Our Ever-changing Technology Part II

If you read my last post on changing technology and how rapidly we are seeing the entire world change around us, you know how I feel about some of the changes. After reading that post, one of my subscribers who happens to be a very high-level quadriplegic with no arm function, sent me an article showing this next high-tech toy soon to be on the market that will have the capability to grow that change even more dramatically.

It is called Google Glass and looks like this:

As always, click on the image to make it larger:

According to articles in New Mobility magazine, Popular Science magazine and a Wikipedia entry, Google Project Glass had originally been designed for paraplegics and quadriplegics who cannot use their arms as a way to maneuver their wheelchairs with voice recognition software. It is expected to be released to the general public sometime in 2014.

Initially, the idea was to wear them as you see them in the picture. However, they are still working on a version where someone could wear them with prescription glasses. They are even working on a version that would come with your prescription glasses built into the unit itself.

I can see tremendous opportunities for everyone, not just people with disabilities to benefit from an item like this.

However, I see a huge downside in this technology and how it could be misused by that multitasking person who is already trying to drive, text, eat a sandwich and keep his or her children behaved on the way to school during the morning commute.

As if distracted drivers do not cause enough traffic accidents already, just imagine what introducing this technology could do to that distracted driver in the lane next to you!

I am all for this technology and its appropriate applications for people with disabilities and/or able-bodied people in the workplace, or in the comfort of his or her own home. It does scare me to think of how it has a huge potential to be misused and will cause people to be even more distracted from their already busy lives.

Like I stated in my last post, I am all for new technology and the changes we see coming. But, like everything else, if it is not used properly, I see some tremendous downside to this new idea.

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike