Usability Views Article Details  home | timeline | recent | popular | e-reports | userati | books | about  We will watch the watchers (03 Aug 2004) On the near horizon are wearable multimedia devices, with displays that blend into your sunglasses, along with computational, data-storage and communications capabilities woven into the very clothes you wear. The term "augmented reality" will apply when these tools overlay your subjective view of the world with digitally supplied facts, directions or commentary. You will expect -- and rely on -- rapid answers to queries about any person or object in sight. In essence, this will be no different than querying your neuron-based memories about people in the village where you grew up. Only we had a million years to get used to tracking reputations that way. The new prosthetics that expand memory will prove awkward at first. Today we worry about drivers who use cellphones at the wheel. Tomorrow will it be distracted pedestrians, muttering to no one as they walk? Will we grunt and babble while strolling along, like village idiots of yore? Article URL: http://salon.com/tech/feature/2004/08/04/mortal_gods/index_np.html Read 59 more articles from Salon sorted by date, popularity, or title. Next Article: Deceivingly Strong Information Scent Costs Sales     This site is a labour of love built by Chris McEvoy