The Google Glass wearable tech’s popularity is certainly on the rise and the device will be available to the public sometime in the future. But did you know that Apple was supposedly working on a similar prototype device a while back? Allegedly, they ditched it due to lack of time to develop the product.
The new info comes to us from Tony Fadell, who was the Senior VP (2006 to 2008) of Apple’s division and is currently the CEO of Nest. In Fast Company’s Oral History of Apple Design, Fadell says,
“At Apple, we were always asking, What else can we revolutionize? We looked at video cameras and remote controls. The craziest thing we talked about was something like Google Glass. We said, “What if we make visors, so it’s like you’re sitting in a theater?” I built a bunch of those prototypes. But we had such success with the things we were already doing that we didn’t have time”.
From these comments, it sounds more like a VR handset for gaming (Think Oculus Rift) and multimedia than an actual true computer solution like Glass. It’s also not clear how far they ever got with such a project, though it seems probable that it was nothing more than a low-resource, side-project.
Either way, the device didn’t make it out of the company’s labs, but maybe something similar will down the road. Who knows for sure (save for Apple)? Do you want to see a Glass-like Apple product? Or are you wishing just for an Apple smartwatch? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Does Project Glass represent the next big step in mobile communications?
Back in early 2012, before the world had heard of Google Glass, the tech world was ablaze with rumours that the search giant was beavering away on augmented reality goggles.
As the days went by, it was clear that not only was this true, but that Google's dream of wearable technology was far, far closer to release than anyone would have guessed.
TechRadar has had time with the Google Glass Explorerso you can find plenty more information right there.
But what exactly is Google Glass? Why is it attracting all this attention and what are the implications - both good and bad - of having a Google-eye view of the world?
oes Project Glass represent the next big step in mobile communicatio
Google Glass and its prism display
What is Google Glass?
Google Glass is an attempt to free data from desktop computers and portable devices like phones and tablets, and place it right in front of your eyes.
Essentially, Google Glass is a camera, display, touchpad, battery and microphone built into spectacle frames so that you can perch a display in your field of vision, film, take pictures, search and translate on the go.
The principle is one that has been around for years in science fiction, and more recently it's become a slightly clunky reality. In fact, the "heads-up display" putting data in your field of vision became a reality as early as 1900 when the reflector sight was invented.
Google Glass options
Google Glass uses display technology instead to put data in front (or at least, to the upper right) of your vision courtesy of a prism screen. This is designed to be easily seen without obstructing your view. According to Google the display is "the equivalent of a 25-inch high definition screen from eight feet away". There's no official word on native resolution, but 640 x 360 has been widely mooted.
Overlaying data into your vision has obvious benefits; many of which are already functional in Google Glass. Directions become more intuitive (although it sounds like there is no GPS on board so you will have to pair it with your phone), you can view real-time translations or transcriptions of what is being said, and you can scroll through and reply to messages - all on the fly.
Google Glass - certainly capturing plenty of attention
The embedded camera obviously does not need a viewfinder because it is simply recording your first-person perspective, allowing you to take snaps or footage of what you are actually seeing.
Any function that requires you to look at a screen could be put in front of you.
Controlling this data is the next neat trick. With a microphone and touchpad on one arm of the frame, you can select what you want to do with a brief gesture or by talking to the device, and Google Glass will interpret your commands.
Google Glass can also provide sound, with bone-induction technology confirmed. This vibrates your skull to create sound, which is both more grisly sounding and much less cumbersome than traditional headphones.
What can Google Glass do?
As well as Google's own list of features, the early apps for Google Glass provide a neat glimpse into the potential of the headset.
As well as photos and film - which require no explanation - you can use the Google hangout software to video conference with your friends and show them what you're looking at.
You'll also be able to use Google Maps to get directions, although with GPS absent from the spec list, you'll need to tether Glass to your phone.
"Is Glass cool and entirely novel? Yes, it certainly is. Is it a device that will change the life of, or even just prove useful to, the average consumer? That's doubtful."
To do that, Google offers the MyGlass app. This pairs your headset with an Android phone. As well as sharing GPS data, this means messages can be received, viewed on the display, and answered using the microphone and Google's voice-to-text functionality.
That functionality will also bring the ability to translate the words being spoken to you into your own language on the display. Obviously you'll need a WiFi connection or a hefty data plan if you're in another country, but it's certainly a neat trick if it works.
The New York Times app gives an idea how news will be displayed when it's asked for: a headline, byline, appropriate image and number of hours since the article was published are displayed.
Google Glass - another reason not to miss your flight
Other cool ideas include a air carrier's suggestion that you could haveflight flight details beamed to you while you are waiting at the airport. Basically, the sky's the limit.
If you want to know if Google Glass is any good - TechRadar's Alex Roth spent time with the device and said the following:
"Is Glass cool and entirely novel? Yes, it certainly is. Is it a device that will change the life of, or even just prove useful to, the average consumer? That's doubtful."
What are the Google Glass specifications?
As well as a mooted 640 x 360 display, the built-in camera is a 5MP snapper that can film at 720p.
Battery life is apparently a day, although that's with the usual "typical use" caveat, which probably excludes a lot of videoing.
There's 16GB of flash memory built into the device, although only 12GB will be available for user storage. The device will sync to your Google Drive in the cloud
Bluetooth and WiFi will be built in, but no GPS chip - so the Glass will probably work best alongside an Android phone, although you can pair with any Bluetooth enabled phone.
The frame will come with replacement and adjustable nosepads, and is expected to be both lightweight and extremely robust. It will also have atouchpad along one arm.
The sound will be produced through bone conduction transfer - vibrating your skull to transmit to your ears.
There is a Micro USB cable and charger for the dev versions, and all of the above specs are expected to be replicated in the consumer versions when they arrive.
Lastly, Google Glass will come in five colours: Charcoal, Tangerine, Shale, Cotton and Sky. Using Glass's translation ability to turn that list from marketing speak to plain English, that's black, orange, grey, white and blue.
Google Glass will come in five colours
What's the Google Glass price?
The Google Glass Explorer (the developer version being sent out now)costs $1,500 - around £985 or AU$1,449.
The consumer versions, which are expected to arrive by the end of 2013, are expected to be a little cheaper, although any actual prices remain speculative. They are unlikely to be super-cheap - but Google's success with the Nexus 7 tablet may prompt the company to subsidise some of the cost.
Google Glass - coming to a developer near you (if you live in the US)
There is going to be plenty of competition going forward
Interestingly, Google might already be considering its own successor to Glass if this patent is to be believed. The patented design looks more like regular glasses, following the style of Google's potential competitors.
Another project that is attracting attention for mixing screens and glasses is the Oculus Rift, which is currently very much about gaming, but could feasibly - using a camera - show you live video of reality and enable some awesome real time overlays because it's a complete screen. Cool.
Is Project Glass evil?
Obviously with any new technology there is the potential for misuse - and Google Glass is, of course, a little problematic when it comes to privacy.
Of course, Google would say that it is merely taking the functionality that we already have in our portable devices and making it more readily accessible.
Google Glass - is it evil?
A lot will come down to personal preference. For many, the prospect of being filmed by someone from their glasses will make them uneasy, having conversations logged and transcribed will be divisive, and the inclusion of facial recognition would clearly be problematic.
Google has released some information regarding how you know when people are filming through the device, which should quash some people's fears that the device will be used as a perving mechanism.
Essentially, if there is a light on then Google Glass is filming you or taking your picture.
It's important to note that there will be restrictions on when you use Glass, and proving it's not on might not be enough. Driving a car, for instance, might well end up pushing you on the wrong side of the law - and filming as you are asked politely to leave the car probably won't endear you to the police either.
Windows Phone 8.1 will likely be released next year and we’re already hearing about some features it will bring.
According to the website Windows-Phone.pl, the next version of Microsoft’s mobile platform will bring the much-rumored Notification Center, ability to select multiple tiles at once, and a Siri-like virtual assistant called Cortana.
Multi-tile select will match the same feature Windows 8.1 brings, making it easier to manage your homescreen, which should also include the Notifications tile (though we guess notifications will also be popping all around the place making sure you don’t miss a beat).
As for the mentioned virtual assistant, it takes its codename from Cortana, an artificially intelligent character in Microsoft’s Halo series who can learn and adapt. As such, this app/service will be able to learn and adapt, relying on machine-learning technology.
Meanwhile, we first have to see the GDR3 update for the platform and that one will likely be unveiled in the next few weeks, bringing support for faster quad-core chips, full HD screens and so on…
Over the past few years, Apple has demonstrated an uncanny ability to enhance performance with each successive iteration of the iPhone while simultaneously maintaining, and sometimes increasing, battery life.
The recently unveiled iPhone 5s and 5c are no different.
Anandtech recently dug through some FCC documentation and found that the advertised battery capacity on the iPhone 5s is nearly 10 percent larger than on the iPhone 5. Meanwhile, battery capacity on the iPhone 5c is approximately 5 percent larger than on the iPhone 5.
It turns out that there are in fact some battery size increases for both the 5S and 5C if the FCC disclosure is to be believed. While I'm somewhat skeptical sometimes of the accuracy of battery capacities as reported in FCC disclosures (which I noted about the battery size for the Nexus 5), these numbers seem credible given what I've heard, the statement Apple made during the keynote about the 5C battery size going up, and what I'd expect with some board re-layout for the 5S. The iPhone 5S ends up getting an almost 10 percent increase in size versus the iPhone 5, the iPhone 5C goes up around 5 percent versus the iPhone 5.
As for how this affects real-world usage, Apple noted during its keynote earlier this week that 3G talk time and LTE browsing time on both phones check in at an impressive 10 hours, marking a 25 percent increase from the iPhone 5. Also of note, standby time on both devices have been upped from 225 hours to 250 hours when measured against the iPhone 5.
As we've noted before, battery life may not be the sexiest of specs to advertise, but it's something that enhances the user experience greatly and yet is quizzically overlooked by critics.
Confused about whether you should buy a Chromebook or not? Google’s latest announcement might help you to make up your mind. The search giant has revealed that their upcoming Chromebooks will be powered by Intel’s new 4th generation CPUs. This means that the machines will be coming with strong computing power and better battery life.
According to Google, the Chromebooks will offer twice the battery life compared to previous models. The devices are coming from companies like Acer and HP, who are not new to Chromebooks, and from new players like ASUS and Toshiba. Of course, the Chrome OS is no Windows or OSX, but the Chromebooks are now a lot more appealing with the upgrade and with the release of the Chrome apps.
HP has announced that they are expecting their Chromebook 14 to ship with a price tag of $299 before the holidays. That’s also when Acer’s new Chromebook will be launching.
China's new leadership, which has been in office for 10 months, is attacking the nation's social media channels, a depressing -- yet unsurprising -- turn of events.
By Minxin Pei
FORTUNE -- Social media in China, which has nearly 600 million users, has long been recognized as a political game-changer. In a country where a one-party regime maintains tight censorship over traditional media, the relative freedom of expression available via Chinese social media, particularly Weibo (the Chinese equivalent of Twitter), has made it a powerful platform for rallying public opinion.
In the past few years, Weibo has been credited for exposing corrupt officials, mobilizing the public against social injustices, and forcing local governments to abandon plans for building hazardous plants in densely populated areas.
The demonstrated potency of China's emerging social media has left many wondering whether the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will continue to tolerate it.
Judging by the recent ferocious crackdown launched by the Chinese government, the answer is clear: The new leadership, which has been in office for 10 months, is implementing a comprehensive plan to eliminate the threat represented by China's social media.
So far, the campaign has resulted in the arrests of several leading online commentators, each of whom used to have tens of millions of loyal followers on Weibo. On August 21, police in Beijing detained Qin Huohuo and Yang Qiuyu, two well-known Big-Vs (online commentators with verified large followings), on charges of rumormongering and defamation. Two days later, police in Suzhou arrested Zhou Lubao, another online muckraker famous for spotting an expensive watch worn by a smiling official inspecting the site of a horrendous traffic accident a years ago (ironically, Zhou's arrest coincided with the trial of the corrupt official). Zhou was accused of blackmail and rumormongering.
Then, on August 25, the Chinese government dropped a real bombshell. Its police arrested Charles Xue, a wealthy Chinese-American investor with more than 12 million online fans. Xue, an outspoken crusader against corruption and social injustice in China, was allegedly caught with a prostitute in Beijing.
What makes these arrests notable -- and disturbing -- is that they were preceded by emphatic official announcements by China's top leadership that the party would tighten its ideological control and followed by a strong endorsement by China's legal authorities on the validity of prosecuting individuals for online rumormongering and defamation.
On August 19, before the latest arrests, China's President Xi Jinping gave a speech at the party's conference on propaganda. He pledged that the party would never cede control over ideology. After these arrests were made, China's supreme court and prosecutor's office issued an unusual joint legal opinion that essentially affirms that online rumormongering is a serious crime that local authorities can prosecute.
The party's war on social media reveals many things, most notably the political orientation of the new leadership. Before it assumed office last November, there were hopes that the Communist Party's new leaders would be more tolerant and open. Their actions suggest they are more conservative, insecure, and obsessed with instability than their predecessors.
The crackdown will also doom the new leadership's much-hyped campaign against official corruption. Experience around the world demonstrates that the most effective weapon against corruption is transparency and free speech. Indeed, China's social media has played a critical role in exposing many corrupt officials in recent years. The vigilance of China's online muckrakers has reached such a fearsome level that few Chinese officials now dare to display those expensive watches and other bribes in public. By prosecuting online activists, the party has essentially given corrupt officials a license to persecute whistle-blowers at will.
Apparently, the new leadership's strategic thinking is "killing chickens to warn monkeys." By prosecuting a few leading commentators, the government hopes to silence the majority and tame the country's social media.
To be sure, the harshness of the offensive against social media could intimidate China's people into submission. But such success is likely to be short-lived. Like all government-sponsored campaigns, the attack on social media will lose momentum at some point because the party will have other fires to put out, thus creating an opportunity for social activists to return to this space.
Fighting a war against social media is like trying to squeeze a balloon: The government may succeed in taming one part, but it simply pushes social activists to other spaces and forces them to be more innovative in fighting Chinese censors.
Eventually, the party will lose this war. But by waging a futile and repressive campaign against transparency, the party will only destroy innocent lives and hopes. That is the real tragedy.
Minxin Pei is the Tom and Margot Pritzker Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College and a non-resident senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States
In 2012 AppAdvice asked the question: "Will an Anti-Reflective Screen Ever Come to the iPhone and iPad?" Well, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple today titled "UV Mask with Anti-Reflection Coating and UV Absorption Material," that answers that question. Apple's patent reveals that an anti-reflection film will be added to the manufacturing process of a future iPad display. The new anti-reflective process may extend to other products in the future including the iPhone, other portables and a television.
According to Apple's patent filing; patent FIG. 5 noted above illustrates a UV mask that includes an anti-reflection film and a UV absorption film to prevent reflections from the mask to the mother glass. In this embodiment, the UV mask may include a metal coating or a black mask (BM). As shown, the UV absorption film is adjacent to and covers the UV mask. The anti-reflection film or coating is provided over the UV absorbing film. An adhesive may be used to adhere the UV absorber to the mask. As such, the antireflection film is placed on top of the UV mask, with the anti-reflection layer facing towards the LCD assembly.
In one embodiment, the UV blocking layer on the mask (e.g., metal and/or BM) are on the same side of the glass as the anti-reflection film. The antireflection film may generally include a plastic substrate that contains UV absorbers and an anti-reflection coating that is effective in the UV range of the spectrum.
Patent Credits
Apple credits Cheng Chen, Kyung-Wook Kim and John Zhong as the inventors of this patent application which was originally filed in Q4 2012. To review this technical patent, see Apple's patent application 20130233482.
Patently Apple presents a detailed summary of patent applications with associated graphics for journalistic news purposes as each such patent application is revealed by the U.S. Patent & Trade Office. Readers are cautioned that the full text of any patent application should be read in its entirety for full and accurate details. Revelations found in patent applications shouldn't be interpreted as rumor or fast-tracked according to rumor timetables. About Comments: Patently Apple reserves the right to post, dismiss or edit comments.
