Show notes
The Meta glasses microphone problem finally has a fix, and it was buried in a settings menu the Adventurer model never showed. Steven Scott and Shaun Preece explain exactly where to find it, why it should have been on by default, and what else has changed across Meta's growing glasses lineup, including walking directions and spatial audio that only work on some models.There is also an honest conversation about the smart glasses privacy backlash, whether blind wearers should start policing where they wear a camera on their face, and whether Meta donating glasses to blind charities is cynical PR or a story worth telling.Steven opens with a delivery disaster involving a cracked desk, a one man Amazon collection van and a refund that left him paying someone to take the thing away. From there the show turns to the Meta glasses, where a software update has finally surfaced the microphone troubleshooting toggle for the Meta Adventurer model. It was always available on the Ray-Ban Meta glasses, which never needed it. Turning it on resolves the muffled, inaudible calls that Steven and listener Gordon had been chasing for weeks. Shaun and Steven also compare notes on settings that reset themselves, the Meta AI app becoming harder to navigate, and the fact that these glasses are no longer one product with different frames. Walking directions have rolled out in the US and Canada, spatial audio is missing from the Ray-Bans, and only some models carry an action button.Richard from Louisiana calls back after his previous question about Bixby. He has stuck with TalkBack on his Samsung phone, describes it as an interrogation technique, and has been trying to connect Audible and iHeartRadio to his glasses without success. Shaun walks through where the connect button actually lives in the apps list. Richard also reports that Meta's walking navigation beats Google Maps in his neighbourhood, accurate enough that a left turn instruction lands within twenty counted steps. His wish to say "get me an Uber" to his glasses leads into a discussion of agentic AI, computer use tools already helping blind users fill in inaccessible web forms, and how long it might take Apple and Google to bring that to the phone.Gavin in Edinburgh raises the privacy question. He still wears his glasses, but swaps to Bose Frames around a pool and would never wear them near a changing room. That prompts a wider debate: Meta now blocks recording if the notification LED is covered, some people have drilled the light out entirely, and mainstream coverage keeps mentioning the benefit to visually impaired users. Steven argues the fear is running ahead of the evidence and says he has no plans to stop wearing them. The PR question follows, tied to a story from a recent Zero Project event about companies choosing a ramp outside a building over the accessibility work nobody can photograph.Along the way: Earshot, the VoiceOver-first podcast app from Michael Babcock, gets a thumbs up, Steven confesses to buying a tiny 3D printed VibeKeys keypad for vibe coding, and floats two future projects, a watch that tells you the time without a rooster, and Wi-Fi presence sensing to find the dog. The episode closes with Apple event predictions, recorded hours before the keynote.Chapters0:00 – Welcome to Double Tap0:48 – The broken desk and Amazon's odd fix10:12 – Falling out of love with the Meta glasses12:19 – The microphone fix for the Meta Adventurer17:48 – Walking directions, spatial audio and a splintering lineup19:36 – Earshot, app overload and the VibeKeys keypad24:30 – A talking watch and Wi-Fi presence sensing27:02 – Richard on TalkBack, Meta app connections and walking navigation32:03 – Learning a screen reader and the promise of agentic AI39:06 – Gavin on privacy, the LED and Scottish inventors44:45 – Would you stop wearing camera glasses?47:12 – Meta's PR and the ramp outside the building52:53 – Apple event predictionsHave the Meta glasses worked for you, or has the privacy conversation changed how you wear them? Send a voice note or an email and it could feature on the show. Subscribe wherever you listen, and hit like on YouTube to help more blind and low vision listeners find us.Relevant LinksMeta AI Glasses: https://www.meta.com/ai-glasses/OOrion: https://www.oorion.fr/enAira: https://aira.io/Be My Eyes: https://www.bemyeyes.com/Earshot Podcasts: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/earshot-podcasts/id6770760602VibeKeys: https://vibekeys.dev/Zero Project: https://zeroproject.org/
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