WEBVTT - TechStuff Classic: The Google Glass Story 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:12.559 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.560 --> 0:00:15.960 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:16.000 --> 0:00:19.880 I'm an executive producer at iHeart Podcasts and how the 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:22.880 tech are you. So it is Friday, It's time for 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:26.880 a classic episode. The episode you're about to hear, originally 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:31.600 published on May twelfth, twenty seventeen, is called the Google 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:36.200 Glass Story. Hope you enjoy. I'm going to talk about 0:00:36.240 --> 0:00:39.120 a subject that I've touched on in past episodes. In fact, 0:00:39.120 --> 0:00:41.360 we did a full episode about this subject. I'm talking 0:00:41.400 --> 0:00:45.080 about Google Glass. And while we did do an older 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:49.360 episode about this, I felt like we could really use 0:00:49.800 --> 0:00:52.800 a chance to revisit this and kind of talk about 0:00:52.880 --> 0:00:55.920 in the more modern style of this show. You might 0:00:55.920 --> 0:00:58.760 remember the old version of tech Stuff was more conversational, 0:00:58.760 --> 0:01:03.000 and this one's less, so it's more narrative. Well, Google 0:01:03.000 --> 0:01:07.200 Glass was a big augmented reality project or an AR project, 0:01:07.200 --> 0:01:10.240 out of Google's R and D labs, the Google X Labs, 0:01:10.240 --> 0:01:13.280 that's the super secret research and development branch of Google. 0:01:14.280 --> 0:01:16.839 And it probably was a little bit ahead of its time. 0:01:16.920 --> 0:01:19.960 In fact, it really was ahead of its time, and 0:01:20.040 --> 0:01:22.640 it was purposefully ahead of its time. That was part 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:26.039 of the problem, but I'm getting ahead of myself. It 0:01:26.240 --> 0:01:29.640 might have suffered from some poor design and implementation, or 0:01:29.640 --> 0:01:33.760 at least some choices that perhaps puzzled people. I wouldn't 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:35.760 go so far as to call them poor myself. I 0:01:35.800 --> 0:01:39.080 actually really liked Google Glass. Maybe it was just too 0:01:39.160 --> 0:01:43.640 darned expensive. It's pretty costly, but whatever the reason, and 0:01:43.680 --> 0:01:47.480 we'll explore all of them. It's no longer a consumer 0:01:47.560 --> 0:01:50.720 product that you can buy from Google. So today we're 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:53.520 going to talk about Project Glass, how it got started, 0:01:53.560 --> 0:01:56.680 the technology behind it, and the failed experiment to turn 0:01:56.720 --> 0:01:59.520 it into a consumer product, and where is it now. 0:02:00.440 --> 0:02:03.160 The reason I decided to cover this is because the 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:06.600 week I'm recording this episode, The Telegraph ran an article 0:02:06.640 --> 0:02:09.799 about some of the biggest flops in technology, and some 0:02:09.840 --> 0:02:12.200 of the usual suspects were in there, like the Nintendo 0:02:12.360 --> 0:02:16.960 Virtual Boy was one of the major flops listed. There 0:02:16.960 --> 0:02:20.600 are also some heartbreaking intrease in there. The Sega Dreamcast, 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:24.320 for example. I know that's another video game component there, 0:02:24.639 --> 0:02:28.160 a console. In this case, it was legitimately a really 0:02:28.200 --> 0:02:30.720 good video game console. It just didn't do very well 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:33.680 in the market. But I still have one and it 0:02:33.720 --> 0:02:37.760 was really really good. Then there was Google Glass. That 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:39.960 was also one of the ones that the Telegraph listed 0:02:40.480 --> 0:02:44.280 another heartbreaker. So what's the story behind it? Well, I 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:49.160 can't talk about Google Glass without first talking about augmented reality, 0:02:49.520 --> 0:02:52.520 can I? You know me? You know I can't. I 0:02:52.560 --> 0:02:56.120 am physically incapable of doing that. I'm sure many of 0:02:56.120 --> 0:02:59.200 you are familiar with the concept of augmented reality or AR, 0:02:59.760 --> 0:03:01.400 but just in case, I'm going to give you a 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:06.200 quick refresher. So Thomas Cottle gets the credit for coining 0:03:06.200 --> 0:03:09.799 the phrase augmented reality in nineteen ninety. He was specifically 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:12.240 talking about a system that would allow you to see 0:03:12.280 --> 0:03:16.000 where wires needed to be laid out in say, the 0:03:16.520 --> 0:03:19.880 fuselage of an airplane. So if you've ever been able 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:22.679 to walk into an airplane where it's been stripped down 0:03:22.720 --> 0:03:25.720 so you can see the guts of it. I was 0:03:25.800 --> 0:03:28.320 recently at an airplane museum where I got to do this. 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:31.480 I walk through what had been a former seven forty 0:03:31.520 --> 0:03:35.720 seven and now included a section where everything got stripped 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:39.720 away so you could see essentially the bones the skeleton 0:03:39.880 --> 0:03:42.480 of the seven forty seven, and part of that included 0:03:42.520 --> 0:03:46.200 conduits through which wires would run well. When you're building 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:48.320 one of these airplanes, you need to know where those 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:51.720 wire conduits have to be so that you can make 0:03:51.720 --> 0:03:55.320 sure they fit into the overall design. Coddle worked on 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:59.600 systems that would give a digital overlay as engineers would 0:03:59.600 --> 0:04:02.880 look at this airplane design so that they could lay 0:04:02.960 --> 0:04:05.200 the cables the proper way, make sure that they were 0:04:05.240 --> 0:04:08.720 aligned so that they weren't going to end up messing 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:13.400 up the design some other way. And really, augmented reality 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:17.880 is just the integration of digital information into the real 0:04:17.960 --> 0:04:20.200 world around us. And you can do this in lots 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:24.680 of different ways, but typically we talk about augmented reality 0:04:24.680 --> 0:04:28.960 in terms of overlaying some sort of visual digital information, 0:04:29.160 --> 0:04:32.400 like a digital display through which you can see a 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:35.120 view of the real world, and thus you can have 0:04:35.200 --> 0:04:39.400 some augmented information on top of that view of reality. 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:42.359 So a good example of this might be a fighter 0:04:42.360 --> 0:04:45.880 pilot who has a helmet that includes a digital heads 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:49.760 up display or HUD on the visor of the helmet itself, 0:04:49.839 --> 0:04:54.400 so you might be able to visualize things like Allied 0:04:54.600 --> 0:04:57.440 aircraft and you'd be able to see it and it 0:04:57.440 --> 0:05:00.600 would be identified within your visor, so that you get 0:05:00.640 --> 0:05:05.599 information about that. That's a simple example, simple in the 0:05:05.640 --> 0:05:08.039 sense that you can easily imagine it. It's actually quite 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:11.720 complicated when you build the technology. A few high end 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:15.200 cars have similar features that give digitally enhanced information that 0:05:15.400 --> 0:05:19.440 is projected or otherwise displayed on the windshield itself, which 0:05:19.480 --> 0:05:22.799 gives the driver the ability to see certain special views. 0:05:23.080 --> 0:05:25.280 You might be able to see, like an infrared view 0:05:25.440 --> 0:05:28.560 of what is outside the car, or a projection of 0:05:28.560 --> 0:05:31.159 things like the outside temperature, that sort of stuff. But 0:05:31.200 --> 0:05:33.680 it tends to be in those luxury cars. You don't 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:37.520 see it in a lot of the lower production cars, 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:45.160 even the nicer ones. It's pretty rare. You also have, 0:05:45.600 --> 0:05:50.760 I'm guessing an augmented reality device on you. More likely 0:05:50.800 --> 0:05:53.479 than not most of you, I'm sure have smartphones. So 0:05:53.560 --> 0:05:55.839 if you have a smartphone, you have a device that 0:05:55.960 --> 0:05:59.480 is probably capable of running augmented reality apps. There are 0:05:59.560 --> 0:06:02.560 tons of different apps in the AR space for all 0:06:02.640 --> 0:06:06.640 of the major smartphone platforms, iOS and Android being the 0:06:06.640 --> 0:06:08.640 two big ones, but there are ones for other ones 0:06:08.640 --> 0:06:11.680 as well, and typically the way these work is that 0:06:11.720 --> 0:06:16.240 you hold your phone up, your phone's backfacing camera pulls 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:19.160 in a view of the world around you. So it's 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:21.839 like you're getting a live view. It's like your phone 0:06:21.920 --> 0:06:24.320 is a monitor for you to look at a live 0:06:24.480 --> 0:06:27.000 camera feed of the world around you. But then the 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:30.120 app allows other digital information to be overlaid on top 0:06:30.200 --> 0:06:32.360 of that view. So it might be something as simple 0:06:32.440 --> 0:06:36.080 as directions of where to go. Say you've programmed your 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:38.880 phone saying I want to get to this one particular 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:42.400 coffee shop and it's about six blocks away, and you 0:06:42.440 --> 0:06:44.760 hold your phone up and it tells you, all right, 0:06:44.760 --> 0:06:46.960 you need to go three blocks straight ahead. Then you're 0:06:46.960 --> 0:06:50.159 going to take a rite. That's a pretty simple again 0:06:50.800 --> 0:06:55.400 concept for augmented reality, but it could do other stuff too, 0:06:55.480 --> 0:06:56.839 Like you might be able to hold it up to 0:06:56.920 --> 0:06:59.040 a sign that's written in a language you can't read, 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:01.680 and it might be able to read it and translate 0:07:01.720 --> 0:07:04.320 it for you. We're seeing a lot of translate apps 0:07:04.360 --> 0:07:08.760 that incorporate this kind of augmented reality, and it's pretty awesome, 0:07:09.040 --> 0:07:12.240 at least in my opinion, is pretty awesome. But there 0:07:12.280 --> 0:07:15.360 are tons of different ways to implement augmented reality and 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:20.760 just as many different use cases for AR, and it 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:26.000 ranges from just entertainment to productivity to industrial use and 0:07:26.040 --> 0:07:31.600 beyond medicine, lots of different potential uses for AR now. 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:35.400 Google Glass started as a head mounted computer device that 0:07:35.400 --> 0:07:38.880 would incorporate augmented reality features into a display that you 0:07:38.960 --> 0:07:42.200 could look through and still see the world beyond. And 0:07:42.280 --> 0:07:44.800 while the project was first teased in a video in 0:07:44.800 --> 0:07:49.560 twenty twelve, the origins for this project go back much 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:53.840 further than that. And first, before there was even a Google, 0:07:54.280 --> 0:07:57.960 there was a guy named Thad Starner. I've actually had 0:07:57.960 --> 0:08:01.239 the good fortune to meet mister Starner because he works 0:08:01.240 --> 0:08:04.560 at Georgia Tech. He's a professor there, and I visited 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:09.280 Georgia Tech. I visited the wearable computing labs, and I've 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:13.440 chatted with him. He's an interesting dude, and Georgia Tech's 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:15.920 just down the street from how stuff works, so it's 0:08:15.920 --> 0:08:18.200 not hard for us to get over there. Well. He 0:08:18.240 --> 0:08:21.040 also served as a technical lead for Google Glass. In fact, 0:08:21.080 --> 0:08:24.520 I believe he served as technical lead longer than anyone 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:27.840 else in that position for that particular project. And it 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:31.160 was Starner's work in wearable technology and augmented reality that 0:08:31.200 --> 0:08:36.280 you could say got the ball rolling. So you remember 0:08:36.280 --> 0:08:39.080 I mentioned a guy named Coddle got the credit for 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:43.560 coining the phrase augmented reality. Well, Starner says that he 0:08:44.120 --> 0:08:48.160 really coined that phrase independently of Coddle. Also in nineteen 0:08:48.240 --> 0:08:51.560 ninety through a fellowship proposal, he wrote, and he thinks 0:08:51.559 --> 0:08:55.280 that that might be the first appearance of augmented reality. 0:08:55.480 --> 0:08:59.240 He wanted to use the phrase artificial reality when he 0:08:59.320 --> 0:09:03.320 was originally talking about this concept. However, someone else was 0:09:03.360 --> 0:09:07.320 already using that term. That someone was Timothy Leary, and 0:09:07.320 --> 0:09:09.199 if you don't know who Timothy Leary is, you should 0:09:09.240 --> 0:09:12.600 look that up. Leary was specifically talking about the kind 0:09:12.640 --> 0:09:15.800 of reality you experience when you have partaken in mind 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:21.880 altering substances. So it wasn't exactly the context that Starner 0:09:21.920 --> 0:09:25.280 wanted to imply when he was talking about his technology, 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.200 so he didn't adopt artificial reality, and he went with 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:33.720 augmented reality instead. In nineteen ninety three, which was years 0:09:34.040 --> 0:09:39.199 before Google ever even existed, Starner created a wearable display. 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:43.359 So it was a display that attached to his glasses, 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:46.080 and really he worked with other people to design this. 0:09:46.200 --> 0:09:49.439 He didn't build it by himself with his own two hands, 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:52.720 but he worked with designers to create a computer system 0:09:52.800 --> 0:09:56.080 that incorporated a display that could clip onto his glasses, 0:09:56.080 --> 0:09:58.560 and it was pretty big and bulky, and it was 0:09:58.640 --> 0:10:02.800 not transparent. It was like having a small computer monitor 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:06.840 mounted on your glasses. And he started to wear this 0:10:07.559 --> 0:10:11.960 all the time wherever he went. It was kind of 0:10:11.960 --> 0:10:17.160 an experiment in finding out how you might use wearable computers, 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:21.280 what elements are important, which ones are not important, how 0:10:21.280 --> 0:10:25.520 do you incorporate it into your daily life. So he 0:10:25.520 --> 0:10:28.280 would wear this all the time, and it very often 0:10:28.280 --> 0:10:31.240 would prompt people to ask questions about this weird thing 0:10:31.400 --> 0:10:36.560 that he had on hims on his face mainly. Eventually 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:39.200 there was a build of this that started going by 0:10:39.240 --> 0:10:42.760 a name called the Lizzy. It was a wearable computer, 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:46.680 complete with input devices and with that head Melton display 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:53.800 that again was kind of unsightly originally anyway, This display 0:10:53.920 --> 0:10:56.640 was able to show a resolution of seven hundred and 0:10:56.640 --> 0:10:59.840 twenty by two hundred and eighty pixels, so tiny resolution 0:11:00.480 --> 0:11:03.080 compared to what you would find today, the very low 0:11:03.160 --> 0:11:08.240 resolution compared to today's screens. It was also monochromatic, so 0:11:08.720 --> 0:11:12.760 only one color. And connected to that was a one 0:11:12.840 --> 0:11:17.000 handed keyboard called a twiddler, which I wish were a joke, 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:19.679 but it is not. So it was a little one 0:11:19.679 --> 0:11:23.120 handed twiddler keyboard. It kind of reminds me of the 0:11:23.440 --> 0:11:26.920 keypads on old cell phones where if you wanted to 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:29.320 send a text message and you had to hit the 0:11:29.400 --> 0:11:32.760 letter E, you had to press the def key twice 0:11:32.760 --> 0:11:34.960 in a row in order for you to select E 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:38.520 before you moved on to your next letter. According to Starner, 0:11:38.559 --> 0:11:40.400 he could hit type up to one hundred and thirty 0:11:40.400 --> 0:11:44.720 words per minute using this one handed keyboard method, which 0:11:44.760 --> 0:11:48.679 is crazy fast. It's crazy fast even if you're using 0:11:48.679 --> 0:11:51.679 two hands on a regular keyboard. So I was really 0:11:51.760 --> 0:11:57.360 impressed to hear about that very large and heavy batteries 0:11:57.400 --> 0:11:59.559 would give the computer more than ten hours of juice 0:11:59.559 --> 0:12:02.840 before you need to recharge. But I mean, these batteries 0:12:02.840 --> 0:12:09.720 weighed several pounds at least, so they weren't little, unobtrusive 0:12:10.360 --> 0:12:14.240 things attached to the computer. It was like wearing a 0:12:14.280 --> 0:12:19.640 hefty backpack, so it wasn't exactly comfortable to wear all 0:12:19.679 --> 0:12:23.520 the time. And the computer was really serving as a platform, 0:12:23.640 --> 0:12:26.720 a development platform. It was the basis for programmers to 0:12:26.800 --> 0:12:31.360 design wearable computing applications. So it's not like it magically 0:12:31.360 --> 0:12:34.240 gave Starner some sort of crazy computing ability. It was 0:12:34.320 --> 0:12:37.000 rather an early wearable device to help explore the applications 0:12:37.000 --> 0:12:42.880 and implementations of wearables without having to worry about creating 0:12:42.880 --> 0:12:47.719 a specific product. So this was really exploratory, and when 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:49.920 you think about it, it was meant to say, we 0:12:50.040 --> 0:12:53.679 think there's something here, but we don't exactly know what 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:55.800 it is yet. We don't know what the final form 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:57.880 is going to be, So I don't have an idea 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:00.840 for something that's going to be in a package on 0:13:00.880 --> 0:13:04.080 a store shelf that other people can go out and buy. Rather, 0:13:04.200 --> 0:13:09.600 I think computing has the capability of transforming our daily 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:13.000 lives in yet another way. Now keep in mind, this 0:13:13.040 --> 0:13:17.360 isn't the early nineteen nineties. This is before smartphones, so 0:13:17.480 --> 0:13:20.360 smartphones would go on to show us that, yes, indeed, 0:13:20.720 --> 0:13:23.320 having a computer device that you can carry around with 0:13:23.360 --> 0:13:28.240 you changes things. There's no question of that. The Internet 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:31.360 itself is a reflection of how much that has changed. 0:13:31.679 --> 0:13:36.360 Internet advertising has changed dramatically because of mobile devices and 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:40.080 the popularity of them. So wearable computers definitely had the 0:13:40.080 --> 0:13:43.680 potential to make an enormous impact, but we had to 0:13:43.679 --> 0:13:48.240 figure out what sort of implementation made sense and what 0:13:48.320 --> 0:13:51.080 kind of applications would you use it? For because just 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:54.480 to have something, just to have it that doesn't remain 0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:57.000 compelling for very long. That would be part of the 0:13:57.040 --> 0:14:02.240 problem of Google Glass later spoiler alone. Now. One of 0:14:02.280 --> 0:14:07.679 those applications that Starner created early on was a program 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:11.120 that would keep track of everything he said, whether or 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:13.120 not it was straight voice to text. I am not 0:14:13.320 --> 0:14:16.720 entirely certain. I'm sure by some point it really was. 0:14:17.640 --> 0:14:19.480 But he would also be able to type things in 0:14:19.600 --> 0:14:23.800 using the twiddler, which I remind you it's not a joke. 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:27.960 So it was kind of like a perpetual notes system. 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.000 He could keep track of things he was thinking about 0:14:30.000 --> 0:14:32.560 and talking about, and then he could run a search 0:14:32.880 --> 0:14:35.760 back against that see if he could find anything interesting 0:14:35.880 --> 0:14:38.560 later on, and he said that about ninety five percent 0:14:38.600 --> 0:14:41.200 of the time what he got back was garbage, wasn't 0:14:41.240 --> 0:14:44.800 particularly interesting, insightful, or helpful. But about five percent of 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:48.680 the time it was totally the opposite. It was something 0:14:48.760 --> 0:14:52.880 really worth knowing and remembering. So he thought of it 0:14:52.920 --> 0:14:57.200 as something like a memory booster. It wasn't replacing his memory, 0:14:57.240 --> 0:15:02.000 but augmenting it. Now, according to popular accounts, Starner attended 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:05.720 a conference in the late nineties and he met two 0:15:05.760 --> 0:15:09.080 postgraduate students from Stanford, so this would be about nineteen 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:13.800 ninety eight. Those two postgraduate students were named Saragaie Brenn 0:15:13.840 --> 0:15:16.920 and Larry Page, and if you're familiar with those two, 0:15:16.960 --> 0:15:20.000 you know those are the co founders or Google. In fact, 0:15:20.040 --> 0:15:22.880 they would found the company Google just a few short 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:27.160 months after this conference. Now, Brin and Page thought that 0:15:27.200 --> 0:15:31.520 Starner's wearable computers were fascinating, and he gave them a 0:15:31.520 --> 0:15:34.960 full demonstration of what the computer was capable of doing. However, 0:15:35.160 --> 0:15:38.000 at the time, they were already focusing on a way 0:15:38.080 --> 0:15:42.600 to improve search engines on the web, so they couldn't 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:46.040 really dedicate any attention to wearable computers. They were too 0:15:46.080 --> 0:15:50.960 busy perfecting their search engine approach. And this was important 0:15:50.960 --> 0:15:54.480 because back in the day before things like Google, the 0:15:54.520 --> 0:15:57.280 algorithm that got so sophisticated that it was able to 0:15:57.360 --> 0:15:59.560 ignore a lot of the tricks people were using to 0:15:59.560 --> 0:16:03.480 try and direct traffic to their sites. Web search engines 0:16:03.520 --> 0:16:06.840 were just okay. Most of them were looking for instances 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:10.640 of keywords appearing on a page, which meant that people 0:16:10.640 --> 0:16:14.400 would try and fool search engines by inserting as many 0:16:14.440 --> 0:16:17.520 different key search terms as possible at the bottom of 0:16:17.520 --> 0:16:19.800 a page, even if the page had nothing to do 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:24.040 with that particular concept. And why would they do this 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:27.920 Because web advertising is based off of how many views 0:16:27.960 --> 0:16:31.240 you get on a page. Page views are king at 0:16:31.360 --> 0:16:33.640 least most web advertising is not all of it, but 0:16:33.720 --> 0:16:36.520 a lot of it is. So if you were able 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:38.720 to direct a lot of traffic to your web page, 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:41.760 that was another page view, it didn't matter if what 0:16:41.840 --> 0:16:44.240 that people founded that by the time they got there, 0:16:44.320 --> 0:16:45.960 if it wasn't what they were looking for, and if 0:16:45.960 --> 0:16:48.640 they bounced, you got the page view. You don't care 0:16:48.680 --> 0:16:52.560 where they go afterward. Well, Google one of its big 0:16:52.640 --> 0:16:54.880 missions was to create a better search engine that would 0:16:54.920 --> 0:17:00.520 ignore all of the gamification of SEO and to try 0:17:00.560 --> 0:17:04.000 and look for the links that are the best representation 0:17:04.119 --> 0:17:06.880 of whatever it is you're searching for. So that's what 0:17:06.920 --> 0:17:11.800 their real focus was on. However, this meeting between Starner 0:17:12.040 --> 0:17:17.000 and Brennan Page may have been the first seed for 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:20.200 Google Glass, and it happened in nineteen ninety eight, before 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:24.600 Google was an official company. Now flash forward a decade, 0:17:24.640 --> 0:17:27.840 it's two thousand and eight. Google by this time is 0:17:27.880 --> 0:17:32.840 a huge company, incredibly successful, and it had just launched 0:17:32.840 --> 0:17:40.080 its own smartphone operating system called Android. Starner immediately thought 0:17:40.080 --> 0:17:44.040 that Android had promise as more than just an operating 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:46.960 system for a smartphone. It could be ported over to 0:17:47.080 --> 0:17:50.480 all sorts of different devices and used for lots of 0:17:50.520 --> 0:17:54.960 different stuff, particularly things that were small and nimble, stuff 0:17:54.960 --> 0:18:00.280 that wasn't like your traditional laptop or desktop computer that 0:18:00.320 --> 0:18:04.119 includes wearables. So he tried to get in touch with 0:18:04.240 --> 0:18:08.119 Brennan Page. However, the phone number he had from ten 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:13.160 years previous was no longer going to either of them. 0:18:13.280 --> 0:18:16.840 Big surprise, right, and he kind of let lie for 0:18:16.880 --> 0:18:19.240 another couple of years. In twenty ten, he would write 0:18:19.240 --> 0:18:24.760 an email to Saragai Brenn and he said, you should 0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:26.919 probably come out to my lab at Georgia Tech and 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:28.960 take a look at the wearables and see where we've 0:18:29.000 --> 0:18:30.760 gone in the last ten years. I think he'd be 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:33.840 really interested. And Brennan said, you know, we're thinking about wearables. 0:18:33.880 --> 0:18:37.280 We think it's about time. And rather than us go there, 0:18:37.280 --> 0:18:39.400 how about we fly you and your team out here 0:18:39.440 --> 0:18:41.600 so you can give us a full day of demonstrations. 0:18:42.280 --> 0:18:44.679 And Starner said yes, and next thing he knew, he 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:48.760 became a technical lead for Project glass Over at Google's 0:18:49.000 --> 0:18:55.000 X division. By Shortly thereafter, after Starner joined the team, 0:18:55.480 --> 0:18:58.240 Starner Brennan Page were able to bring over another leader 0:18:58.280 --> 0:19:00.720 in wearable tech, someone that Starner had worked with in 0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:04.600 the past, Greg Priest Dorman, who had pioneered work with 0:19:04.640 --> 0:19:07.399 biofeedback systems in the seventies and into the eighties and 0:19:07.440 --> 0:19:12.199 then moved into wearable computing. He's another huge name in wearables, 0:19:12.680 --> 0:19:17.959 so he also joined the Google Glass development team. On 0:19:18.000 --> 0:19:21.879 August eighteenth, twenty eleven, four Google employees filed a patent 0:19:21.920 --> 0:19:25.600 for what was called a wearable device with input and 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:29.919 output structures. It's the title of a patent, and like 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:33.359 most patent titles, it's a little dry and it seems 0:19:33.400 --> 0:19:37.399 pretty nondescript. The illustrations accompanying the patent include one that 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:41.080 closely resembles what the final form of Google Glass turned 0:19:41.080 --> 0:19:44.000 out to be. Some of the other illustrations looked more 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:46.520 like a more or less normal pair of glasses. Some 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:49.719 of them looked a little strange or odd. The patent 0:19:49.760 --> 0:19:53.280 described the general components for the invention, which you know 0:19:54.359 --> 0:19:56.840 patents are supposed to do. In order for you to 0:19:56.880 --> 0:19:58.960 get a patent on something, you have to actually explain 0:19:59.040 --> 0:20:01.880 how the thing works the parts that are that it's 0:20:01.920 --> 0:20:05.800 made out of. Otherwise you can't You're not supposed to 0:20:05.800 --> 0:20:09.800 get a patent on it. So what did this cover? Well, 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:12.800 I suppose I can quote directly from the patent itself 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:17.320 under the claims section. The first and most important of 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:24.760 the claims reads thus late an electronic device comprising a 0:20:24.800 --> 0:20:27.399 frame configured to be worn on the head of a user. 0:20:27.720 --> 0:20:30.720 The frame including a bridge configured to be supported on 0:20:30.800 --> 0:20:34.280 the nose of the user, a brow portion coupled to 0:20:34.560 --> 0:20:38.120 and extending away from the bridge to a first end 0:20:38.200 --> 0:20:42.600 remote therefrom and configured to be positioned over a first 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:45.520 side of a brow of the user, and a first 0:20:45.640 --> 0:20:48.720 arm having a first end coupled to the first end 0:20:48.800 --> 0:20:51.920 of the brow portion and extending to a free end, 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:54.959 the first arm being configured to be positioned over a 0:20:55.000 --> 0:20:58.480 first temple of the user, with the free end disposed 0:20:58.520 --> 0:21:02.280 near a first ear of the user, wherein the bridge 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:05.920 is adjustable for selective positioning of the brow portion relative 0:21:05.960 --> 0:21:09.680 to an eye of the user. A generally transparent display 0:21:10.119 --> 0:21:12.800 means for a fixing the display to the frame such 0:21:12.840 --> 0:21:15.480 that the display is movable with respect to the frame 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:19.240 through rotation about a first axis that extends parallel to 0:21:19.280 --> 0:21:22.800 the first brow portion, and an input device a fixed 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:25.800 to the frame and configured for receiving from the user. 0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:29.679 And input associated with a function wherein information related to 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:34.840 the function is presentable on the display. What the what? Well, 0:21:35.359 --> 0:21:39.160 I'm going to explain what that means, but first let's 0:21:39.160 --> 0:21:49.800 take a quick break to thank our sponsor. All right, 0:21:49.840 --> 0:21:54.239 So what did that patent speak actually mean? Because it 0:21:54.280 --> 0:21:58.840 got so weird and dry, and that's typical for patents, 0:21:58.920 --> 0:22:02.600 by the way. That's it's a very formulaic approach because 0:22:04.760 --> 0:22:08.480 patent system is a bureaucracy and you have to conform 0:22:08.680 --> 0:22:11.760 to the methodology of the bureaucracy in order to get 0:22:12.240 --> 0:22:17.080 your idea through Otherwise, if it doesn't conform, you're not 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:21.080 likely to get a patent award. So what it actually 0:22:21.080 --> 0:22:23.359 means is the invention would fit on your face like 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:27.200 a pair of glasses that one arm or stem if 0:22:27.200 --> 0:22:31.480 you prefer, of these glasses would curve around the brow 0:22:31.800 --> 0:22:35.120 above one eye to rest against the side of your head, 0:22:35.240 --> 0:22:38.760 so over one eye, and in early Google glass it 0:22:38.800 --> 0:22:42.640 was always the right eye. There'd be a little protrusion. 0:22:43.520 --> 0:22:46.160 That's where at the end of that protrusion. That's where 0:22:46.160 --> 0:22:50.680 the screen would be, the clear transparent screen. I guess 0:22:50.680 --> 0:22:52.439 I can say clear and transparent like I can say 0:22:52.480 --> 0:22:57.520 ATM machine. Then the other part of it would wrap 0:22:57.560 --> 0:23:01.480 around back behind your ear, with a part of it 0:23:01.600 --> 0:23:04.919 resting just behind your ear. More on that than just 0:23:04.960 --> 0:23:07.960 a second, but that would be the main part of 0:23:08.040 --> 0:23:11.080 Google Glass. The other section would just be a dumb 0:23:11.160 --> 0:23:15.399 frame that exists really just to provide stability. So you 0:23:15.400 --> 0:23:17.000 would have a part that would rest on the bridge 0:23:17.040 --> 0:23:21.800 of your nose that would help support the stem I 0:23:21.840 --> 0:23:25.720 was talking about. And on the other side your second ear, 0:23:25.760 --> 0:23:29.680 because you remember the patent said first ear and first etc. 0:23:30.040 --> 0:23:33.119 Et cetera. First brow. The other one would be the 0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:35.760 second one. This is not important to the invention because 0:23:35.880 --> 0:23:40.359 nothing of any technical import is going on on that side. 0:23:40.400 --> 0:23:43.679 It's literally just a frame to hold the rest of 0:23:43.680 --> 0:23:46.959 the technology in place. So over your right ear you 0:23:47.040 --> 0:23:49.880 have the stem of the Google Glass, and in that 0:23:49.920 --> 0:23:53.480 section you've got a control area. You've got your battery, 0:23:53.520 --> 0:23:56.879 you've got your speaker, you've got your projector for the screen, 0:23:57.040 --> 0:24:00.639 you've got inside, you've got the processor, you've got the 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:04.360 receiver for Bluetooth et cetera. On the other side, over 0:24:04.400 --> 0:24:07.679 your left ear, it's just a regular little stem that 0:24:07.840 --> 0:24:09.760 fits over your ear, kind of like a regular pair 0:24:09.760 --> 0:24:14.639 of glasses. There's nothing, no technical elements inside that side 0:24:14.640 --> 0:24:22.840 of it. It's just dumb plastic. So the part that's 0:24:22.880 --> 0:24:26.360