The Google Clips Camera has Features that Some Might Find Disturbing
Mike Sanders / 7 years ago
Big Brother is watching you
Google is no stranger to pushing the limits and thinking outside the box. It is a business strategy like this which has helped it become one of the biggest companies on the planet. While some innovations have been fantastic (Google Home), some have been not so great (Google Glass).
One can not help but generally praise Google for its innovative thinking. Particularly the $1.2b it has (or will) invest in self-driving car technology.
This new product, however, the Google Clips, is frankly a little disturbing.
As for design, it is a rather neat looking product. One in which you would certainly associate Google with its forward-thinking ideas. That, however, is where the praise ends and the weirdness begins.
So what’s so weird about this Google Clips?
Well, it starts ok, then frankly, the deeper the rabbit hole goes the more disturbing this product might sound.
The camera has a built-in AI which is designed to identify specific people and users. That’s a little different for a camera, but not unheard of. We are, after all, as a society getting more used to the idea of facial-recognition technology and the advantages it could potentially have.
The disturbing thing about Google Clips is that it decides moments, based on it’s AI and what it can see, times to take pictures of record short videos. What determines this factor is unclear, however, I doubt many people would be comfortable with the thought of something which randomly records or photographs you.
In a report via the BBC, the intent of this is not creepy. The idea is that the camera will catch you, or your family, at moments when you are relaxed.
There are also obvious caveats to this, for example, there are very few sofas in the country which haven’t utilised for purposes other than sitting if you know what I mean. You certainly wouldn’t fancy having that memory kept as a treasured 6-second video.
What do you think? Google Clips, cool or creepy? Let us know in the comments!
