This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
While the company insists that owners technically don't have to shell out $20 a month, even premium subscribers will be locked out after using 15 hours of "Conversation Focus," a feature that amplifies the voices of people you're talking to, per month. Without a subscription, owners are restricted to just three hours of the feature a month.
Bwhahhaaha - it's a hearing aid! Just buy a fucking hearing aid!
It's not even that sophisticated. A hearing aid works by directly stimulating the small bones in the ear. This is just a pair of earbuds with audio passthrough and a volume knob
Not all hearing aids are cochlear implants or bone conducting types. There's plenty that are basically an Airpod.
Source: am a user.
How else are they going to pay for server upkeep to store everything it hears?
In the literal sense, yes. In the clinical sense, no.
That being said, there's value in a hearing aid that doesn't look like a hearing aid. It's why Apple implemented a similar functionality into AirPods.
That being said, this is not a special feature, it's just Meta leveraging their marketing and ability to change the terms OTA to squeeze every dollar possible out of their customers.
Arguably they're also potentially more helpful if they can detect who you're looking at and only amplify that person's voice.
I have auditory processing issues and this is something that would help me a lot. Not enough to justify the costs - the glasses themselves, the subscription, my own self-respect, the privacy and respect of the people around me...
I suppose that's possible but I would expect to see data attesting to that before shelling out the dough.
Yeah. The center channel on my TV's audio system has all the dialog. I love being able to focus my attention a specifc direction to hear what they're saying and the sound system does whatever the hell it does to make that happen. I could really see something like what you described being part of a cochlear implant to improve its functionality. But this is way beyond me. I just make noise.
That's pretty shitty. But I have a hard time mustering up any sympathy for anyone buying Meta's ~~smart glasses~~ surveillance tech. Fuckin' narcs.
Agreed. To expand on that, I have zero sympathy for anyone who complains about the worldwide rise of fascism while still participating in corporate-owned social media or shopping at Amazon/Temu as anything other than a last resort for essential items.
Like, who do they think is funding all these fascists and where exactly do they think all the money comes from?
as anything other than a last resort for essential items.
It's very nice being seen, and also interacting with folk like y'all who understand the idea of exigent or mitigating circumstances
Wait, didn't they JUST start rolling these stupid things out? And theyre already to "its a subscription now" levels of enshitification?
Boy, I guess we're just speed running everything these days.
"Our AI has detected you're taking a lot of videos and photos of children in public. If you would like us to not inform your family and workplace of this please sign up for our $99.99 monthly secrecy package."
"We have also signed you up to the GOP mailing list for your convenience in finding like-minded individuals and a sense of community."
"If you think you may require a presidential pardon for any crimes against children that may soon come to light, we can also provide contact with his son, who heads the PPPP (Persidential Pedophile Pardon Program) to arrange that. Our service is $2,500, which must be paid prior to receiving the contact information and is in no way a guarantee of their acceptance or a part of their own fee."
(Persidential
Don't you dare fix that
Blackmail as a Service (BaaS)
You know I woke up a little stopped up and had the idea for Buttholes as a Service. Seems like your idea and mine go together well
I was gonna say into the faraday cage you go but it's probably already on the cloud.
People stupid enough to buy smart glasses from META, are probably also stupid enough to pay a monthly fee.
I think META should make an advertising subscription, where users pay extra to have advertisements shown at intervals too.
I bet a pretty decent percentage of users would pay for that.
And sadly, as we're constantly reminded of, people that have money to spend aren't intelligent in general. It's narcissim, sociopathy and hoarding mentality that is behind most people who have money, and those same things is what would make someone want to use tech like this.
I mean if they could Augmented Reality the billboards into, I don't know, enormous robotic hookers? I forget the name. I might reconsider.
Time to develop a system to detect these glasses asafp. Court houses, jails, strip clubs will be the first to buy them up. Then bars/clubs for liability reasons. Then everywhere else as who wants that shit around.
that could be part of the system, but you know the chinese are reverse engineering them now and this app may not be able to detect them. I was thinking a more active system running in tandem.
Qr code clothing only works if you hold it flat, too. Or maybe I'm too lumpy.
Anyone buying these fucking spyware shitnesses deserve it.
Bait and switch? Weird, who ever would have saw that coming?
All you idiots willingly buying shit that you can't control are encouraging this bs
This is likely connected to the recent AI price hikes.
Looooooooooooooooooool
Hey guys! Now you need to pay for the espionage outpost you carry! Pure mafiology...
Can't wait until trash corps start selling implants to zombie consumers, and then start f*cking around with the subscription model.
neurolink cautiously looks around a corner at you
neurolink
"Creating a generalized brain interface to restore autonomy to those with unmet medical needs today and unlock human potential tomorrow."
An elon musk thing, trustworthy guy, clearly interested in the greater good, what could go wrong /s
Corpos gonna corpo. Anyone who's seen how meta operates could have and should have expected this. Plus, these are a luxury. Nobody "needs" these to live.
Meta is shitty for doing this but I'm still having a really hard time feeling bad for any of the buyers.
I am in no way a smart glasses advocate. But I do wonder what Australia's (and other similar countries) consumer rights have to say about this.
