Google glasses to hit shelves in less than two years

PanARMENIAN.Net - Search engine Google said that it will roll out a consumer version of its electronic specs that can live-stream images and audio and perform computing tasks in less than two years, TechEye reports.

So far the outfit has not mentioned a price for its Google Glass smart glasses, but it will be "significantly" lower than the $1,500 that the company is selling it to U.S.-based software developers from early next year.

Google co-founder Sergey Brin showed off the glasses at Google's annual developer conference in San Francisco yesterday and provided the most in-depth public look at the futuristic technology since Google first announced the project in April.

Google Glass is a stamp-sized electronic screen mounted on the left side of a pair of eyeglass frames which can record video, access email and messages, and retrieve information from the Web.

The glasses were shown off using several skydivers wearing the glasses who jumped out of an airship and landed on the roof of San Francisco's Moscone Center. They streamed video of the stunt to the audience.

Hacks who tested the glasses said that the perspective in the video shifted as wearers moved their heads to look up, down or sideways. The technology is not that impressive. Each of the glasses contains a wireless networking chip and most of the bits you see are in a smartphone, too.

It runs on a battery, and Google is trying to work out how to make the chip last longer than a day.

We would have thought the main problem with that sort of technology is that kids would not be able to use it because it would scramble their developing brains to be plugged into one all day.

Brin said that the glasses are still a "work in progress", like so much else of Google's technology. It is testing to see if it can provide directions on the screen and the ability to have the glasses speak out text messages.