Google Glass is back from the dead, with a new $999 headset that delivers upgraded capabilities, longer battery life, and the promise of new confusion around augmented reality. The Glass Enterprise Edition 2 is, as the name makes clear, not really intended for consumers. Instead, Google is hoping to convince businesses that their workers should be wearing a computer.

It’s the audience that Google turned to as its original, consumer-focused Glass vision crumbled in early 2015. Google Glass Explorer Edition was to be the first taste of what benefits a head-born wearable could bring to us. Instead, it birthed the “glasshole” nickname and became mired in privacy fears.

Come mid-2017, and a vaguely-massaged version of the Explorer Edition was reborn as the Glass Enterprise Edition. However it has taken until now, another two years on, before Glass has finally got the hardware and design that it really needed from the outset. While that happened, of course, augmented reality and wearable technology didn’t stand still.

Google Glass still isn’t Augmented Reality

In the years since Google axed the Glass Explorer Edition, we’ve seen augmented reality and mixed reality pick up pace. Neither has quite made it into the mass market, at least not in a set of smart glasses. However we do know more about what that AR experience would feel like.

Products like Microsoft HoloLens have begun pushing into enterprise, offering multi-location teams a way to collaborate on virtual objects and projects, as well as into medical settings and retail environments. Magic Leap has gone from being a mysterious, cash-gobbling startup to having a product you can actually buy.

At the same time, consumer wearables have changed immeasurably. The smartwatch category has evolved from notifications and more on your wrist to a fitness and lifestyle accessory. Android Wear has lost much of its luster, hamstrung by manufacturers clinging to old chipsets and Google’s own apathetic approach to software and feature updates. The Apple Watch has cemented its place as the heavyweight in the segment.

Smart glasses have seen less acceleration, though consumer models do exist. With Apple and others believed to be working on true AR eyewear, startups like North have taken it into their own hands to do what many of us wanted Google to deliver with the original Glass. Smarter notifications, timely location-based information, and a form-factor that looked less like a Star Trek prop and more like something you could wear day to day.

All of the hardware upgrades we wanted… in 2015

Glass Enterprise Edition 2 checks off plenty of the boxes for what many hoped Glass …….

Source: https://www.slashgear.com/google-glass-is-back-so-is-ar-uncertainty-20577266/