RFA Ethanol Podcast

What’s Going on with ZimmGlass

Chuck Zimmerman

ZimmGlassWith the recent surprising announcement from Google regarding their Glass project I thought it was an appropriate time to write an update on my own ZimmGlass Project.

What did Google announce? Here’s the message those of us in the Glass Explorers program received:

It’s been an exciting ride. Since we first met, interest in wearables has exploded and today it’s one of the most exciting areas in technology. We asked you to be pioneers, and you took Glass further than we ever expected. We’ve learned a ton, we’ve “graduated” from Google[x] labs, and now we’re hard at work and you’ll see future versions of Glass when they’re ready.

Since we’re focusing all our efforts on the future, we’ll be closing the Explorer Program on January 19. We realize you might have questions about what this means for you. New feature development on the Explorer Edition will stop while we work on the next version of Glass, but you can still call or email us anytime with questions, thoughts or feedback.

I’ve been asked several times in the last few month why I haven’t been wearing my ZimmGlass. Well, I have on a few occasions but mostly not. The main reasons are for ones I’ve expressed before about the product – poor battery life, low quality microphone, tendency to crash suddenly, overheating and shutting off in a random way. The product works very well at some things for an ag journalist like hands free shooting of video, especially in outdoor product demonstration settings. But it leaves much to be desired.

I still have ZimmGlass and I still plan to use it on the agriblogging highway for certain events. But I’ll be pretty selective about it and the reasons why. We invested quite a bit of money in this product and I would do it again if I had the chance. I’ve learned from it and am looking forward to what Google has in store for the future of Glass. I think we’ll see a new version taking into account the tons of feedback we’ve given them.

One of the main things I and other Google Explorers in ag have learned is the potential this kind of device has for use on the farm. Let’s see if that potential is realized in the near future. In the meantime, this AgNerd will continue to try out new technology and let you know what I find out.

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