Are You a Glasshole? Take This Quiz to Find Out
Google Glass developer Maximiliano Firtman. Actually a nice guy. (Photo: Reuters)
Just because you wear Google Glass, it doesn’t automatically make you a Glasshole. Right?
Since early versions of the uber-gadget were sold to 8,000 lucky Googletonians last year, there’s been a growing backlash against the $1,500 device and its owners. Most of the controversy surrounds the gadget’s ability to capture photos or videos and then upload them with a few taps of your finger. Many anti-Glassians see them as a symbol of gratuitous affluence or as an intrusion into their personal space.
Source: Stop the Cyborgs
Meanwhile, Glass fans are fighting back, claiming that irrational fear of technology—not boorish behavior by Glass wearers—is responsible for the ill will.
Still, if you own Glass or are just thinking about buying a pair when they become widely available later this year, you may want to take this test to make sure you aren’t offending everyone around you. Unless, of course, you really like offending everyone around you.
Ready? Here goes.
1. Have you ever been asked to leave a bar or a restaurant because you were wearing Google Glass?
a. No, because I take them off first.
b. No, because capturing total strangers in various states of inebriation would be rude.
c. Yes, and I posted a Glass video of the whole thing to Google+.
If you answered c, you might be official Google Glass Explorer Sarah Slocum. Last month, Slocum was chased from a bar in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district for wearing Glass, but not before using Glass to capture video of being given the heave-ho and posting it online. Or you could be digital marketer Steven Mautone, who was asked to leave a San Francisco coffee shop recently after he entered wearing Glass. Meanwhile, nightspots in San Francisco, Seattle, and elsewhere have begun banning their use.
2. If you have been bodily removed from a place of business for wearing Glass, how did you describe it afterward?
a. A verbal and physical assault.
b. Yet more raging technophobia.
c. A hate crime.
d. All of the above.
Answer d is Slocum again, making new friends in a Facebook post immediately following the incident and garnering even more media attention. Hey, she may have been thrown out of Molotov’s bar, but at least she landed on CNN.
3. Complete the following sentence: The one thing I would never do with Google Glass is:
a. Wear them in the shower.
b. Use them to take nude photos of myself.
c. Use them to take nude photos of myself while wearing them in the shower.
Unless of course you’re Robert Scoble, in which case that’s one of the first things you’d do. We hope you have a strong stomach for what’s coming next.
4. Have you ever proposed to your spouse wearing Google Glass?
a. I do – er, I mean yes.
b. I don’t, and I wouldn’t.
c. I would, if I ever actually meet a member of the opposite sex.
For Valentine’s Day, Google cobbled together a highlight reel of G-men proposing to their Glassy soulmates. Of course, they showed only the ones who got a yes.
5. Did you propose in Klingon?
a. Sadly, no.
b. Hija’, ‘ej DaH bIHegh vaj vIghaj.
Answer b is Klingon for “Yes, and now I shall have to kill you.” But if you’re the Glass-wearing geek we think you are, you already knew that.
6. Have you ever watched Google Glass porn?
a. Ewwww.
b. Please tell me Robert Scoble wasn’t involved; I beg you.
c. I’m watching it now—on my Glass.
Source: MiKandi
The first Glass porn apps appeared last July and were promptly banned by Google. Now they’re back. Fortunately, no Scoble sightings.
7. When the cop who just pulled you over asks why you’re wearing Google Glass, the correct response is:
a. Hang on, Officer, I need to finish this email.
b. Did you know you have an 8.7 rating on PoliceFlirt.com?
c. No need to read me my Miranda rights, I just Googled ’em.
d. Smile, you’re on candid camera.
Or maybe you should just take them off before the cop gets to your window. The first person to get ticketed for a DUGI (driving under Google’s influence) was acquitted earlier this year. The reason: Officers could not prove her Glass was actually turned on while the vehicle was in motion. Still, some argue that driving in Glass is safer and less distracting than hands-free cellphone use.
8. Wearing Google Glass in public has become so controversial that Google felt compelled to publish rules of etiquette for its Explorers. Which one of the following is not on the list?
a. Don’t be creepy.
b. Don’t be rude.
c. Don’t “Glass out” for hours at a time.
d. Don’t use Glass to peer into other people’s souls.
The correct answer is d, thank goodness. On the other hand, that whole peering-into-people’s-souls idea comes directly from Google, which mentions it right at the beginning of its rules. So, yes, you could say we’re a little concerned.
9. Does wearing Google Glass make you feel like a member of an oppressed minority, even though your personal net worth is greater than the gross domestic product of Botswana?
a. Yes.
b. Hell, yes.
c. Sorry, I was just glancing at my stock portfolio—you were saying something?
While Glass isn’t exclusively for exceedingly affluent males of a notably pale demeanor, these are the guys who seem to always have their pictures taken while wearing them (including Yahoo Tech’s own Rafe Needleman—he swears he was just borrowing a pair at the time).
(Source: White Men Wearing Google Glass on Tumblr)
10. When you wrote your inevitable blog post about why people shouldn’t hate you for wearing Google Glass, which of the following arguments did you use?
a. It’s just like a smartphone, only I’m wearing it on my face.
b. It’s just like a CCTV camera, only it costs $1,500 and comes in three colors.
c. People who hate Google Glass are self-absorbed, irrational Luddites.
d. All of the above.
If you’re longtime tech writer Mike Elgan, the answer is d. But he’s hardly the only geek to come rallying to the defense of his fellows. This debate has only just begun.
How did you do on the quiz? Are you a Glasshole? If you have to ask, then you probably already know the answer.
