181–190 of 539 posts
The porn industry is about to be reinvented
This , my friends, is how business travel becomes nearly irrelevant. This is a beautifully executed idea and if the demos live up to expectation the hype may even be warranted. But on a much more fundamental level (i.e. fancy 3D imaging and spatial audio aside), this also possibly suggests people would benefit from dedicated videoconferencing hardware. TVs and telephones do one thing really well (or at least historic…
Is "Starlink" going to be a Gmail or a Wave? Hard to say.
This is cool as hell, but I have to say I feel like we're solving top-level problems when most consumers don't even seem to be getting solutions to the most basic pain-points. For me, the problem with video-calling isn't the image-quality. It's all the much more mundane technological problems - high latency, lag-spikes caused by bad ISPs, failed noise-cancellation for people who don't use headsets for audio, bad wifi…
The issues with connection stability and latency are very real, but I don't know if it's reasonable to expect Google to fix it; the issues there are probably more political than technical.
edit: Also, I think they did mention using AI for noise cancellation while videoconferencing in the keynote today.
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Do you think it's possible 90% of this is due to the studio quality lighting, large high quality screen, good mic/speakers, and low latency network? It seems like those factors alone would get most of the way there and the 3D aspect is just a bonus. Obviously I haven't used it in person but this was just a thought since most people are used to video calls on their small phone/laptop with poor lighting, mics, etc
Eye tracking is the core feature here--the rendered "hologram" is correct from every possible angle. The things you mention are probably closer to 2% of the final result.
A good friend of mine at Google is the technical lead of this project (he has a Phd Princeton, and was a professor before joining Google). I've tried it in person and it was truly amazing. They used some very fancy tech when I saw the demo, so I'm thrilled it is finally being announced and possibly shared with a larger audience. Explanation of why it is amazing: It totally fools your perception. No glasses or goggles…
My mind was also blown when I got to demo this a few years ago. You sit down and you forget that there's technology happening. The person is there, in front of you. I don't know how else to describe it. The testimonials in the video aren't exaggerating compared to my experience.
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If this was a consumer product I would buy two of these today, one for myself, and one for my parents. It is more compelling that any product I have seen for a long time.
How much would you pay? I expect the lower end to be around $20,000 from hardware alone, plus at least gigabit down/up connectivity.
My dad used to tell a story about my grandfather's first experience with television in the late forties. There was a buxom woman on the screen, and he walked up to it, trying to look down her cleavage. It didn't work. Does Starline give you a different view when you change your perspective? It looks like it does to some extent. If so, it might work before long, but grandpa died about fifty years too soon for it.
[0] https://www.google.com/amp/s/techcrunch.com/2020/06/23/googl...
https://www.wired.com/story/google-project-starline/
> What I’m actually looking at is a 65-inch light field display. The Project Starline booths are equipped with more than a dozen different depth sensors and cameras. (Google is cagey when I ask for specifics on the equipment.) These sensors capture photo-realistic, three-dimensional imagery; the system then compresses and transmits the data to each light field display, on both ends of the video conversation, with seemingly little latency.
> All of the data is being transmitted over WebRTC... What Google claims is unique is the compression techniques it has developed that allow it to synchronously stream this 3D video bidirectionally.
On a related note, I wanted to share my amazing experience with a similar but lo-fi tech. My mom and dad for the past 2-3 years have mostly lived in two separate countries (due to work reasons) and I could tell they miss each other quite a bit. I got both of them an Echo Show 10" device each and set it up for them. I don't think I can explain how our lives have changed for the better, just based on this simple piece…