ultimate aim of providing an aid to those with mobility impairments.

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The product description says the robot is "a perfect companion for times when your child needs a little extra comfort and friendship" and "will keep your child happily occupied". In other words, it's something to turn on to divert your infant for a few moments, but it is not intended as a replacement child-minder.

An ethical survey of "robot nannies" by Noel and Amanda Sharkey suggests that as robots become more sophisticated parents may be increasingly tempted to hand them too much responsibility.

The survey also raises the question of what long-term effects will result from children forming an emotional bond with a lump of plastic. They cite one case study in which a 10-year-old girl, who had been given a robot doll for several weeks, reported that "now that she's played with me a lot more, she really knows me".

Noel Sharkey says that he loves the idea of children playing with robots but has serious concerns about them being brought up by them. "[Imagine] the kind of attachment disorders they would develop," he says.

But despite their limitations, humanoid robots might yet prove invaluable in narrow, fixed roles in hospitals, schools and homes.

"Something really interesting happens between some kids with autism and robots that doesn't happen between those children and other humans," says Maja J Mataric, a roboticist at the University of Southern California. She's found that such children respond positively to humanoids and she is trying to work out how they can be used therapeutically.

In their study, the Sharkeys make the observation that robots have one advantage over adult humans. They can have physical contact with children - something now frowned upon or forbidden in schools.

"These restrictions would not apply to a robot," they write, "because it could not be accused of having sexual intent and so there are no particular ethical concerns. The only concern would be the child's safety - for example, not being crushed by a hugging robot."

When it comes to robots, there is such a thing as too much love.

"If you were having a mechanical assistant in the home that was powerful enough to be useful, it would necessarily be powerful enough to be dangerous," says Peter Robinson of Cambridge University. "Therefore it'd better have really good understanding and communication."

His team are developing robots with sophisticated facial recognition. These machines won't just be able to tell Bill from Brenda but they will be able to infer from his expression whether Bill is feeling confused, tired, playful or in physical agony.

Roboy's muscles and tendons may actually make him a safer robot to have around. His limbs have more elasticity than a conventional robot's, allowing for movement even when he has a power failure.

Rolf Pfeifer has a favourite question which he puts to those sceptical about using robots in caring situations.

"If you couldn't walk upstairs any more, would you want a person to carry you or would you want to take the elevator?"

Most people opt for the elevator, which is - if you think about it - a kind of robot.

Pfeifer believes robots will enter our homes. What is not yet clear is whether the future lies in humanoid servants with a wide range of limited skills or in intelligent, responsive appliances designed to do specific tasks, he says.

"I think the market will ultimately determine what kind of robot we're going to have."

You can listen to Click on the BBC World Service. Listen back to the robots for humans special via iplayer or browse the Click podcast archive.

Via Slash Gear

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Google will be conducting a 45-day public trial with the FCC to create a centralized database containing information on free spectrum. The Google Spectrum Database will analyze TV white spaces, which are unused spectrum between TV stations, that can open many doors for possible wireless spectrum expansion in the future. By unlocking these white spaces, wireless providers will be able to provide more coverage in places that need it.

The public trial brings Google one step closer to becoming a certified database administrator for white spaces. Currently the only database administrators are Spectrum Bridge, Inc. and Telcordia Technologies, Inc. Many other companies are applying to be certified, including a big dog like Microsoft. With companies like Google and Microsoft becoming certified, discovery of white spaces should increase monumentally.

Google’s trial allows all industry stakeholders, including broadcasters, cable, wireless microphone users, and licensed spectrum holders, to provide feedback to the Google Spectrum Database. It also allows anyone to track how much TV white space is available in their given area. This entire process is known as dynamic spectrum sharing.

Google’s trial, as well as the collective help of all the other spectrum data administrators, will help unlock more wireless spectrum. It’s a necessity as there is an increasing number of people who are wirelessly connecting to the internet via smartphones, laptops, tablets, and other wireless devices. This trial will open new doors to more wireless coverage (especially in dead zones), Wi-Fi hotspots, and other “wireless technologies”.

Via engadget

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We've had a bit of a love / hate relationship with the Google Chromebook since the first one crossed our laps back in 2011 -- the Samsung Series 5. We loved the concept, but hated the very limited functionality provided by your $500 investment. Since then, the series of barebones laptops has progressed, and so too has the barebones OS they run, leading to our current favorite of the bunch: the 2012 Samsung Chromebook.

In that laptop's review, we concluded that "$249 seems like an appropriate price for this sort of device." So, then, imagine our chagrin when Google unveiled a very similar sort of device, but one that comes with a premium. A very hefty premium. It's a high-end, halo sort of product with incredible build quality, an incredible screen and an incredible price. Is a Chromebook that starts at more than five times the cost of its strongest competition even worth considering? Let's do the math.

Hardware

Wow. This is certainly a departure. If you're going to charge an obscene premium for a laptop with an incredibly limited OS, you'd better produce something that is incredibly well-made. In that regard, the Chromebook Pixel is a complete success. If you'll forgive us just one cliche, Google has gone from zero to hero with the Pixel. It's truly something to behold.

First impressions are of a laptop with surprising density. Apple's MacBook Pros, with their precisely hewn aluminum exteriors, have long been the benchmark against which other laptops were held in when it comes to a sense of solidity. In its first attempt, Google has managed to match that feeling of innate integrity with the Pixel, and in some ways go beyond it.

It's all machined aluminum, anodized in a dark, almost gunmetal color that successfully bridges the gap between sophisticated and cool. Everything is very angular; vertical sides terminate abruptly at the horizontal plane that makes up the typing surface. In fact, the only thing not bridged by right angles is the cylindrical hinge running nearly the entire width of the machine, but thankfully the edges of the entire laptop are just rounded enough to keep it from digging into your wrists uncomfortably. Battle scars received while typing have become a bit of an annoyance in many modern, aluminum-bodied machines.

A good, quick test of a laptop's rigidity is to open it up, grab it on both sides of the keyboard and try to twist. On a flimsy product you'll hear some uncomfortable-sounding noises coming from beneath the keys and, if you're really unlucky, you might send a letter or two flying. Not so with the Pixel. The torsional rigidity is impressive for a machine that is as thin, and as light, as this.

To put some numbers on that, the laptop measures 16mm (0.62 inch) in thickness and 3.35 pounds (1.52kg) in heft. That compares very favorably to the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina, the one that we would most closely pit this against, which is 19mm (0.75 inch) thick and weighs 3.57 pounds (1.62kg). So it's thinner and lighter, and with a very similar 12.85-inch, 2,560 x 1,700 display (which we'll thoroughly discuss momentarily), but with lower performance. It is, however, on par with the 13-inch MacBook Air when it comes to speed, and is only slightly thicker (0.06 inch) and heavier (0.39 pound).

A dual-core Intel 1.8GHz Core i5 chip is the one and only processor on offer here, paired with 4GB of DDR3 RAM and generally providing more than enough oomph to drive the very minimalist operating system, which is installed on either a 32 or 64GB SSD. The larger option is only available if you opt for the $1,449 laptop, which also adds Verizon-compatible LTE to the mix (along with GPS). Either model sports dual-band MIMO 802.11a/b/g/n along with Bluetooth 3.0. For those who like to keep it physical, there are two USB ports on the left (sadly just 2.0) situated next to a Mini DisplayPort and a 3.5mm headphone jack. On the right is an SD card reader, along with the SIM card tray -- assuming you paid for the WWAN upgrade.

For those who aren't interested in making use of that headphone jack, there are what Google calls "powerful speakers" built in here -- though they're hard to spot. They're integrated somewhere below the keyboard and, believe it or not, that "powerful" description is quite apt. You won't be giving your neighbors anything to complain about if these are cranked to maximum volume, nor do you need to concern yourself about cracking the masonry thanks to the bass, but the output here is respectably loud and good-sounding. These speakers are at least on par with your average mid-range Bluetooth unit, meaning you'll have one less thing to pack.

For the receiving end, Google has also integrated an array of microphones throughout the machine to help with active noise cancellation, including one positioned to detect (and eliminate) keyboard clatter when you're typing whilst in a Hangout or the like. Without the ability to selectively disable this microphone we can't be sure how great an effect it had, but we can say that plenty of QWERTY-based noise got through in our test calls. Google, though, has indicated it will continue to refine the behavior of that mic, so there's hope for improvement.

Integrated in the bezel is a webcam situated in the center-top of the bezel, next to a small status LED to let you know when Big Brother is watching. One final piece is the power plug, a largish wall wart that takes a cue from Apple by including a removable section. Here you can slot in either a flip-out, two-prong end or a longer, three-prong cable. The inspiration is obvious, but we're not complaining. This lets you have both a short, easy-to-pack version when you're traveling light and a longer but rather more clunky version for those times when you need a bit more reach.

We do, however, wish Google had also taken inspiration from Apple and Microsoft and included some sort of magnetic power connector. We found that the small plug, with its traditional, single-prong-style connector, had a tendency to slowly work its way out of the laptop when the cable had any tension from the left. Thankfully, a bright glowing light on the connector lets you know when the laptop is charged or charging -- and thus when the thing has slid out far enough to lose connection.

Keyboard and trackpad

Island-style keyboards continue to be all the rage and, for the most part, Google makes no exception for its latest Chromebook. The primary keys float in a slightly recessed area, comfortably sized and comfortably spaced. Each has great feel and great resistance. Typing on this machine is a joy.

However, the row of function keys that rest atop the number keys, discrete buttons for adjusting volume and brightness and the like, is a different story. These are flush with each other and far stiffer than the normal keys. This isn't much of a bother, since you won't be using them nearly as frequently as the rest, but butting them right up against each other makes them difficult to find by touch. Thankfully, all are backlit, so locating them in the dark is no problem.

We also wished for dedicated Home and End keys, after finding the Chrome OS alternative of Ctrl + Alt + Up or Down to be a bit of a handful. Regardless, you'll quickly learn to type around these relatively minor shortcomings and enjoy the great keyboard. Thankfully, the trackpad is equally good.

It's a glass unit, darkly colored and positioned in the center of the wrist rest, which makes it slightly shifted to the right compared to the space bar. It has a matte coating but still feels quite smooth, resulting in a very nice swiping sensation indeed. Of course, with a 12.85-inch touch-sensitive display, you may find yourself using it less frequently than you think.

Display

Again, up top is a 12.85-inch, 2,560 x 1,700 IPS LCD panel that we can't look at without thinking of the very similar 13.3-inch, 2,560 x 1,600 panel on the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display. It's smaller but packs an extra 100 pixels vertically, giving it a slightly higher pixel density of 239 ppi. Naturally, that's far from the full story here, and those who are really into proportions will know that resolution equates to a 3:2 aspect ratio. In other words: it's rather tall.

A 16:9 aspect ratio (or something close to it) is the prevailing trend among non-Macs these days, but even when acknowledging that, this one feels particularly tall. Still, we didn't exactly mind it. As mentioned above, the keyboard is plenty roomy, and given that Chrome OS isn't particularly friendly to multi-window multi-tasking (manually justifying windows is a real chore) we were rarely left wanting a wider display.

That was, really, our only minor reservation about this panel. Otherwise we have nothing but love for the thing. It is, of course, a ridiculously high resolution, which makes pixels basically disappear. Indeed the simple, clean and stark Chrome OS looks great when rendered with such clarity, but we couldn't help but lament the occasional excess of white space that's becoming common across many of Google's web apps. For a display with a pixel density this high, it feels somewhat under-utilized.

That is until, of course, you boot up the 4K sample footage Google thoughtfully pre-installed on the machine, which looks properly mind-blowing -- even if it is only being rendered at slightly higher than half its native resolution.

This is a glossy panel, tucked behind a pane of Gorilla Glass, so glare may be a bit of a problem if your work setup has bright lights positioned behind you. Still, reflectivity seemed to be on par with the latest, optically bonded panels -- that is to say, far from the "mirror, mirror" effect provided by many of the earlier gloss displays. Contrast is quite good from all angles, though the color accuracy drops off if you look at it from too high or low, with everything quickly getting a bit pink. Slightly pretty.

And, finally, this is indeed a touch-enabled panel, something we didn't know we needed on a Chromebook -- and frankly we're still not sure we do. We'll discuss that in more detail in the software section below.

Performance and battery life

Again we're dealing with a 1.8GHz Intel Core i5 processor here, a bit on the mild side compared to most higher-end laptops. Still, it proves to be more than enough to run the lightweight Chrome OS. That's paired with 4GB of DDR3 RAM and, predictably, integrated graphics courtesy of Intel's HD 4000 chipset.

It's no barnstormer, but it runs a browser with aplomb. And, really, that's about all it's likely to do with the limited selection of apps available for Chrome. Everything we threw at it ran fine, though after extended sessions we did notice heavier websites started to get a little bit stuttery. It's nothing that rebooting the browser didn't fix.

High-def videos play smoothly, though when pushing the pixels (or running games), the machine does get fairly warm. The fan vents are below the hinge; a thin sliver of an opening that thankfully doesn't seem to dump a lot of hot air into your lap. It's noticeable, but it isn't particularly loud or annoying and again, since you likely won't be doing too much taxing stuff here, don't expect to hear it all that often.

When it comes to battery life, Google estimates the 59Wh battery will provide "up to" five hours of continuous use. And, indeed it may. On our standard battery run-down test, which loops a video at fixed brightness, the machine clocked in at four hours and eight minutes for the WiFi model. The LTE model, with its LTE antenna on, came in about 30 minutes shorter at 3:34.

These numbers are rather poor, unfortunately. The 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina clocks in at more than six hours on the same battery test, while both the 13-inch MacBook Air and the latest Samsung Chromebook score about 30 minutes more even than that.

Connectivity

As mentioned above, both Chromebook Pixel models include dual-band MIMO 802.11a/b/g/n, which means you'll be sucking down bits at an optimal rate more or less regardless of what sort of router you're connecting to.

Stepping up to the $1,449 LTE version of course means you can walk away from those routers. That machine includes a Qualcomm MDM9600 chipset to receive on LTE band 13, intended for Verizon in the US only. So, then, we tested it in the US in two different LTE markets on both coasts. Speeds varied widely from location to location, but in general matched or exceeded the speeds we saw from other Verizon-compatible mobile devices.

In terms of more practical connectivity concerns, it's worth noting that the modem takes about 30 seconds to reconnect after the laptop resumes from its suspended state, which is a bit annoying but certainly no slower than your average LTE USB modem. Also, Verizon is kindly including 100MB of data each month for free for your first two years of Chromebook ownership, but after that you'll be stuck paying up for one of Verizon's tiered data plans.

Oh, and the Pixel lacks an Ethernet port, and does not include an adapter. We tried a few standard USB Ethernet adapters and all worked without a hitch.

Software

As we concluded in our review of the most recent version, Chrome OS has come a long, long way since that first Chromebook crossed our laps. What we have now is a far more sophisticated and comprehensive experience than we did a few years ago, but it's still incredibly limited compared to the broader world of desktop operating systems.

Simple tasks like file management can be a real chore if you're doing anything other than moving a file into a subdirectory. And while the OS itself has a refreshingly simple visual style, it's also very stark and, frankly, a somewhat wasteful design. Not to keep harping on the file explorer, but each file in a list is separated by a sea of white big enough to basically double the effective height. When you're skimming through a big 'ol list of files in a directory, it takes a lot more scrolling than should be necessary given the resolution of this display.

At least Google made the scrolling easy. As mentioned above, the trackpad is quite good and very responsive. Multi-finger gestures are responsive, so good that you might not be inclined to reach up to that touch panel. But, you should, because the experience is generally good as well, though you'll rarely be doing anything more than scrolling webpages or documents. There's not really a whole lot more Chrome OS can do, but even in games like Cut the Rope and Angry Birds, touch was just as good as... well, as it is on an Android tablet.

That said, it's disappointing that Google didn't introduce any gestures to the OS to match its newfound touch compatibilities. In fact, you can't even pinch-zoom in the image viewer or even on most pages in the Chrome browser -- only in specifically pinch-friendly websites (like Google Maps). There are no three- or four-finger gestures for switching apps, and swiping in from the bezels does nothing. Except, that is, for a swipe up from the bottom, which alternatively shows or hides the launcher bar.

Again, we won't restate the entire review of Chrome OS, but it's important to note at least briefly that functionality here is still very minimal. There are built-in apps for viewing photos and videos, for browsing files, for taking photos from the integrated webcam, an app for taking notes and... the web browser. That, of course, is the most important part. Suffice to say, if you can't do all your work from inside of an instance of Chrome on some other platform (like Windows or Mac), you probably won't be able to do it here, either.

Still, we did want to point out one important part of the software, and that is it's easily replaceable. The bootloader is not locked and we've already seen the thing rocking Linux -- and looking quite good while doing it. So, if you happen to be looking for an incredibly well-designed laptop to run that most noble of open-source operating systems, this could be it.

Pricing and competition

We can keep the pricing bit short, because there are only two options here. For $1,299, you can get yourself the WiFi model with 32GB of local SSD storage. For $1,449 you step up to the LTE model, which throws in 64GB of storage in a bid to sweeten the deal.

Should that still be too bitter for your tastes -- and we're thinking there's a very good chance it will be -- Google has included plenty of other incentives that are at least mildly saccharine. First among these are 12 free Gogo passes for in-flight connectivity, each one worth about $14 for a total of $168. The other, rather more compelling add-in, is 1TB of online storage free for three years.

That, believe it or not, is worth a whopping $1,800, which of course means that if you were looking to rent that much data for a period of three years you'd actually be better off just buying a Pixel. It would, effectively, just be a nice, free toy.

For everyone not interested in storing copious quantities of stuff in the cloud, both price points are rather dear to put it mildly. As ever, it's difficult to compare a Chromebook to other laptops on the market thanks to the limited functionality provided by the OS. So, we'll focus primarily on hardware comparisons, and as we mentioned above, we find ourselves inclined to compare this to the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display.

That machine, with a full operating system and a faster, 2.5GHz Core i5 processor, starts at $1,499. That, though, has a 128GB of SSD, twice that of the biggest Pixel. We could also see many comparing this against the 13-inch MacBook Air, which offers the same CPU, integrated graphics and 4GB of RAM for the same $1,199. It's lacking the high-res screen but it perhaps makes up for that with, again, 128GB of storage.

On the PC side of things, that resolution is unmatched, but the other specs certainly aren't. We recently had reasonably good feelings about Samsung's Series 5 UltraTouch, a 13-incher packing a similar Core i5 CPU, 4GB of RAM, but again a 500GB platter-based hard disk. An SSD isn't an option, but the $849 price is certainly more palatable.

Again, none of these is an apples-to-apples comparison, as the Pixel offers a touchscreen, something all the Macs lack, and offers LTE connectivity, thus making it even more of a rare bird on the laptop scene. Whether these unique attributes, plus the various goodies Google is throwing in, turn this into a compelling proposition compared to the competition is something you'll have to decide for yourself.

Wrap-up

Again we reach the dreaded wrap-up section on a Chromebook review. It's simply never easy to classify these machines. In some regards, the Pixel is even harder to pigeonhole than its predecessors. The level of quality and attention to detail here is quite remarkable for what is, we'll again remind you, Google's first swing at building a laptop. Boot-ups are quick, performance is generally good and, of course, there's that display.

But, with one single statistic, Google has made the Chromebook Pixel even easier to write off than any of its quirky predecessors: price. For an MSRP that is on par with some of the best laptops in the world, the Pixel doesn't provide anywhere near as much potential when it comes to functionality. It embraces a world where everyone is always connected and everything is done on the web -- a world that few people currently live in.

The Chromebook Pixel, then, is a lot like the Nexus Q: it's a piece of gorgeous hardware providing limited functionality at a price that eclipses the (often more powerful) competition. It's a lovely thing that everyone should try to experience but, sadly, few should seriously consider buying.

Via The Verge

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The frosted-glass doors on the 11th floor of Google’s NYC headquarters part and a woman steps forward to greet me. This is an otherwise normal specimen of humanity. Normal height, slender build; her eyes are bright, inquisitive. She leans in to shake my hand and at that moment I become acutely aware of the device she’s wearing in the place you would expect eyeglasses: a thin strip of aluminum and plastic with a strange, prismatic lens just below her brow. Google Glass.

What was a total oddity a year ago, and little more than an experiment just 18 months ago is now starting to look like a real product. One that could be in the hands (or on the heads, rather) of consumers by the end of this year. A completely new kind of computing device; wearable, designed to reduce distraction, created to allow you to capture and communicate in a way that is supposed to feel completely natural to the wearer. It’s the anti-smartphone, explicitly fashioned to blow apart our notions of how we interact with technology.

But as I release from that handshake and study the bizarre device resting on my greeter’s brow, my mind begins to fixate on a single question: who would want to wear this thing in public?

Finding Glass

The Glass project was started "about three years ago" by an engineer named Babak Parviz as part of Google’s X Lab initiative, the lab also responsible for — amongst other things — self-driving cars and neural networks. Unlike those epic, sci-fi R&D projects at Google, Glass is getting real much sooner than anyone expected. The company offered developers an option to buy into an early adopter strategy called the Explorer Program during its I/O conference last year, and just this week it extended that opportunity to people in the US in a Twitter campaign which asks potential users to explain how they would put the new technology to use. Think of it as a really aggressive beta — something Google is known for.

I was about to beta test Glass myself. But first, I had questions.

Seated in a surprisingly bland room — by Google’s whimsical office standards — I find myself opposite two of the most important players in the development of Glass, product director Steve Lee and lead industrial designer Isabelle Olsson. Steve and Isabelle make for a convincing pair of spokespeople for the product. He’s excitable, bouncy even, with big bright eyes that spark up every time he makes a point about Glass. Isabelle is more reserved, but speaks with incredible fervency about the product. And she has extremely red hair. Before we can even start talking about Glass, Isabelle and I are in a heated conversation about how you define the color navy blue. She’s passionate about design — a condition that seems to be rather contagious at Google these days — and it shows.

Though the question of design is at the front of my mind, a picture of why Glass exists at all begins to emerge as we talk, and it’s clearly not about making a new fashion accessory. Steve tries to explain it to me.

"Why are we even working on Glass? We all know that people love to be connected. Families message each other all the time, sports fanatics are checking live scores for their favorite teams. If you’re a frequent traveler you have to stay up to date on flight status or if your gate changes. Technology allows us to connect in that way. A big problem right now are the distractions that technology causes. If you’re a parent — let’s say your child’s performance, watching them do a soccer game or a musical. Often friends will be holding a camera to capture that moment. Guess what? It’s gone. You just missed that amazing game." Isabelle chimes in, "Did you see that Louis C.K. stand up when he was telling parents, ‘your kids are better resolution in real life?’" Everyone laughs, but the point is made.

Human beings have developed a new problem since the advent of the iPhone and the following mobile revolution: no one is paying attention to anything they’re actually doing. Everyone seems to be looking down at something or through something. Those perfect moments watching your favorite band play or your kid’s recital are either being captured via the lens of a device that sits between you and the actual experience, or being interrupted by constant notifications. Pings from the outside world, breaking into what used to be whole, personal moments.

Steve goes on. "We wondered, what if we brought technology closer to your senses? Would that allow you to more quickly get information and connect with other people but do so in a way — with a design — that gets out of your way when you’re not interacting with technology? That’s sort of what led us to Glass." I can’t stop looking at the lens above his right eye. "It’s a new wearable technology. It’s a very ambitious way to tackle this problem, but that’s really sort of the underpinning of why we worked on Glass."

I get it. We’re all distracted. No one can pay attention. We’re missing all of life’s moments. Sure, it’s a problem, but it’s a new problem, and this isn’t the first time we’ve been distracted by a new technology. Hell, they used to think car radios would send drivers careening off of the highways. We’ll figure out how to manage our distraction, right?

Maybe, but obviously the Glass team doesn’t want to wait to find out. Isabelle tells me about the moment the concept clicked for her. "One day, I went to work — I live in SF and I have to commute to Mountain View and there are these shuttles — I went to the shuttle stop and I saw a line of not 10 people but 15 people standing in a row like this," she puts her head down and mimics someone poking at a smartphone. "I don’t want to do that, you know? I don’t want to be that person. That’s when it dawned on me that, OK, we have to make this work. It’s bold. It’s crazy. But we think that we can do something cool with it."

Bold and crazy sounds right, especially after Steve tells me that the company expects to have Glass on the market as a consumer device by the end of this year.

Google-level design

Forget about normal eyeglasses for a moment. Forget about chunky hipster glasses. Forget about John Lennon’s circle sunglasses. Forget The Boys of Summer; forget how she looks with her hair slicked back and her Wayfarers on. Pretend that stuff doesn’t exist. Just humor me.

The design of Glass is actually really beautiful. Elegant, sophisticated. They look human and a little bit alien all at once. Futuristic but not out of time — like an artifact from the 1960’s, someone trying to imagine what 2013 would be like. This is Apple-level design. No, in some ways it’s beyond what Apple has been doing recently. It’s daring, inventive, playful, and yet somehow still ultimately simple. The materials feel good in your hand and on your head, solid but surprisingly light. Comfortable. If Google keeps this up, soon we’ll be saying things like "this is Google-level design."

Even the packaging seems thoughtful.

The system itself is made up of only a few basic pieces. The main body of Glass is a soft-touch plastic that houses the brains, battery, and counterweight (which sits behind your ear). There’s a thin metal strip that creates the arc of the glasses, with a set of rather typical pad arms and nose pads which allow the device to rest on your face.

Google is making the first version of the device in a variety of colors. If you didn’t want to get creative, those colors are: gray, orange, black, white, and light blue. I joke around with Steve and Isabelle about what I think the more creative names would be. "Is the gray one Graphite? Hold on, don’t tell me. I’m going to guess." I go down the list. "Tomato? Onyx? Powder — no Avalanche, and Seabreeze." Steve and Isabelle laugh. "That’s good," Isabelle says.

But seriously. Shale. Tangerine. Charcoal. Cotton. Sky. So close.

That conversation leads into discussion of the importance of color in a product that you wear every day. "It’s one of those things, you think like, ‘oh, whatever, it is important,’ but it’s a secondary thing. But we started to realize how people get attached to the device… a lot of it is due to the color," Isabelle tells me.

And there is something to it. When I saw the devices in the different colors, and when I tried on Tangerine and Sky, I started to get emotional about which one was more "me." It’s not like how you feel about a favorite pair of sunglasses, but it evokes a similar response. They’re supposed to feel like yours.

Isabelle came to the project and Google from Yves Behar’s design studio. She joined the Glass team when their product was little more than a bizarre pair of white eyeglass frames with comically large circuit boards glued to either side. She shows me — perhaps ironically — a Chanel box with the original prototype inside, its prism lens limply dangling from the right eye, a gray ribbon cable strewn from one side to the other. The breadboard version.

It was Isabelle’s job to make Glass into something that you could wear, even if maybe you still weren’t sure you wanted to wear it. She gets that there are still challenges.

The Explorer edition which the company will ship out has an interchangeable sunglass accessory which twists on or off easily, and I must admit makes Glass look slightly more sane. I also learn that the device actually comes apart, separating that center metal rim from the brains and lens attached on the right. The idea is that you could attach another frame fitted for Glass that would completely alter the look of the device while still allowing for the heads-up functionality. Steve and Isabelle won’t say if they’re working with partners like Ray-Ban or Tom Ford (the company that makes my glasses), but the New York Times just reported that Google is speaking to Warby Parker, and I’m inclined to believe that particular rumor. It’s obvious the company realizes the need for this thing to not just look wearable — Google needs people to want to wear it.

So yes, the Glass looks beautiful to me, but I still don’t want to wear it.

Topolsky in Mirrorshades

Finally I get a chance to put the device on and find out what using Glass in the real world actually feels like. This is the moment I’ve been waiting for all day. It’s really happening.

When you activate Glass, there’s supposed to be a small screen that floats in the upper right-hand of your field of vision, but I don’t see the whole thing right away. Instead I’m getting a ghost of the upper portion, and the bottom half seems to melt away at the corner of my eye.

Steve and Isabelle adjust the nose pad and suddenly I see the glowing box. Victory.

It takes a moment to adjust to this spectral screen in your vision, and it’s especially odd the first time you see it, it disappears, and you want it to reappear but don’t know how to make it happen. Luckily that really only happens once, at least for me.

Here’s what you see: the time is displayed, with a small amount of text underneath that reads "ok glass." That’s how you get Glass to wake up to your voice commands. Actually, it’s a two-step process. First you have to touch the side of the device (which is actually a touchpad), or tilt your head upward slowly, a gesture which tells Glass to wake up. Once you’ve done that, you start issuing commands by speaking "ok glass" first, or scroll through the options using your finger along the side of the device. You can scroll items by moving your finger backwards or forward along the strip, you select by tapping, and move "back" by swiping down. Most of the big interaction is done by voice, however.

The device gets data through Wi-Fi on its own, or it can tether via Bluetooth to an Android device or iPhone and use its 3G or 4G data while out and about. There’s no cellular radio in Glass, but it does have a GPS chip.

Let me start by saying that using it is actually nearly identical to what the company showed off in its newest demo video. That’s not CGI — it’s what Glass is actually like to use. It’s clean, elegant, and makes relative sense. The screen is not disruptive, you do not feel burdened by it. It is there and then it is gone. It’s not shocking. It’s not jarring. It’s just this new thing in your field of vision. And it’s actually pretty cool.

Glass does all sorts of basic stuff after you say "ok glass." Things you’ll want to do right away with a camera on your face. "Take a picture" snaps a photo. "Record a video" records ten seconds of video. If you want more you can just tap the side of the device. Saying "ok glass, Google" gets you into search, which plugs heavily into what Google has been doing with Google Now and its Knowledge Graph. Most of the time when you ask Glass questions you get hyper-stylized cards full of information, much like you do in Google Now on Android.

The natural language search works most of the time, but when it doesn’t, it can be confusing, leaving you with text results that seem like a dead-end. And Glass doesn’t always hear you correctly, or the pace it’s expecting you to speak at doesn’t line up with reality. I struggled repeatedly with Glass when issuing voice commands that seemed to come too fast for the device to interpret. When I got it right however, Glass usually responded quickly, serving up bits of information and jumping into action as expected.

Some of the issues stemmed from a more common problem: no data. A good data connection is obviously key for the device to function properly, and when taking Glass outside for stroll, losing data or experiencing slow data on a phone put the headset into a near-unusable state.

Steve and Isabelle know the experience isn’t perfect. In fact, they tell me that the team plans to issue monthly updates to the device when the Explorer program starts rolling. This is very much a work in progress.

But the most interesting parts of Glass for many people won’t be its search functionality, at least not just its basic ability to pull data up. Yes, it can tell you how old Brad Pitt is (49 for those keeping count), but Google is more interested in what it can do for you in the moment. Want the weather? It can do that. Want to get directions? It can do that and display a realtime, turn-by-turn overlay. Want to have a Google Hangout with someone that allows them to see what you’re seeing? Yep, it does that.

But the feature everyone is going to go crazy with — and the feature you probably most want to use — is Glass’ ability to take photos and video with a "you are there" view. I won’t lie, it’s amazingly powerful (and more than a little scary) to be able to just start recording video or snapping pictures with a couple of flicks of your finger or simple voice commands.

At one point during my time with Glass, we all went out to navigate to a nearby Starbucks — the camera crew I’d brought with me came along. As soon as we got inside however, the employees at Starbucks asked us to stop filming. Sure, no problem. But I kept the Glass’ video recorder going, all the way through my order and getting my coffee. Yes, you can see a light in the prism when the device is recording, but I got the impression that most people had no idea what they were looking at. The cashier seemed to be on the verge of asking me what I was wearing on my face, but the question never came. He certainly never asked me to stop filming.

Once those Explorer editions are out in the world, you can expect a slew of use (and misuse) in this department. Maybe misuse is the wrong word here. Steve tells me that part of the Explorer program is to find out how people want to (and will) use Glass. "It’s really important," he says, "what we’re trying to do is expand the community that we have for Glass users. Currently it’s just our team and a few other Google people testing it. We want to expand that to people outside of Google. We think it’s really important, actually, for the development of Glass because it’s such a new product and it’s not just a piece of software. We want to learn from people how it’s going to fit into their lifestyle." He gets the point. "It’s a very intimate device. We’d like to better understand how other people are going to use it. We think they’ll have a great opportunity to influence and shape the opportunity of Glass by not only giving us feedback on the product, but by helping us develop social norms as well."

I ask if it’s their attempt to define "Glass etiquette." Will there be the Glass version of Twitter’s RT? "That’s what the Explorer program is about," Steve says. But that’s not going to answer questions about what’s right and wrong to do with a camera that doesn’t need to be held up to take a photo, and often won’t even be noticed by its owner’s subjects. Will people get comfortable with that? Are they supposed to?

The privacy issue is going to be a big hurdle for Google with Glass. Almost as big as the hurdle it has to jump over to convince normal people to wear something as alien and unfashionable as Glass seems right now.

But what’s it actually like to have Glass on? To use it when you’re walking around? Well, it’s kind of awesome.

Think of it this way — if you get a text message or have an incoming call when you’re walking down a busy street, there are something like two or three things you have to do before you can deal with that situation. Most of them involve you completely taking your attention off of your task at hand: walking down the street. With Glass, that information just appears to you, in your line of sight, ready for you to take action on. And taking that action is little more than touching the side of Glass or tilting your head up — nothing that would take you away from your main task of not running into people.

It’s a simple concept that feels powerful in practice.

The same is true for navigation. When I get out of trains in New York I am constantly jumping right into Google Maps to figure out where I’m headed. Even after more than a decade in the city, I seem to never be able to figure out which way to turn when I exit a subway station. You still have to grapple with asking for directions with Glass, but removing the barrier of being completely distracted by the device in your hand is significant, and actually receiving directions as you walk and even more significant. In the city, Glass make you feel more powerful, better equipped, and definitely less diverted.

I will admit that wearing Glass made me feel self-conscious, and maybe it’s just my paranoia acting up (or the fact that I look like a huge weirdo), but I felt people staring at me. Everyone who I made eye contact with while in Glass seemed to be just about to say "hey, what the hell is that?" and it made me uncomfortable.

Steve claims that when those questions do come, people are excited to find out what Glass is. "We’ve been wearing this for almost a year now out in public, and it’s been so interesting and exciting to do that. Before, we were super excited about it and confident in our design, but you never know until you start wearing it out and about. Of course my friends would joke with me ‘oh no girls are going to talk to you now, they’ll think it’s strange.’ The exact opposite happened."

I don’t think Glass is right for every situation. It’s easy to see how it’s amazing for parents to capture all of the adorable things their kids are doing, or for skydivers and rock climbers who clearly don’t have their hands free and also happen to be having life changing experiences. And yes, it’s probably helpful if you’re in Thailand and need directions or translation — but this might not be that great at a dinner party, or on a date, or watching a movie. In fact, it could make those situations very awkward, or at the least, change them in ways you might not like.

Sometimes you want to be distracted in the old fashioned ways. And sometimes, you want people to see you — not a device you’re wearing on your face. One that may or may not be recording them right this second.

And that brings me back to the start: who would want to wear this thing in public?

Not if, but when

Honestly, I started to like Glass a lot when I was wearing it. It wasn’t uncomfortable and it brought something new into view (both literally and figuratively) that has tremendous value and potential. I don’t think my face looks quite right without my glasses on, and I didn’t think it looked quite right while wearing Google Glass, but after a while it started to feel less and less not-right. And that’s something, right?

The sunglass attachment Google is shipping with the device goes a long way to normalizing the experience. A partnership with someone like Ray-Ban or Warby Parker would go further still. It’s actually easy to see now — after using it, after feeling what it’s like to be in public with Glass on — how you could get comfortable with the device.

Is it ready for everyone right now? Not really. Does the Glass team still have huge distance to cover in making the experience work just the way it should every time you use it? Definitely.

But I walked away convinced that this wasn’t just one of Google’s weird flights of fancy. The more I used Glass the more it made sense to me; the more I wanted it. If the team had told me I could sign up to have my current glasses augmented with Glass technology, I would have put pen to paper (and money in their hands) right then and there. And it’s that kind of stuff that will make the difference between this being a niche device for geeks and a product that everyone wants to experience.

After a few hours with Glass, I’ve decided that the question is no longer ‘if,’ but ‘when?’

Via TXCHNOLOGIST

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