“The Daily Show” correspondent Jason Jones has discovered a pernicious new form of discrimination — against people wearing Google Glass.
The technology allows people to do anything you can do with a cell phone — including filming strangers without their consent– from their Google glasses. The difference with a phone is that it’s harder to tell when you’re being recorded by glasses.
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Early adopters of Google Glass, who call themselves “explorers,” have discovered that other people think they’re jerks.
“Yes, it seems even in this day and age you can still be treated differently because of how you look — wearing a $1,500 face computer,” Jones said in a segment Thursday.
One explorer secretly taped Jones during an interview, explaining that he was taping her, too.
“Except that our cameras have red lights on them, and big crew guys operating them. and you signed a release form for a national TV show. Otherwise, exact same thing, yeah,” Jones said.
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He noted that all the explorers he spoke with “had stories of name calling, denial of service at restaurants and bars, even assaults — all because people thought they were being surreptitiously filmed. Which sometimes they were.”
One woman said she was a victim of a “hate crime” because people assumed she was filming them in a bar — which she was — and tried to snatch her glasses from her face.
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Another told Jones, “The best uses of Glass today are apps where it acts as an interface between you and the real world.”
“Do you guys hear yourselves when you talk? An interface between you and the real world. Those are called eyes,” Jones said.
Then he rigged up his own cheaper version of Google Glass and hit the streets.
“People wouldn’t even make eye contact with my invasive headgear. And since when can’t a grown man walk into a child’s playground with a secret camera on his face?” he complained.
Watch the video: