Disconnect: Magic Leap’s vision for augmented reality is incredibly Orwellian

Disconnect is a weekly column in which Tech in Asia’s Charlie Custer pokes at holes, plays devil’s advocate, or otherwise attempts to rain on the tech industry’s parade.

A promotional image of the Microsoft Hololens.

Virtual reality may be the future of fun (like video games, movies, and even sex), but augmented reality is the future of, well, reality. AR tech like Magic Leap and Microsoft Hololens is increasingly ubiquitous in tech reporting, and though it hasn’t manifested much in the real world just yet, that day is coming. “In 10 years I expect that mixed-reality technology like Magic Leap will be used as much as, if not more than, smartphones,” director Peter Jackson – who is an advisor to Magic Leap – told Wired.

Microsoft has similar aspirations for its Hololens project, and it makes sense. Once augmented reality technology is good enough it can replace every device we use with a screen – any screen you need can be rendered by the AR device itself. You’ll be able to throw out your smartphone, because your AR device will be able to run all those apps and render their UIs in midair, on your wall, or anywhere else you’d like them.

But one lesson you may have learned from the smartphone era: the more you use a device, the more it can learn about you. And when AR becomes as ubiquitous as smartphones, it promises to bring even more Orwellian levels of surveillance to its customers even as it delivers on some of our wildest sci-fi fantasies.

I swear to god this is in the patent filings: “subtly controlling brain signals to change the user’s thoughts or impulses.”

Consider, for example, the preposterously lengthy patent application Magic Leap filed earlier this year. Nestled within that document are a variety of features that might make you think twice about wanting to strap on an AR headset 24/7.

Work surveillance. AR in the workplace could be an employer’s dream come true, but a procrastinating employee’s nightmare. The headset “may be used to gauge productivity of employees at a company,” say Magic Leap’s filings. That could be used to “detect unproductive behavior” and “render virtual content to help motivate the user.” It could also be used outside the workplace to gauge employees’ health habits and tweak health benefits accordingly. In other words, your Magic Leap might report to your employer that you ate an entire pizza for dinner, and your employer might ratchet up your health insurance premiums accordingly.

Judging your life. Your AR headset will be watching you all the time and, Magic Leap suggests, judging your actions. Its patent application includes a feature that would render a virtual plant that blooms when you behave well and withers when you do not. From the filings:

In a specific example, the plant may bloom when the user is being a good boyfriend, for example (e.g., buys flowers for girlfriend, etc.) and may wither away when the user has failed to call his girlfriend all day.

How Magic Leap beams light into your eyes, from its patent filings.

Tracking your eyes (for profit). An AR headset can (and indeed must) know where you’re looking to render focus properly. But that eye gaze data can be used for all kinds of other things, like ad tracking and even ecommerce. Magic Leap’s patent filings suggest a gaze-based microtransaction system where users could be charged for each page of a book they look at (for example).