Following on from my initial exploration of Google Glass, I was keen to see what my kids would make of this device. As anyone who has seen a toddler using an iPad will know, some technology is just so intuitive that kids take to it like a duck to water. So I wondered what challenges Glass would throw up for a child, whether they would reflect my own challenges and frustrations in getting familiar with this device. After all, I had to undo decades of engrained user interface practice, whereas my daughter only had a few years of computing under her belt. Sharing Google Glass with my daughter turned out to be just as exciting and eye opening as I had hoped, but what really surprised me was the rather sobering reflection it led to, about just what kind of future we are leading our children towards.
Firstly, a word of warning. Officially Google Glass is not supposed to be used by children under 13 years of age, whose eyes are still developing. This was disappointing to find out, as I was looking forward to what my kids might make of it. I actually stumbled across the age guidance on the Google Glass Help site, there was nothing on the Glass box to indicate a danger to children, although I later found an FAQ card inside the box, in tiny print, with the age guidance on. Like many people who buy a gadget, I tend to try the device first and read the booklets later. I blame Apple for shipping mobile devices that ‘just work’! Google really need to stick a “13+ years” on the box. Smallprint just doesn’t cut it, this is kids’ eyesight we’re talking about. Otherwise we will end up with lots more uninformed parents posting videos like this one I found on YouTube, once Google Glass hits the retail stores.
Google do not give any background to their age restriction, however the Children’s BBC site CBBC has interviewed a professor from the Royal College of Opthalmologists, who suggested that the reason for the restriction would be due to the unknown effects of Glass on developing eyes, and that the age of 13 was likely used just because no research has taken place yet. He stated that children’s eyes are actually fully developed by 7-8 years, and that children basically have their adult eyes by then.
Based on this advice and after a discussion with my wife, we decided to let our daughter, who is nearly nine years of age, have a go on Google Glass, but only after her younger brothers had gone to bed, otherwise there would be hell to pay!
My first impressions were that this is absolutely not intuitive to set up! It’s not like getting a new iPhone that ‘just works’. This thing takes a bit of time to get to know and understand. That’s fine I guess, as most of our interactions with computers to date have been limited to using mouse or touchscreen as input devices, so you do need to learn the basic user interactions needed for this thing.