Google Glass Archives - Argyll Free Press

Garmin Varia Vision Is Like Google Glass, But For Cyclists

January 5, 2016 By Cristopher Hall Leave a Comment

Garmin Varia Vision is like Google Glass, but for cyclists – at least, at a first glance.

Garmin might just make this Google Glass lookalike popular, as it targets a demographic that is in need of this kind of gadgets. The Varia Vision can attach to any pair of glasses. It weighs about 30 grams, and its battery juice makes it run just shy of eight hours on a single charge.

The Varia Vision can be clipped on either side of the glasses. It provides a compact display at the right, or left, edge of a cyclist’s view so they don’t need to look down at the handlebars and away from oncoming traffic ahead.

The Varia Vision comes with a pretty hefty price tag of $400 – this converts to 270 pounds in the UK, and AU$555 in Australia; and it’s most certainly not for newcomers to the sport. It’s aimed at professionals who compete, train and for those who rely on their bikes for commuting in a traffic-riddled city.

The heads-up display provides turn by turn directions, distance, cadence, speed metrics and other performance data, and even notifications and messages if the user pairs it with a smartphone. Furthermore, we don’t really know the resolution of the display, or what it’s actually made out of, but the company has assured us that it will be clearly readable in all weather conditions.

Analysing it, we notice that it does about everything that Google’s Glass did – it even has a touch-sensitive strip on the side so you can easily navigate the UI. Garmin claims that it can be utilized if the individual even wears gloves or has wet hands.

The Varia Vision can also connect to Garmin’s Rearview Bike Radar – a device that notifies the user if a car is coming from behind in order to ensure that the cyclist doesn’t steer in front of its path.

The Varia Vision offers an augmented reality display, but considering that the AR tech is somehow still in its incipient development phase we are quite curious to see it how it functions in real-life.

The device will come out in Q1 of 2016 and it’s compatible with Android and iOS – there doesn’t seem to be any love for Windows mobile OS at the moment, but we are still hoping.

However, Garmin isn’t the only company developing augmented reality devices for athletes. Recon Instruments is the first that comes to mind. The company was recently bought by Intel, so we are foreseeing great things in AR for athletes in the near future.

The Garmin Varia Vision has been announced at this year’s CES, which takes places in Las Vegas.

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Google Glass Team Re-Branded as Project Aura, Not Ara

September 17, 2015 By Roxanne Briean Leave a Comment

Project Aura is Google’s new Glass team name. This time around Google is looking mostly at business rather than focusing on consumers.

The Project Aura team has been hiring straight from Amazon’s Lab126. Software developers, engineers and even project managers are being swooped over to Google’s side – It is unknown at the moment if there were cookies involved or not.

Regardless, Google capitalized on Amazon’s phase 1 of laying off staff members. Due to their Fire smartphone failure, Amazon fired more than a dozen engineers.

Ivy Ross will be in charge of Project Aura. However, she still reports to Google’s head of connected-home business Nest Tony Fadell. There hasn’t been any significant change in the hierarchy that comprises the Glass team. Ross previously ran the project.

While Project Aura is working hard on the new iteration of the Glass, the team is also meddling with other kinds of wearable technology. This is according to job descriptions found on LinkedIn.

One software development manager that worked on Lab126, and later on joined Project Aura in August of 2015, described the project simply as Glass and Beyond. He also noted on his LinkedIn profile that the team is developing cool wearables.

Dimitry Svetlov, the manager in this case, didn’t quickly reply to a message seeking answers on LinkedIn, the Wall Street Journal adds.

Unfortunately for Google, their first try at selling the Glass failed, miserably. Partly do to the whole NSA scandal and because it featured a more than hefty price. Their first iteration of Glass retailed at $1,500.

People across the US were seeing Google’s Glass as a devilish thing that someone can use to record them in public places without nobody noticing.

Google couldn’t handle the backlash. They stopped selling the Glass in January and the company’s execs confirmed that their device was clearly not ready for consumers.

Eric Schmidt, Executive Chairman at Google, noted earlier this year that the big G won’t give up trying to develop and market the Glass because they see this kind of technology as having a huge potential.

It’s a new market that doesn’t yet have a standard of quality imposed.

In the last couple of months, Google has been spreading Glass 2.0 to select few companies in the energy, health care and manufacturing industries.

Project Aura won’t have a consumer release this year, and rumors have it that they probably won’t have it ready even for 2016. What we do know is that it’s going to be released sometimes in the near future.

Will you give it another go when the time comes? Do you think people will forever hate the Glass?

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Google Glass Ain’t Dead, Now It’s More Enterprise Oriented

August 1, 2015 By Karen Jackson Leave a Comment

Google Glass ain’t dead, and it’s going to make a come-back sometime this year, or mayhaps even in 2016. It will look almost the same, but this time it will be more enterprise oriented.

Google hasn’t admitted, yet, that their first iteration of Google Glass was a big flop, mainly because of the NSA leaks, and the big G is trying once again to make G-Glass happen.

Rumors have it that the new Glass, which is basically the same as the company’s first product, design wise, will cost less than $1,500 so enterprises will be enticed in buying them, instead of other smart glass devices already released on the market.

The second gen Google Glass device has already been distributed to Glass at Work partners, notes Re/code.

Can Google make a stance in the smart glass market? There are a few consumer oriented smart glasses set to release in 2016 like the ODG R7, but it will retail at almost $3,000. Microsoft’s HoloLens will also debut in 2016, and the augmented reality device already has a cult following, mainly because of their Minecraft demo.

Google Glass competitor ODG R7

The team behind the development of Google Glass, which is lead by Tony Fadell, who took control of the project only last year, hasn’t released any technical specs, nor any information regarding a new software update, but sources note that they are working towards developing a more user-friendly, and highly intuitive interface.

Enterprise-specific augmented-reality apps have a high demand, and enterprises are more keen on testing smart glasses, and experiment to see if it helps them on the long run. Not like average consumers, who quickly disinherited the Google Glass after its launch.

The FBI was called at a cinema by an usher, because he thought someone with Google Glass was recording the movie, and streaming it live to his friends, or on the internet. The man in cause was indeed wearing Google Glass, but he had a prescription for them, and no footage was found on his device.

Paranoia drives to more paranoia.

But this isn’t to say that Google has completely put the lid on a consumer version for their G-Glass. They are still in partnership with Luxottica, a giant glass manufacturer who played a huge part in developing the Glass 1.0.

Sources close to Google, and Fadell, note that the company is secretly working on releasing a consumer friendly device. Fadell discussed the topic with BBC, and noted that – ” it’s going to take time to get it right.”, and Google needs to make a long-term commitment, and continue to invest money in wearables.

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