Snapchat's $130 Spectacles Up The Creep Factor With 10-Second Recorded Video Snippets
Let’s pretend you are at the park with your child. You would really love to send a video of them playing and giggling to grandma, but you do not want to ruin the moment by rummaging in your pocket for your phone and then awkwardly snapping a picture. Snapchat has the perfect, albeit slightly creepy, solution for you. Its “Spectacles” or camcorder-like sunglasses, should be hitting the market soon.
Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel remarked, “It’s one thing to see images of an experience you had, but it’s another thing to have an experience of the experience. It was the closest I’d ever come to feeling like I was there again.”
Snapchat, which has recently been rebranded as Snap, Inc., has been working on the Spectacles for several years. Roughly a year ago, Spiegel was spotted on the beach wearing a pair of Spectacles. They are sunglasses that have one of the one of the world's smallest cameras built-in. The Spectacles can record a ten second video, which can then be loaded to the Snapchat app through Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.
The videos will appear in the app in a new circular format. The curricular photos capture a 115 degree field of view and can be played on any device at any orientation. The idea is that the videos will be captured the way human beings experience their memories.
A light on the glasses indicate when they are recording. This is not only a useful feature for the user, but warns others whether they are being creeped upon. The Spectacles also charge in their case and provide roughly a day’s worth of power. No other particular specs have yet to be released.
Hopefully, Snapchat’s Spectacles will face a different fate than Google Glass. The cyborg-like glasses were widely unpopular and earned their users the nickname “Glassholes”. There were also major concerns over privacy. Unlike the Spectacles, Google Glass did not indicate when it was recording. The issue came to head when the New York Police Department decided to test Google Glass out for themselves. With any luck, the Spectacles will not experience the same hate.
Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel remarked, “It’s one thing to see images of an experience you had, but it’s another thing to have an experience of the experience. It was the closest I’d ever come to feeling like I was there again.”
Snapchat, which has recently been rebranded as Snap, Inc., has been working on the Spectacles for several years. Roughly a year ago, Spiegel was spotted on the beach wearing a pair of Spectacles. They are sunglasses that have one of the one of the world's smallest cameras built-in. The Spectacles can record a ten second video, which can then be loaded to the Snapchat app through Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.
The videos will appear in the app in a new circular format. The curricular photos capture a 115 degree field of view and can be played on any device at any orientation. The idea is that the videos will be captured the way human beings experience their memories.
A light on the glasses indicate when they are recording. This is not only a useful feature for the user, but warns others whether they are being creeped upon. The Spectacles also charge in their case and provide roughly a day’s worth of power. No other particular specs have yet to be released.
Hopefully, Snapchat’s Spectacles will face a different fate than Google Glass. The cyborg-like glasses were widely unpopular and earned their users the nickname “Glassholes”. There were also major concerns over privacy. Unlike the Spectacles, Google Glass did not indicate when it was recording. The issue came to head when the New York Police Department decided to test Google Glass out for themselves. With any luck, the Spectacles will not experience the same hate.
