Submitted via IRC for Sulla
A glance to the left. A flick to the right. As my eyes flitted around the room, I moved through a virtual interface only visible to me—scrolling through a calendar, looking up commute times home, and even controlling music playback. It's all I theoretically need to do to use Mojo Lens, a smart contact lens coming from a company called Mojo Vision.
The California-based company, which has been quiet about what it's been working on for five years, has finally shared its plan for the world's "first true smart contact lens." But let's be clear: This is not a product you'll see on store shelves next autumn. It's in the research and development phase—a few years away from becoming a real product. In fact, the demos I tried did not even involve me plopping on a contact lens—they used virtual reality headsets and held up bulky prototypes to my eye, as though I was Sherlock Holmes with a magnifying glass.
Source: https://www.wired.com/story/mojo-vision-smart-contact-lens/
(Score: 2) by Snospar on Tuesday January 21 2020, @04:20PM (2 children)
So 5 years ago this was just vapour and now it's virtual vapour? Eye tracking inside a VR headset (Easy) vs. Eye tracking inside a contact lens already on the surface of your eye (Hard).
Huge thanks to all the Soylent volunteers without whom this community (and this post) would not be possible.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday January 21 2020, @08:10PM
I would rather wear some smart (sun)glasses than a 1-2 of these. Eye gestures sound annoying and potentially awful too.
Speaking of eye tracking, more VR headsets should ship with it so that they can finally do foveated rendering.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Wednesday January 22 2020, @10:19AM
Honestly, if you can make a display and camera that small and light then you could make a really nice pair of AR glasses and they'd probably be more convenient. The contact lens option only sounds useful if you can go the implanted contact lens route and have them permanently in your eye, though that still leaves the problem of how you communicate between the display and the GPU.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 21 2020, @04:43PM (2 children)
A startup that is in for the second round of financing shows their investors and, incidentally, a journalist that they've not been blowing the first-round capital on blackjack and hookers, but that they've been doing, real actual, useful and most of all very, very, VERY! promising work (that's the startup's version of the story, anyway). Results are so very promising, that even a first press preview could already be done.
The investors shared or did not share the startup's opinion. To opine on that would require market and technology knowledge that I do not have.
The journalist, from beginning to end, didn't realize the theater he was invited to - or part of?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 21 2020, @06:37PM
You're probably correct about the VC part of this, but it doesn't mean the journalist doesn't know this. There is nothing wrong with a tech status update story, and as future tech goes, this does make a good story.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Tuesday January 21 2020, @07:56PM
And even beyond the blackjack and hookers, they offered a guarantee [youtube.com]!
(Score: 4, Informative) by VLM on Tuesday January 21 2020, @05:12PM (5 children)
People share chargers all the time.
This is gonna be gross. "Can I borrow your charger?" "Sure bro" /bro sticks USB micro plug in other bro's eyeball
More seriously its gonna be gross at work and elsewhere when "over-sharers" want to dip into my saline solution charger thingie and I'm like no I think you have HIV or at least pink eye so you can PLEASE use your own charger, K thx bye. And they always act all butthurt when I don't want their earwax covered bluetooth earpiece on my desk charger already, so "Apple iBall" chargers are going to be a new level of gross.
On the bright side its not as gross as borrowing someone else's charger for a teledildonic device.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 21 2020, @07:27PM
I'm sure we can assume the manufacturers will put safety, security, and hygiene first when it comes to these wonderful Eye-o-T devices. It will be perfectly safe to share chargers. There's no possibility that someone will be able to spam ads across the viewing surface, and any ads which might somehow accidentally get through will absolutely NOT be able to interfere with the user's line of sight. It will not be possible to distract or block the view of anyone wearing these while walking, biking, or driving.
Really.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday January 21 2020, @08:02PM (2 children)
Power will be wirelessly transmitted to the device.
Maybe it shouldn't contain a battery though. Don't want that area burnt.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Tuesday January 21 2020, @08:07PM (1 child)
So, what happens to the wires from the battery?
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday January 21 2020, @09:13PM
They melted when the insulation gave up and the battery shorted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Funny) by darkfeline on Tuesday January 21 2020, @09:42PM
This is the perfect application for solar power. Need a charge? Just stare at the sun for a few minutes.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 21 2020, @05:35PM
Even if they're genuine and do all the hard work of actually developing, implementing new technologies and building the stuff they'll likely still have to pay money to those who did all the "hard work" of patenting it...
https://www.cnet.com/news/sony-patents-contact-lens-that-records-what-you-see/ [cnet.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by gtomorrow on Tuesday January 21 2020, @05:57PM
Can't wait until to comes to market. Really!
That way all the cellphone zombies will rush out to buy them, stick them in their eyes...and walk out into traffic while reading their messaging app, or even sweeter, Google Maps! Hurrah!
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Freeman on Tuesday January 21 2020, @06:10PM (6 children)
I used to have contact lenses with a backup pair of glasses. Now, I just have glasses. Contact lenses get dust in them or the like, easily dry your eyes out, and are a pain to take care of. Insert technology for a display into the whole mess of just being able to see right and I'm not touching that with a 10ft pole. Then again, people get colored contacts, because they want different color eyes. There's no accounting for taste.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by canopic jug on Tuesday January 21 2020, @07:41PM (2 children)
There is also the matter of alignment. Either they're going to have the image in just one eye or they will have a hell of a time making sure both lenses have the exact same rotation. With fine details like text, it matter a lot and even a little error will be intolerable.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22 2020, @03:36AM
It would probably be spherical screen that could be calibrated in some fashion. I'm not sure how else you'd assure proper alignment on this sort of a shape.
On the plus side, if they made this work, it would take eye coordination out of the equation. They'd just have to make the eye focus as if the objects were where they wanted to appear.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Snospar on Wednesday January 22 2020, @08:06AM
Contact lenses already have to be perfectly aligned in order to correct for astigmatism. The lenses are created such that the bottom of the lens is heavier than the top and they autorotate into position using nothing more than gravity (and the natural lubrication of the eye).
Huge thanks to all the Soylent volunteers without whom this community (and this post) would not be possible.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Nuke on Tuesday January 21 2020, @08:24PM (2 children)
Tolerance of contact lenses varies greatly with the individual. It is better to have naturally "wet" eyes.
I have worn them for years and have no more trouble with dust than about once a month (about the same as if I did not wear them?), and I do a lot of practical outdoor stuff. Taking care of them is putting them in soaking solution each night (~30 seconds), and putting them into my eyes each morning (~60 seconds). Once a week I change the soaking solution (~60 seconds). I wear reading glasses "over the top" of the contact lenses for close work, and I spend more time cleaning those glasses in total than I spend on caring for the contact lenses.
I wear hard contact lenses, but I believe soft lenses do require more care, are more expensive, and optically inferior. Newbies seem to prefer soft lenses as they are quicker to acclimatise to.
I'd put contact lenses among the greatest handful of inventions of all time, up there with anesthetics and the wheel. From fuzzy vision when I get up in the morning, things suddenly become crystal clear, like a New Testament miracle, and once in, unlike glasses, I am completely unaware of their presence. Contact lenses are optically superior to glasses because in effect they change the front refractive surface of the cornea to what it should be, OTOH glasses change the light rays en-route at a distance from that surface.
As for putting a display into them - no way, even if it were ever possible which I highly doubt. As someone else said, a "flick to the left" etc would not work because the lenses move with the eye, and even if it did it would be a recipe for eye ache. I can't even grasp what the point of it would be.
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Wednesday January 22 2020, @06:47AM
Personally I much prefer to put in my contact lenses before going to sleep, and take them out in the morning.
No joke [allaboutvision.com].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22 2020, @06:59AM
Never could poke myself in the eye, will just have to wait for brain implant. Will also have to wait for qdvertising being a thing.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by jmichaelhudsondotnet on Tuesday January 21 2020, @06:20PM (1 child)
You should assume there are invisible cameras in hats and glasses.
That all 'smart' phones can be remotely penetrated with ease.
That you have some or another article on you that gives off a passive rfid echo that can be tracked.
That tiny earpieces with direct telecommunication with the fusion center and whatever op team is coordinating, no matter if you are in the middle of nowhere or the city.
I saw, on one occasion, with someone I am damn sure was an agent, him do something that you could not have done without a contact lense display.
I have believed since then that this exists, and considering what they can do with idk cheap camcorder viewfinders, and that it is a holy grail type of thing, I bet it exists.
Hilarious is when in movies and teevee like 'Gemini Man' they are still wearing earpieces as big as 1980's hearing aids.
mmmhmm.
decultification.org
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 21 2020, @07:27PM
According to Morpheus the matrix is all around us. As the sun dims and shrinks the habitable zone holding the CPU moved from the exploded asteroid belt planet, to mars, to now earth, and next Venus. Then finally it will move to Mercury and hopefully by then the sun will spit out a new planet.