Google Glass: Are You For or Against?

There has been so many opinions, both negative and positive, about Google creating and soon to be releasing what they call Google Glass, we thought that we would look into this and develop some of our own opinions.

Essentially Google Glass is a pair of spectacles that features a small computer which has the ability to record everything that you see and hear, take pictures, recognise voices and give directions, to name but a few. The glasses also feature built in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth as standard, so all images, videos etc… can be instantly uploaded to the internet… but this is nothing new.

The idea of having a computer set within glasses or put directly and constantly within your peripheral vision is certainly not a new idea. Sci-fi films and books have many times over, written and featured this concept and even as early as the beginning of the 20^th century saw the invention of the reflector sight which uses a similar idea.

What does make Google Glass unique however is that it could potentially have the power to change the way we view, react and take in the world around us. OK maybe you may think that this is a bold statement, but just as an example, have you ever been to a gig and looked round at all the hundreds of people viewing the gig through their smart phone? Some people don’t even wait until after the event to upload their pictures to various social media platforms and wait impatiently for comments and “likes” whilst responding whilst the show is going on, missing it completely! And that is just the smart phone.

Already third party “app-makers” have begun development into face recognition software that specifically for Google Glass that can be used for situations such as finding people in crowds, and concerns have already been raised. The technology is already available within our CCTV cameras and monitoring software with an alarming fact that “the average Londoner is filmed on average 300 times a day” so really do we need to worry?

There has been so much negativity surrounding the concept of Google Glass, largely to do with invasion of privacy. With the ability of people being able to film at any time from their field of vision, may people have been worried that they will be filmed unknowingly. Seriously though, this technology has already been around and with the creation of Youtube, this sort of thing can already happened and can we really say that it has affected us that badly? Not only this, but the glasses themselves not exactly what you call discreet.

There is another problem that has also been flagged up, and that is the temptation for distraction. We as a race are prone to being distracted; it might go hand in hand with us being a curious species, but nevertheless, placing a computer screen that is constantly within our peripheral vision, may prove to be somewhat risky, particularly whilst driving.

Information that is collected through the glasses, some are worried, will be available to police and government authorities, but surely with the way in which social media functions nowadays, such information is already available.

Like any new technology that has been released, there will always be negativity surrounding it. With everything new there seems to be an over pessimistic view with the inevitable final outcome never really being as bad as previously envisaged. We don’t think there is any great cause for concern and that we should embrace this new form of technology.