Meta’s new Ray-Ban smart glasses take on-the-go to a whole new level

This morning at their annual Connect conference Meta announced the next generation of their Smart Glasses in partnership with well known sunnies brand Ray-Ban.

Following on from the original “Ray-Ban Stories” the new glasses are known as the Ray-Ban Meta collection are a wider range of styles but critically advances in almost all the technology on-board.

As per the original Stories, you can capture still images and short clip videos on the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, as well as listening to your music or podcasts via Bluetooth and make and take calls.

All those things though are enhances, with a new 12 MP camera for better quality capture, and new microphone array for enhanced sound as well as improved speaker system.

However, aside from the physical technological advances, it’s the “smarts” of the “Smart Glasses” that really matters here.

Initially only in Beta in the USA, you’ll be able to summon the new Meta AI assistant. No matter where you are, simply ask Meta any question. Using advanced AI to not just understand your question, but then find the answer in it’s own knowledge bank or via Microsoft Bing search, you’ll hear the answer in real-time.

This has the potential to dethrone even the oldest voice assistants in our lives if executed well.

But the biggest overall change is probably the ability to live-stream. Yes, Live-stream, from your glasses.

Of course, this and all these features require your smart phone for connectivity, and in the case of live streaming you need to initiate the live stream on your phone, then you “switch” cameras to the glasses.

No word yet on how long you can live stream given the battery life challenges, we’d expect it to be no more than an hour.

While this is a radical new feature, it will raise privacy concerns. Right now when you are filming a video on your Ray-Ban Smart Glasses a white light turns on near the camera, and we can assume that will stay on when live streaming – but is that enough?

Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses will launch on October 17 for $449 and can be pre-ordered at meta.com and ray-ban.com.