After accusations of selling ‘perv glasses,’ Meta prepares to sell a pair without a camera
TechCrunch Lucas Ropek ● Covered by 2 sources
Rumor — unconfirmed reporting.
Meta may launch Luna, smart glasses without a camera. It’s a direct answer to people who think its current glasses feel too surveillance-y.
Based on reporting by TechCrunch, Lucas Ropek — read the original for the full story.
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Meta’s smart glasses have sold better than most rivals, but they’ve also picked up a nasty reputation among people who see them as “perv glasses.” Now the company appears ready to try the obvious fix: a pair without a camera.
According to The Information, the new model is called Luna. Instead of image capture, it’s built around talking to Meta’s AI chatbot and Muse, the company’s AI consumer agent. That means six built-in microphones, plus a side button that wakes the AI system when pressed.
The timing could be soon. The outlet says Luna may show up at Meta Connect, the company’s annual hardware and developer event in Menlo Park next week. TechCrunch contacted Meta for comment.
And the pitch makes sense in a market that still can’t quite decide what these glasses are for. Smart glasses have grown over the past few years, and Meta is near the front of the pack. But concerns about usability, cost, and privacy keep hanging over the category like a cloud that nobody can swat away.
There’s also the small issue of money. Meta’s Reality Labs, the unit behind the glasses line, is still losing a huge amount of cash, according to its April earnings report. A camera-free pair won’t solve that on its own, but it does suggest Meta knows exactly where the pushback is coming from.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is the right move, because a lot of the “AI glasses” pitch has been quietly asking people to trust a tiny camera pointed at everyone around them. Strip that out and the product becomes less creepy and a lot harder to meme into oblivion. Meta still has to prove these things are useful, though; privacy panic is a symptom, not the disease.
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