Sorry wannabe Google Gogglers, but your Terminator-styled visual overlays are not going to be here as soon as you might have wanted. Google is still being quite dodgy with the details surrounding its much-anticipated augmented reality glasses, but CNET confirms after spending some time at Google HQ that informational overlays will be more restricted, displaying above the normal line of sight, “about where the edge of an umbrella might be.”
That’s something of a far cry from the in-your-face, information-heavy overlay Google teased us with in its demo video (see below), which shows text messages, maps, video calls, and various other info (and--conspicuously--no ads) popping up smack in the middle of the user’s field of view. We were promised augmented reality. It sounds like what we’re getting is more like glasses with an info bar across the top of the lenses.
This is probably a good thing, however. Think more along the lines of the head-up display on a car windshield than a fully-immersive AR experience, which will be both easier to adapt to and easier to integrate into all the activities for which humans need to retain some degree of their normal, un-augmented vision (like mostly everything). Look for more coverage on this here as Google’s testing of the product matures and company execs slowly bleed out more details.
[CNET]
140 years of Popular Science at your fingertips.
Each issue has been completely reimagined for your iPad. See our amazing new vision for magazines that goes far beyond the printed page
Stay up to date on the latest news of the future of science and technology from your iPhone or Android phone with full articles, images and offline viewing
Featuring every article from the magazine and website, plus links from around the Web. Also see our PopSci DIY feed
For our annual How It Works issue, we break down everything from the massive Falcon Heavy rocket to a tiny DNA sequencer that connects to a USB port. We also take a look at an ambitious plan for faster-than-light travel and dive into the billion-dollar science of dog food.
Plus the latest Legos, Cadillac's plug-in hybrid, a tractor built for the apocalypse, and more.


Online Content Director: Suzanne LaBarre | Email
Senior Editor: Paul Adams | Email
Associate Editor: Dan Nosowitz | Email
Assistant Editor: Colin Lecher | Email
Assistant Editor:Rose Pastore | Email
Contributing Writers:
Rebecca Boyle | Email
Kelsey D. Atherton | Email
Francie Diep | Email
Shaunacy Ferro | Email
Google goggles is a completely different application. This article pertains to Project Glass. That being said the commercials are always better than the product, and that is a shame.
This is a good thing... I can only imagine how bad this could become if this was "in your face". While driving a car or doing something remotely important.
---
In space, no one can hear a tree fall in the forest.
Just so everyone knows as we browse the internet and cookies track us, so will this device track out real life and develop a data base upon us.....
Google will keep track of what gains our interest, perhaps our emails and sent and receive conversations, purchases too. Does this thing have means to delete its temporary files and cookies? Does it keep track of all the places we go, while wearing it?
.............................
Science sees no further than what it can sense, i.e. facts.
Religion sees beyond the senses, i.e. faith.
Open your mind and see!
Reality check
All I want want from google is "THE CAR"
In the future, when a person becomes 100% or close to being predictable, where will our true freedom be? Will our choices truly be our own or we just being completely marketed and then a slave race via our greed and personal needs.
As we mature into adults and become of the general part of the market, we will be led down a path of market predictability, government efficiency and productivity, with a efficiency for profit and government purpose and tax.
It will feel like a fait is coming out direction, but in fact we are really being led and all our other opportunities that might be thought of by somebody else taken away.
When you do a search on Google or any other search engine, you assume you are given the most the choices that are available to your question. But are you really given all those choices or what the search engine wishes you to choose from?
As we get more dependent upon the internet information highway and the marketing search engines giving us information, we do become lazy in going to the local library or out into the world and finding hand to hand, face to face real tangible factual information.
We adapt to being blindly lead from a source we which has no solid tangable crediablity...the internet.
this is a heads up display, like in video games or a scouter from dragon ball z. I think this is much less stupid
@Auroria , I read a book like this. it was terrifying. The premise was that augmented reality had taken hold, and it had 10 videos from 5 seconds into the future to a day into the future. I would show you what it deemed the 'optimal' path, and it would also show a lay over on reality making reality look better. people got so used to taking the 'optimal' path that over the generations humans lost free will, and even the knowledge that they were in a heads up display. It was accepted as reality. the story goes on to show rebels trying to break out of the optimal path, which in the end shows that they were only able to do so because a rogue part of the AI that controlled the display had been working years to try to break humans out. It took a long time because most had a breakdown when the AI tried to lead them into the revolution.
correct. in the future privacy will only be obtained by the "elite" and also by the hackers/rebels. everyone else will have to do what the government tells them. with the google goggles big brother will see where we are and what you are doing at all times. soon they will have "bugs" implanted into our brains. so we wont be able to take them off. it will able our "fourth eye" by The Trial by Franz Kafka. plus with this technology they will always have an idea of our future actions. they can blame us for something that we haven't done yet like in the Minority Report. the only good i see from this is people will think twice before harming someone since all eyes will be on them......
"religion is like a prison for the seekers of wisdom"
-Killah Priest
Would be awesome if these could be perfected but without the: no privacy, computer take over, big brother on your back and google advertising thats proabably going to come with it, its never going to be quite what people want. Nothings perfect i guess reality check
sometimes people say that they are making cool stuff but they actually are making a not so good thing. You know how that is called? Advertisement. And google loves it.
Auroria
while i can see where your coming from, is it really that bad?
say you frequent a specific spot all the time, but then you move, wouldnt it be great for your google goggles to recommend a spot that is similar to the old one?
like when im watching the stupid commercials on hulu. i like the fact that i can get the commercials to be the funny geico commercials.
or when i shop on amazon, i like getting recommendations for things i have shown interest in rather than something i would never even look at.
you are going to get lead in one direction or another, you will always have commercials, so whats wrong with making them tailored to you.
who really cares if some random guy in san francisco knows some guy named *john smith* has genital warts, does that really matter? he is not going to visit you at the bar while your hitting on girls and say "hey john, i recommend this ointment for your genital warts". thats not going to happen, so why not let them gather information to give you services that ultimately benefit you