Google Goggles - A Sign Of The Ridiculously Big Changes Ahead Of Us
I posted a couple of months ago about an app for the iPhone called FoodScanner that uses the camera on the iPhone to look up details about any food item by simply pointing the camera at the bar code on the food packaging. The app itself is cool, but I mostly saw it as a harbinger of things to come that could have a massive impact on commerce.
I also posted a ways back about Yelp's augmented reality app that overlays Yelp reviews on businesses that have them as you pan around "looking" with the camera on your phone.
Today Google launched an application called Google Goggles that takes these types of activities a big step further. In one mode you can snap a picture of any object and it will try to use character recognition and other techniques to recognize what the object is and then return web search results for it. In another mode you can turn on an augmented reality view and look around you and it will overlay Google information for the businesses that are near you.
Take a look at the videos below to see some examples of Google Goggles in action.
The Goggles app is initially available for Android phones, but presumably will be coming to other smartphones soon.
Keep in mind that it will not work in many cases still and will be prone to error in environments where the picture isn't clear or is of a object that doesn't have easily identifiable text, bar codes, etc. Think of this like dial-up vs. the broadband that you enjoy today...within 5-10 years it will work reliably in almost all cases and will change a lot of the way that we engage in commerce.
And then we'll implant an interface directly into people's brains and things will get really crazy...
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- 9 months ago
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