E-SPEAIT T1

Greetings, welcome to my blog. This blog is being written with the intentions of satisfying the requirements of the E-SPEAIT course I am currently taking.

When we talk about interesting technology and their failures, I always like to start the conversation by bringing up Google Glass. Google Glass was a foray into ubiquitous computers as a pair of a smart glasses which would provide online information to a user just a glance away.

google-glass

On April 15, 2013 Google began selling prototypes for 1500$ before it went public on May 15, 2014. It came with a touchpad at the side of the frame allowing the user to control the device through timeline like interfaces, a 720p video camera, and a small unique LCD display. There were many apps designed for the glass such as the standard Google Maps, Gmail, and search engine, as well as ones for, photo manipulation, translation, facial recognition and more. So, with such an intriguing concept and capability how were the glasses a failure? When they were launched not even considering their price, they were only available to select backers who got on the prototype program. Even before it was released to the public there were privacy concerns of having a camera directly aligned with your line of sight on for a considerable amount of time. Health concerns of having a device that could possible be leaking harmful radiation with direct skin contact next to one’s face. Little progress on the device after it released lead to many feeling confused if Google was going to develop the product further when it felt like a work in progress device at the time. The more prevalent issue I believe was the lack of a clear function for the glasses, even if I personally really like the concept and can think of a couple of way to use it at home or even in a work setting, I have to admit it sounds like a tedious product to integrate in a working lifestyle without simply defaulting to standard alternatives. All in all, considering what I’ve mentioned collectively, on January 15, 2015 Google stopped commercial Google Glass production, however it still lives on the enterprise side of technology.

Moving on to a product that I like to believe was a very, very early foray into the world of Virtual Reality, but not really, is the Virtual Boy.

SONY DSC

The Virtual Boy was released in 1995 and marketed as the first gaming console capable of displaying stereoscopic 3D graphics. The console was intended to be viewed at eye level pressing one’s head directly against its eyepiece. By utilizing a parallax effect with a red monochrome display to create an illusion of depth, the console did not truly provide a 3D experience. With the small number of games totaling to 22 released, none were true 3D gaming experiences. What I believe to be the true failure of the Virtual Boy was Nintendo’s pushing it into the market in a rather unfinished state since they devoted more focus into the Nintendo 64 which released just a year later and became an enormous success. I find the concept of the virtual boy to be one of the numerous examples of early forays into 3D which failed, but the Virtual Boy is one the more well-known ones.

And to end this post, I’d like to talk about a product that I myself had high hopes for, but unfortunately did not see success, and it’s Google’s Project Ara.

modular-motorola-project-ara1

The concept was a modular phone which a base design that would allow components to be swapped out and upgraded in order to provide a longer lifecycle as well as reduce electronic waste. The concept of having a modular frame to which you could add yearly released processors, cameras, displays, batteries, and more specialized modules sounded amazing to me. The project was first publicly announced by Motorola on October 29, 2013, and then the prototype was demonstrated by Google I/O in June 2014. Unfortunately, by 2016 Google the concept had been revised into a simple base phone with non-upgradable features and modules providing supplemental features. By late 2016 the manufacture and release data of the device had been delayed indefinitely.

Sources:
https://www.business2community.com/tech-gadgets/5-reasons-google-glass-miserable-failure-01462398
https://www.pocket-lint.com/ar-vr/news/google/132399-google-glass-a-brief-history
https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/4595/Nintendo-Virtual-Boy/
https://www.vrs.org.uk/red-black-legacy-virtual-boy/
https://www.pocket-lint.com/phones/news/google/127564-google-s-abandoned-project-ara-modular-smartphone-everything-you-need-to-know
https://dailywireless.org/mobile/what-happened-to-project-ara/

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