Yet another example of how the tv show, Silicon Valley, hits the nail on the head [1].
I can think of two "useful" applications of this tech... 1) see what you look like with cosmetic surgery / tattoo / etc before permanently modifying your body. 2) Try on clothes before shopping online.
But both still don't solve the underlying issue I have with this tech. Even the "useful" ideas for it boil down to satisfying people's vanity. It solves no problem, it provides no useful benefit to humanity. It's the same with Valve making hats for TF2 and skins for CS:Go instead of focusing on making great new games with story and content and adventure. This AR tech is the equivalent of serving a poopie diaper in a 5-star restaurant and calling it "Powerful Foods to inspire the imagination." And people are eating it all up.
Is this what we are moving toward?
- Look at items and see metadata around the item itself (or ability to pull that data up, like someone's name)
- Interact with objects across the room by looking at them
- See things like GPS way points in real space
I think an AR like this could solve real problems by merging the information available via the internet and what exists in our real world space, but the tech necessary to do it well isn't here yet (and there are still some unsolved problems: http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/abrash/why-you-wont-see-hard-...)
However, I can think of some useful AR applications that could be useful for surgery.
The same was said when myspace came up.
The same was said when facebook came up.
The same was said when twitter came up.
The same was said when instagram came up.
The same was said when snapchat came up.
Here's a dirty secret about American style consumerism. Crap sells!