All of this always-listening and always-recording tech (like Meta's pervert glasses) is surveillance & unwanted data collection. You can't proactively opt out of it. What you can do is call it out for what it is — gross! Friends don't let friends wear pervert glasses or use listening devices. https://this.weekinsecurity.com/reframing-smart-glasses-as-pervert-glasses/
@zackwhittaker One of the quite valid uses for a smart pair of glasses is for the hearing impaired. There are smart glasses that incorporate hearing aids and also closed-captioning tech. If one needs glasses and hearing aids, it's often difficult to get them to work together. The arms rub and make scratchy sounds on the behind the ear portion of a hearing aid. The built in aid eliminates that.
Disabled people are being used to cripwash this badness. I still think consent is needed and it is still unfair not to make it possible to turn off recording when needed.
I am a deaf person.
I work with disabled people.
The university I work for has had to ban these devices from healthcare placement students cos of privacy rights.
@NatalyaD Thank you for saying this. I'm not someone for whom this kind of tech could be beneficial, so I don't feel it's my place to say; but I've been left feeling very queasy by the scrambling of Meta and others, belatedly insisting on these devices somehow being assistance tech.
From the outset, they were never intended or designed as such.
I understand how they can be useful in a poorly-accessible world but unlike previous assistive devices (or things that happen to assist) they put other people at risk in ways which are difficult to identify and are not reasonable.
I hear they're not all that reliable a lot of the time and we need to be careful not to let Meta/Google/Apple cripwash them into forcing everyone to accept them without some discussion and nuance.
@clickhere @NatalyaD@disabled.social @zackwhittaker There are specially designed devices that aren't general spyware devices. My hearing aids if turned up sufficiently can spy on conversations even a normal hearing person couldn't hear from across the room. It's not comfortable, but I can do that with an app on my phone.
Just saying a type of tech shouldn't be allowed just because some companies are abusing the tech in their iteration of it is just wrong.
@zackwhittaker glassholes will be glassholes no matter how often we call them out.
@zackwhittaker
> Friends don't let friends wear pervert glasses or use listening devices.
Counterpoint: sighted friends *do* let visually impaired friends use smart glasses, for real-time image description (street signs and product labels, for instance). Plus, since when did sighted people need smart glasses to be perverts?
#a11y #accessibility
@pauamma @zackwhittaker Or having easy access to what a person said for someone who is def or hard of hearing? Or allowing a defblind person to be a part of the conversation.
@ysotomayor @zackwhittaker Yeah, there are many uses. I was paraphrasing from memory what a blind woman wrote last time the topic popped up into my timeline.
@pauamma @zackwhittaker Yeah, I was thinking about these glasses, i just don't wanna get punched in the face buy one of you crazy weirdos.
Nov 3, 2026, 10:50 PMSimple, it makes it easier for men to be rapists. How about you let us concealed carry then.
Nov 3, 2026, 11:03 PM@pauamma just admit you're a cop and be done with it.
Nov 3, 2026, 10:06 PM@zackwhittaker I use a listening device -- it's called a pocket talker and of course does not record. This design, dating back into probably the 80s, has done millions of people a lot of good. I cringe thinking of when venerable Williams Sound will let itself be cajoled into scraping conversations the way Zoom does. Can only pray it never happens.
@zackwhittaker Friends let there friends use whatever works for them and don't shame them for it.