Google Glass? Oculus Rift? Those are old ideas.
Academics and tech outfits have explored similar concepts for decades. The ideas behind the Oculus virtual reality headset date to the early 1980s. By the early aughts, Dyson---yes, the vacuum-maker---was tinkering with something quite like Google Glass. And around the same time, IBM was working on all sorts of computer headwear, actively trying to create a world in which we could trade emails, edit documents, and even communicate in real-time through tiny, voice-activated, image-recognizing machines attached to our noggins.
In the late '90s, IBM's research arm developed something dubbed "the Wearable," a portable machine with a 1.5-inch etched glass display. Only one was built, and it was so delicate, it had to be handled with gloves. In 1997, the tech giant commissioned a futuristic short film that showcased the gizmo---and its much bigger, clunkier predecessors (see video above). Some of them look an awful lot like the Rift.
Packed into a Walkman-sized container, the brain of the Wearable---the actual computer---only sort of worked, which probably is why we don't see it do much in the video. "It was supposed to be voice-controlled, but in fact, there was a mouse stick on the computer which hung off of your hip," says John Allen, whose company, Possible Pictures produced the ad. "It was very primitive."
Still, it looked good, thanks in large part to Richard Sapper, IBM's design guru and the man said to have declined an offer from Steve Jobs to work at Apple. The spot never aired, Allen says. It was meant to get IBM execs excited about mobile computing.
About three years later, Big Blue unveiled another wearable-computing teaser (see below). At the time, IBM was actively testing a wearable computer in Japan, and the ad was meant to rev up interest among stateside business types. This time, a twenty-something in a suit sits in St. Mark’s Square, apparently yelling at no one, like a crazy man. As it turns out, he’s working remotely through the voice-activated mini-computer on his head. It looks almost exactly like Google Glass---except for the wires connected to a hip-side computer.
IBM never quite got these devices to consumers. But it laid the groundwork for the devices that are finally bringing these ideas to the mainstream. It even explored a pair of shades with image-recognition capabilities. Fourteen years on, these ideas are reality. Conferencing on the go is now mainstream, thanks to headsets and Bluetooth devices. Glassholes roam the streets, if in small numbers. And Occulus is about to remake the very idea of social networking. Maybe.
