One of the coolest things at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this month had nothing to do with drones, robots, or self-driving cars.
The new MyMe camera from Israeli company OrCam clips to your shirt. When it records, instead of saving photos, video, or audio, it activates image and audio recognition and generates a text list of what it sees and hears. That list can be transmitted wirelessly to a smartphone app and even read back to you via Bluetooth earphone.
Using cutting-edge AI, the device is aware of everything we do throughout the day: the people we meet; what we talk about; our visual surroundings; what we eat; the activities we engage in and so much more. The visual and audio processing functions serve as an extension to the wearers’ awareness and can be used for both for real-time and hindsight applications.
What’s the point?
OrCam’s previous product was a camera that clipped onto eyeglasses, helping those with severe vision impairments “read” by turning written words, products, and faces into spoken audio, played via earpiece. Set to launch later this year, the new MyMe is more discreet and convenient; the company describes it as a “wearable personal assistant” that “revolutionizes wellness.”
If it works, it’s easy to see how technology like this could be useful, from navigating a networking event to taking notes in a meeting, or tracking what you eat. Especially once it’s small enough to seem invisible.