December 2023
A brief account of my experience with Glass, ideas on wearables, and why I wear Linux.
Multiple pivotal moments in computer history have propelled a new technology into the zeitgeist and (eventually) widespread adoption.
The launch of Glass in 2012 marked a pivotal moment for augmented reality, as it brought wearable computers into the mainstream and challenged traditional human-computer interaction paradigms. Before Glass, optical headworn AR was mainly confined to research prototypes in places like the MIT Media Lab. Google's bold move changed this by introducing wearable technology on an international scale through its well-known brand presence.
The Glass Skydiving demo at Google I/O in 2012. Credit: The Verge
The public had mixed reactions to Glass, with some negative feedback. Despite this, Glass marked a significant advancement in wearable technology before Oculus was announced and Pebble watches were shipped. A concept video for Glass inspired me to pursue augmented reality and spatial computing at the age of 13 while working on various hardware and software projects. Although access to the "Explorer Program" was limited at that time, I began building my own AR headset as part of a project called "Tiger," which laid the foundation for my current work in this field.
After I started working with a nonprofit in Los Angeles to expand the App Club concept to more schools, a colleague in the Glass Explorer Program offered me one of his invitations to purchase a Glass Explorer Edition (XE) device. I used most of my earnings from building iOS applications for the App Store to buy it, and this risky move accelerated my spatial computing projects, laying the foundation for what I do now.
Wearing Glass has brought both positive and negative experiences over the years. The Glass Explorer community developed social etiquette, such as moving Glass from the face to the neck when entering a restroom, making its camera less intrusive in private spaces.
The biggest complaint has been against the built-in camera, where people have thought I may be recording their conversation or worse, streaming it to cloud storage for nefarious purposes. In my experience, people have been increasingly interested with a positive attitude toward Glass in the past few years, likely due in part to a higher prevalence of smartwatches, wireless earbuds, and VR headsets. I anticipate that along with Apple’s unveiling of Vision Pro, social acceptance of AR glasses will continue to improve.
A few years later, as a first-year computer science student at Georgia Tech simultaneously working on my first AR startup (Teleportal), I was scanning the College of Computing faculty directory to see what research opportunities were available. One line caught my eye: “Starner, Thad E.” This was one of my heroes, a wearable computing pioneer who is perhaps most famous for his Lizzy computer at the MIT Media Lab in the 1990s, and is also a prolific researcher and significant contributor to the Glass project.
Dr. Thad Starner and “Lizzy”
Members of the Wearable Computing Club at the MIT Media Lab, circa 1995.