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https://www.garbageday.email/p/don-t-worry-about-privacy-just-make-more-content-it-s-fine>
"Back in May, I wrote that Meta Ray-Bans are “a Cybertruck for your face” and
“great for weird fucking losers that want to look down your shirt and plaster
it all over Instagram.” Well, a little update lol: Instagram is finally
cracking down on that last part.
As
Business Insider reported last week, Instagram head Adam Mosseri is
banning “pickup line kind of videos.” As with every moderation decision Meta
makes, this is probably going to be very vaguely defined, not target any users
with actual audiences, and ultimately result in more insidious behavior from
the aforementioned weird users. I know this will happen because that’s how
Meta’s business model has always worked. They invent some new torment nexus and
then spend all their time tweaking the moderation to softly police all the
horrible behavior caused — and rewarded — by the torment nexus. But the Meta
Ray-Bans are the most egregious example of this yet.
I’ve long said that good augmented-reality glasses could be very cool. I
actually think a lot of the horrors of the modern world are caused by the
one-app-per-screen experience of the smartphone and bringing multiple windows —
and context — to mobile computing would be a net positive. I would happily buy
a pair of glasses that both extended and opened up my smartphone’s screen and
meant I no longer had to use it as a computer in public. Open a bunch of
windows while I’m sitting on a train, use built-in cameras to orient the
augmented reality features, make all of it end-to-end encrypted, and maybe even
block the ability to use those cameras as actual cameras.
And if a user were to use those cameras as cameras, there’s certainly no reason
to not have a big unavoidable flashing light letting people know. Meta Ray-Bans
have an LED that flashes when the camera is in use, but there are all kinds of
complaints that it’s not immediately visible to those not wearing the glasses.
I, also, in the course of researching this piece discovered a whole world of
(mostly) men teaching each other how to bypass it. So perhaps this entire idea
is dead on arrival. Fun fact: In Japan, it’s illegal to sell smartphones that
let you mute the shutter sound. Because of perverts!
Meta Ray-Bans are not trying to solve real problems with mobile computing. They
want you to think they are, of course, but the rotten core of the whole project
means they can’t actually admit what they’re doing. They’ll tell you the lack
of end-to-end encryption is so their AI model can work as an assistant for you,
and they’ll say that you need the AI assistant because it’s a better hands-free
experience than glasses that work as a mobile display for your smartphone, and
they’ll say that the video capabilities are perfect for posting to Instagram or
letting the AI assistant tell you information about a flower you’re looking at
or whatever. It goes on and on and on, but the truth is very clear.
They need the glasses because Meta’s attempts at making phones and operating
systems have been a flop. They dumped their AI into the glasses because they
need a way to sell their AI. And the content-creation tools they’ve built in,
like taking photos and videos, are meant to populate Instagram feeds because
it’s a great way to get users to advertise the glasses for free. But this puts
Meta in a hilariously awkward position. They want users to post Ray-Ban footage
to Instagram, an app still overwhelmingly popular with young women, and they
clearly know their glasses are perfect for creeping on young women. So what
have they done? Well, they’ve recently partnered with Kylie Jenner and
Blackpink’s Jennie Kim to paper over that little conundrum. As
Salon recently
wrote, “Meta recruited a celebrity to make smart glasses feel safe for women.
They aren't.”"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
