Earlier this week Google announced an end to Google Glass which spawned a flurry of articles in various tech magazine about the failure of the product, google over-stretching itself and that there is no market for such a thing.
It was the same week that Tesco announced it's new app for Google Glass, which caused many ironic articles to be written.
However, on digging a little further the facts are a little more straight forward and certainly less emotive.
Yes, Google will no longer be selling the current version of Google Glass to consumers. However, it will still be available to developers and to businesses. Google will now be spending time on R&D for the next generation of Google Glass and there may be a bit of a wait for it, but it will be a fully tested product, rather than a beta version. Google will also continue to support all existing users and developers of the current Google Glass.
So not quite as startling as first indicated. Coupled with the development work being carried out by other suppliers of heads-up displays (Sony, Microsoft and Epson to name a few) and Google's commitment for the generation 2 Google Glass, it looks as though this technology is going to be here for the long run.
We can easily imagine the benefits for this kind of tech and no doubt in the same way many of the applications for smartphones were only apparent when people had got to grips with them on a fundamental level, there are bound to be many that no-one has thought of yet as well.
It can only be a good thing for retailers. It would be fantastic for your favourite items to be visually highlighted on a shelf or for nutritional information to be displayed more prominently if that's what you want.
I'm also wondering about an in store sat-nav type system that takes you on the most efficient route of the store to get all the items on your shopping list.
The opportunities for promotion are also pretty obvious....