Glasses

The Google Glass may have gloriously failed, but that's not stopping tech companies from giving the eyeglass camera wearable another shot. Most notable has been the gradual rollout of Snapchat's Spectacles, which features a camera integrated with a pair of simple sunglasses that records brief videos and shares them on the social app. But if you'd prefer to shoot video that's not tied to one app, and use your own glasses, the PogoCam is just what you're looking for.

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Will Apple succeed in a market where Google miserably failed? That will probably be the biggest question that will come to anyone’s mind on hearing about Cupertino’s latest moonshot project. According to the usual insider sources, Apple is already taking baby steps towards potential digital glasses, ala Google Glass pictured above. Though there’s always a chance it would never see the light of day, such a wearable device could be its ticket into the augmented reality market.

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Snapchat created a lot of buzz a few days ago by launching its new Spectacles wearable — sunglasses equipped with a camera — through a bright yellow vending machine placed in Venice Beach, California. The surprise release came without warning, and what's more, the vending machine is the only way to buy a pair of the $130 glasses. But the big yellow box has appeared in a second location today, giving those in central California another chance to snag a pair.

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Snapchat has revealed its first hardware product, the Snapchat Spectacles, taking a more playful (and affordable) approach to wearable video capture than Google Glass. Resembling at first glance a set of regular, rounded sunglasses, albeit with oversized hinges, the eyewear includes a wide-angle camera on one side.

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These days, expensive headgear is becoming more and more common. There are two consumer virtual reality headsets, the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, available for prices of $600 and $800, respectively. That's already a steep buy, and it doesn't include the high-end gaming PC required to run the devices. But now here's Nike debuting a pair of sunglasses that cost a jaw-dropping $1,200. Are they capable of VR or augmented reality features? Nope. They're just sunglasses. Really, really expensive sunglasses.

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The second edition Google Glass header has appeared, and it looks... very similar to the first. This is what Google calls the "Enterprise Edition" of the headset, aiming it directly at the industry that decided it was a device that'd be helpful - businesses. Using this headset in the line of duty in a wide variety of trades has been a real boon for the popularity of the device, and here it would appear that it's been kept afloat by the segment that Google doesn't normally go after - not with as much veracity as the consumer world, anyway.

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Being blind and unable to see the world around us is a nightmare for a lot of people, but for many that is everyday life. A woman named Kath Beitz is legally blind and lost her vision as a child. Over the years, she has adapted to being unable to see the world around her. The challenge for Beitz was that she wanted to see her newborn son the day he was born.

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The Google Glass Explorer Program has officially been tapped by Google to shut down. That doesn't mean that there won't be any more Google Glass - in fact the opposite, more than likely - it's just part of the transition process. When a group exits inside Google X, Google's experimentation lab, it generally has more of a "not quite ready for the real world" vibe to it - now Google Glass is being brought into that real world. The real working world - not necessarily as a consumer product.

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Last year Sony revealed their first SmartEyeglass prototype to a bit of a tepid crowd - this year they've been a bit mum about the project as it hits a second generation. The "SmartEyeglass Attach!" as its called works with a high-resolution color OLED Microdisplay near the right eye and works with its own high-powered ARM Cortex A7 processor. It's made to be a bit more versatile than the original, and here aims to get sporty as well - look how well they attach to a pair of snowboard goggles, for instance - so sport-ready!

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From now until the 16th of February, the de Young Museum in San Francisco will be hosting Keith Haring: The Political Line, fully Google Glass-friendly. It's not a direct effort on the part of Google to represent Glass for new users - they're not exactly aiming for the consumer market at the moment - but it is set to be a treat for Google Glass Explorers. The "Explorer" group of Google Glass owners are the first wave - early adopters - and possibly the last wave of users outside the enterprise market.

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Smart glasses, while fancy and interesting, have the peculiar problem of usually being ugly, if not hard to personalize. Well, that and they could be used as instruments to invade privacy. Without giving up on the entire smart eyepiece category, Sony is trying to take a different spin on the wearable. Instead of a complete smart glass like Google Glass, Sony is developing a standalone display module instead, one that can be attached to any fashionable eyewear of your choosing and can even be used without a smartphone.

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Sometimes it's the little things that make a big difference, and Sets reckons it has just that in sunglasses. The customizable glasses are kicking off in a crowdfunded campaign to outfit affordable polarized shades with a clever interchangeable stainless steel hinge.

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