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Showing posts with label Project Glass. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Project Glass. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Google Glass, Revisited.

Google is one of a few companies that has both the capabilities and the resources to adapt to the rapidly changing landscape of technology. With first-mover advantages leading innovators to net huge profits for their creativity and timeliness, research and development teams are constantly trying to find that cutting edge that will set their brand apart from everyone else.

A few weeks ago, I posted about the potential of Google's new product development, Project Glass. It could, and still can, disrupt the entire advertising industry. Here's the link.

Breaking through the advertising Glass ceiling.

The online giant has posed a new challenge, though. With the online market functioning so heavily off of consumer feedback and communication, Google has asked those interested in the project to tell all about what they would do if they had a model of Glass. A revamped video that, once again, highlights the many uses of the product can be found on multiple YouTube channels online, and it was just released this morning.


On their website (Google Glass) this video follows up a plethora of information regarding the new product, its many color offerings, and a contest.

Google has become so confident in Project Glass that they have implemented this contest to see just what potential users would do with it. Using the hashtag "#ifihadglass" on Twitter and Google+ and explaining just what you would do enters you into a contest just to be able to buy an early model of Glass for $1500+ and try it out. That doesn't include taxes or the cost of flying out to one of three large American cities to actually pick it up.



Let's first address the fact that this may be the best $1500 opportunity to ever be available to the general public. As a college student, I have maybe that much money collectively from both my savings and my checking accounts. I would spend all of it to acquire a pair of these bad boys.

With that in mind, the luxurious price tag they've slapped on it can only do them well. It generates interest in the product, and, in the worst-case scenario, they would have to lower prices to facilitate demand for a product that is already generating a ridiculous amount of buzz online.

A multi-billion dollar company doesn't have as much as the average company trying to roll out a groundbreaking product, but it seems as if Google won't have any problem with Glass.

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Breaking through the advertising Glass ceiling.

Many of us have seen the video of Google's Project Glass. For those that haven't, here it is.


Pretty nifty. It takes everything we ever wanted in a smart phone and condensed them into a techie-hipster style pair of glasses. While it isn't available for purchase yet, it will be. The folks at Google are both smart enough and wealthy enough to make sure a cool product like this is ready for production before the buzz around it wears out.

But what comes next? Mass production of a concept like this?


The idea of interactive holograms isn't new by any means, but it is a much more realistic idea now. Pattie Maes revealed at a TED Talk some technology that provides user-friendly interface for operating a phone system from just around your neck. A few years from now, bigger companies like Google could make even bigger strides in developing the technology that just may challenge the tangibility of space.

How Google Glass Could Change Advertising

With innovation comes opportunity. Mashable did a brief write-up about the possibilities created by the introduction of Google's Project Glass. While noting that Project Glass coordinators won't be having any of companies trying to advertise on their experimental platform, writer Todd Wasserman points out that the web browser wasn't supposed to initially be a breakthrough for advertising.

Is it just a matter of time? One could argue either way.

On one hand, consumers often hesitate to consistently use products that try to manipulate or sell their brand to them. Twitter faced a decent uproar recently due to their adding banner ads to the top of users' home screens, something many users found aesthetically displeasing. Sure enough, the site fixed the problem and all was well.

On the other hand, the technology giant with a brand big enough to draw more advertising revenue than most companies can even dream of should hardly scoff at the opportunity to capitalize on that very fact. Partnerships are nice to have. Google may not need any partners, but in an economy as down as ours is expected to be in the near future, their partnering with smaller firms and companies could mean more for the rest of us than for them.


With programs like AdWords and Analytics, Google has done plenty to foray outside of the search engine label that has so limited sites like Bing and Yahoo!. They know the appeal for companies of advertising on large platforms, as Project Glass projects to be.

So until those techie-hipster glasses finally come out, the rest of us will publicly sweat the debate regarding whether Google will choose to protect the purity of their flashy eyewear or promote the very processes that have made them so much money from the start.

Commence freaking out.