I am not into Facebook/Meta nowadays, bet the technology is so lovely freaking magnificent... Back in the days, these were in Sci-Fi and dreams only...
// https://www.ifixit.com/News/113543/theres-groundbreaking-wav...
// https://www.ifixit.com/News/113543/theres-groundbreaking-wav...
It's also important to consider that while many places have some legal framework along the lines of "no reasonable expectation of privacy in public spaces," there's a social-psychological gap between that and the presumption of being constantly recorded, be it by other private individuals or governments.
Because of this, my view on this technology is that it's a net negative in society, and generally unhealthy.
But as a privacy-conscious developer, I want exactly zero connection to any FAANG cloud service in my smart classes.
So until someone releases a pair of smart glasses I can get with my prescription and, for example, use my phone for "local" compute with no forced cloud access, I'm going to skip the whole category.
Something with open-ish hardware running Linux without any specific blocks on installing your own software on it.
For example, there's no reasonable expectation that singing to myself in public won't be recorded.
But almost everyone in public does reasonably-assume that their every step isn't being permanently logged by a stalking drone swarm.
Blending into rush hour foot traffic is easy, and I never feel like I stand out enough to attract attention... though in the back of my head, I know that most commercial and government properties have some form of video surveillance, probably backed by some kind of (hopefully coarse) AI subject tagging.
No opinion on the decision from OP's post, just noting that, privacy is getting 86'd six ways to Sunday. All that's left are truly owned homes and natural spaces, and Orwell laid the pattern for both.
A bit "meta" here, but this was never about surrendering to advancing capability, humans have been capable of eavesdropping ever since eaves were invented, people could bring hidden microphones and cameras in "private" spaces for decades, etc.
The "reasonable expectation" doesn't come from our fears of the worst, or else it would be meaninglessly permissive. Rather, it's an attempt to judge individual situations based on some kind of collective agreement about normality. Just because we can't preemptively block something doesn't mean it cannot be a crime.
In other words, we (should) have a lot more power to decide what they become than that. Supposing--and I'm not endorsing this--anyone caught recording in public typically gets their stuff smashed by an angry mob, then the "reasonable expectation" is that you're not being recorded.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/03/workers-report-watch...
Like Star Trek holodecks. They seem amazing at first, but only because the weirdest it ever got was a sweaty Lt. Barclay, a creepy Cmdr. LaForge, and a safe-for-TV sleazeball named Quark.
In reality, if you could "jack in" to a self-controlled Matrix, or walk onto a holodeck and make anything you wanted feel real, it would be 24/7, 100% the unhealthiest invention since the nuclear weapon.
The entire society in Star Trek has moved beyond greed and sadism.