Lorde AI glasses criticism Sparks Privacy Debate

Source Domain: en.cryptonomist.ch

There was a moment at Madrid’s Real Cool Festival on Thursday when Lorde stopped mid-set, thanked the crowd for being part of “something real,” and then went off. Her target: AI smart glasses. The singer’s criticism of AI glasses spread quickly across social media, resonating far beyond the festival crowd — and landing right in the middle of one of tech’s most uncomfortable conversations about privacy, surveillance, and what it means to feel watched.

Key takeaways

Lorde called AI smart glasses “not sexy” during her Real Cool Festival performance in Madrid, urging fans not to buy them.
She did not name brands directly, but Ray-Ban — a festival sponsor that collaborated with Meta on AI glasses — was the implied target.
Blackpink’s Jennie, a Ray-Ban Meta AI ambassador, performed at the same festival and appeared in promotional videos screened between sets.
Meta is facing multiple investigations and lawsuits over privacy concerns tied to its AI glasses, while reportedly developing “super-sensing” glasses that continuously record audio and take photos.
Meta recently announced a camera safety update disabling recording when the glasses’ LED indicator is tampered with — an admission that some users had already been covering the light to record covertly.

Lorde’s Critique of AI Smart Glasses at the Real Cool Festival

“Increasingly in our world it gets harder and harder to know what is real,” Lorde told the Madrid crowd, building toward her point. Then came the unambiguous conclusion: “Fuck the glasses. Don’t get the glasses. Not sexy.”

The comments were captured on video and circulated widely on social media. In her remarks, Lorde described the discomfort of not being able to tell whether someone nearby is simply wearing sunglasses or quietly recording everything in sight through an AI-enabled device. It was a visceral, blunt articulation of something many people feel but rarely say out loud at a music festival — with a…

Source