Overdue
Stylish shooting
Silicon Valley has finally come up with video-capturing eyewear that doesn’t make people look like epic dorks. (We’re looking at you, Google Glass.) Spectacles, the new shades from Snap Inc. (née Snapchat) have all the whiz-bang technical features you’d expect of a buzz-worthy wearable—including circular video orientation to better adapt to varied screens, and an external light to let the paranoid know you’re filming—in a package that is both stylish and, at US$130, affordable. It’s faddish, yes, but also a timely and smart mix of fashion and function.
Overdone
Conspicuous cameras
We humans have become pretty obsessed with documenting our every move—we upload more than 400 hours of content to YouTube every minute—but most people don’t love the awkwardness of holding out a smartphone (or, ugh, an iPad) to shoot an impromptu film. Many analysts expect standard gadget cams will soon be eclipsed by their wearable equivalents; sales of the latter will triple by 2021, according to market intelligence firm Tractica. By then, seeing a sea of screens at a concert may appear as jarring as catching someone on a landline is today.
This article is from the November 2016 issue of Canadian Business. Subscribe now!
