Would You Like Your Earbuds to Have Cameras?
Meta and Apple are exploring them.
Earbuds with cameras? What’s next, helmets with wings? Cellphone with a straw for drinks?
Seriously, Meta (Facebook’s parent company) proposes to build a variation of its very successful smart glasses.
Stay with me for the explanation:
As you may know, Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses have been well-received and very promising. Contrary to what many would expect, those smart glasses don’t include any VR or AR component — actually, they don’t include any display at all.
I wrote a candid review of the Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses four months ago. They link the camera and microphone to an AI system on the cloud, so you can ask aloud questions like “Hey, Meta, what plant is this?” (facing the plant).
Answers will come in audio, using the speakers at the lens’s arms.
You can also take photos, make and get phone calls, launch livestream sessions, listen to music, and more.
In my post, I also proposed some (not yet available) functionalities that could be, in principle, implemented by smart glasses, like tourist guidance, translation, reading aloud physical books, and guidance for vision-impaired people.
