It turns out billionaire Sam Altman has something in common with a lot of consumers after all: He's not a fan of smart glasses.
In an interview with Alex Heath, which was released on Tuesday, the CEO of OpenAI said: "I find it very uncomfortable talking to people with a camera and a light."
Altman's comments come at at time when Meta's Ray-Bans and other smart glasses have been given the moniker of "pervert glasses," the subject of a lot of public backlash, following reports of the devices being used to record and harass women, and then post the videos on Instagram and other social media without their consent.
Meta's glasses have also come under fire for lax security; specifically, owners destroying or disabling the small recording light, so as not to alert others they were capturing video. Meta has since released firmware updates that prevent its smart glasses from recording video if the light is removed or blocked.
Still, the perception remains, and it's something that other companies, such as Google and Samsung, will have to reckon with, as the launch of Intelligent Eyewear is imminent.
It's not the first time the OpenAI CEO has weighed in on wearables. Last year, according to Business Insider, he was quick to correct a journalist who asked him if he was wearing smart glasses. "Absolutely not," he said. "I don't like smart glasses."
Altman's comments on smart glasses in his interview with Heath came in the context of OpenAI's hardware, which he's developing with Jony Ive, Apple's former head of design.
At the core of OpenAI's philosophy is a so-called ambient computer that's always listening, which "seems very helpful but also a privacy nightmare," Heath noted in the interview.
Altman acknowledged as much. "As we get closer to launching this device, we'll be talking about kind of the new privacy controls and technology we're building for a device that's like kind of ambiently computing," he said.
Altman also said that OpenAI was looking at releasing not just one, but "a small handful of form factors."
"There's something that belongs on a table, there is something that belongs in your pocket, and there is something that like belongs on your body," he said. However, given his statements on smart glasses, it would seem that the device is more likely to be a pendant, akin to the Plaud pin.
Altman gave no timeline as to when OpenAI's devices would arrive, only that we could see the first consumer device "soonish."
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