Lorde says AI glasses are ‘not sexy’

Pop stars don't usually double as tech critics, but Lorde gave it a shot at Mad Cool Festival in Madrid last week. Mid-set, she went off on smart glasses, telling the crowd it's getting impossible to know if someone's wearing regular sunglasses or a camera-equipped pair recording everything. Her conclusion, delivered in signature blunt fashion: forget the glasses, they're not sexy.

The timing wasn't random. Ray-Ban sponsors the festival, and Ray-Ban's parent company partners with Meta on exactly the glasses Lorde was roasting. She even performed right before Jennie, who happens to be a Ray-Ban Meta ambassador. Subtle it was not.

Lorde's rant lands amid a real pile of concerns about this product category. Smart glasses with built-in cameras and AI have already shown up in harassment and extortion cases. Meta says it's added safeguards, including a visible light that turns on during recording, but that hasn't stopped a wave of lawsuits and investigations. One suit claims Kenyan contract workers were forced to view graphic footage captured by the glasses as part of training Meta's AI systems; Meta hasn't laid out a public response to that particular allegation.

None of it has dented sales. EssilorLuxottica, which makes the Ray-Ban hardware, reported over 7 million Meta AI glasses sold in 2025, more than triple the combined total from 2023 and 2024. Meta, riding that momentum, keeps growing the lineup rather than slowing down.

So privacy warnings clearly aren't moving the needle. Lorde's pitching a different angle entirely, betting that vanity might succeed where ethics arguments haven't. Her closing line was simple: being present, here and now, is the sexy thing.