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Midway through singing at Taipei Dome late December, Jolin Tsai mounted a 30-meter mechanical serpent that carried her through the venue while she performed "Medusa" a spectacle that left 40,000 attendees stunned and went viral online.The pop star's "PLEASURE" world tour, which cost around USD 280 million to produce, opened with a three-story-tall ceremonial bull procession before Tsai appeared unexpectedly on an elevated platform wearing a dual-faced mask expressing both pleasure and pain. The massive snake, which she rode as she circled the entire dome, was just one element of what ETtoday reports was the most expensive concert production in the Taipei Dome's history. The show's five narrative chapters also featured nearly 30 large-scale art installations and 20 hybrid fantasy creatures.TREND BITEAs generative AI makes digital spectacle infinitely reproducible, physical experiences are moving into the realm of the impossible to fake. Tsai's serpent too massive, too mechanical, too viscerally present to be dismissed as a deepfake exemplifies how live entertainment is weaponizing scale and IRL overwhelm against the flattening effect of screens.The strategy extends beyond concert stages: Louis Vuitton's ship-shaped Seoul flagship and Gentle Monster's theatrical retail spaces demonstrate that when algorithms can conjure anything, brands compete by building what AI cannot: three-dimensional absurdity that demands physical presence to fully comprehend. The question facing industries from hospitality to automotive isn't whether to embrace maximalism, but whether they can engineer moments so deliberately excessive that "you had to be there" becomes the ultimate social currency.
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Marketing and Advertising
Lumus got a major boost in brand recognition when one of its waveguides was selected for use in the Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses. But that already feels like old tech now because at CES 2026, the company brought some of its latest components to the show and based on what I saw, they seem poised to seriously elevate the optical quality of the next wave of high-end smartglasses. When the Meta Ray-Ban Displays glasses came out, they wowed users as they were (and still are) one of a handful of smartglassess to feature a full-color in-lens display with at least a 20-degree field of view. But going by the specs on Lumus newest waveguides, were set for a major upgrade in terms of future capabilities. If you look closely, you can see where light from the waveguide propagates into the one of the smartglasses' lenses.Sam Rutherford for EngadgetThe first model I tried featured Lumus optimized Z-30 waveguides, which not only offer a much wider 30-degree FOV, they are also 30 percent lighter and 40 percent thinner than previous generations. On top of that, Lumus says they are also more power efficient with the waveguides capable of hitting more than 8,000 nits per watt. This is a big deal because smartglasses are currently quite limited by the size of batteries they can use, especially if you want to make them small and light enough to wear all day. When I tried them on, I was dazzled by both the brightness and sharpness I saw from the Z-30s despite them being limited to 720 x 720 resolution. Not only did the increase in FOV feel much larger than 10 degrees, colors were very rich, including white, which is often one of the most difficult shades to properly reproduce.I had to take a photo of one of Lumus' non-functioning smartglasses with the company's 70-degree FOV waveguide, because two out of three of the working ones had already broke and the last one that I used was being held together by tape. Sam Rutherford for EngadgetHowever, even after seeing how good that first model was, I was totally not prepared for Lumus 70-degree FOV waveguides. I was able to view some videos and a handful of test images and I was completely blown away with how much area they covered. It was basically the entire center portion of the lens, with only small unused areas around the corners. And while I did notice some pincushion distortion along the sides of the waveguides display, a Lumus representative told me that it will be possible to correct for that in final retail units. But make no mistake, these waveguides undoubtedly produced some of the sharpest, brightest and best-looking optics Ive seen from any smartglasses, from either retail models or prototypes or. It almost made me question how much wider FOV these types of gadgets really need, though to be clear, I dont think weve hit the point of diminishing returns yet. This is one of Lumus' thinnest waveguides measuring in at just 0.8mm.Sam Rutherford for EngadgetOther advantages of Lumus geometric reflective waveguides include better overall efficiency than their refractive counterparts along with the ability to optically bond the displays to smartglasses lenses. That means unlike a lot of rivals, Lumus waveguides can be paired with transitions lenses instead of needing to resort to clip-on sunglass attachments when you go outside. Lumus also claims its designs also simplifies the manufacturing process, resulting in thinner waveguides (as small as 0.8mm) and generally higher yields. Unfortunately, taking high-quality photos of content from smartglasses displays is incredibly challenging, especially when youre using extremely delicate prototypes, so youll just have to take my word for now. But with Lumus in the process of ramping up production of its new waveguides with help from partners including Quanta and SCHOTT, it feels like there will be a ton of smartglasses makers clamoring for these components as momentum continues to build around the industrys pick for the next big thing. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/wearables/lumus-brought-a-massively-wider-fov-to-smartglasses-at-ces-2026-233245949.html?src=rss
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Marketing and Advertising
When Meta first announced its display-enabled smart glasses last year, it teased a handwriting feature that allows users to send messages by tracing letters with their hands. Now, the company is starting to roll it out, with people enrolled in its early access program getting it first,I got a chance to try the feature at CES and it made me want to start wearing my Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses more often. When I reviewed the glasses last year, I wrote about how one of my favorite tings about the neural band is that it reduced my reliance on voice commands. I've always felt a bit self conscious at speaking to my glasses in public. Up to now, replying to messages on the display glasses has still generally required voice dictation or generic preset replies. But handwriting means that you can finally send custom messages and replies somewhat discreetly. Sitting at a table wearing the Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses and neural band, I was able to quickly write a message just by drawing the letters on the table in front of me. It wasn't perfect it misread a capital "I" as an "H" but it was surprsingly intuitive. I was able to quickly trace out a short sentence and even correct a typo (a swipe from left to right will let you add a space, while a swipe from right to left deletes the last character). Alongside handwriting, Meta also announced a new teleprompter feature. Copy and paste a bunch of text it supports up to 16,000 characters (roughly a half-hour's worth of speech) and you can beam your text into the glasses' display. If you've ever used a teleprompter, Meta's version works a bit differently in that the text doesn't automatically scroll while you speak. Instead, the text is displayed on individual cards you manually swipe through. The company told me it originally tested a scrolling version, but that in early tests, people said they preferred to be in control of when the words appeared in front of them. Teleprompter is starting to roll out now, though Meta says it could take some time before everyone is able to access. The updates are the among the first major additions Meta has made to its display glasses since launching them late last year and a sign that, like its other smart glasses, the company plans to keep them fresh with new features. Elsewhere at CES, the company announced some interesting new plans for the device's neural band and that it was delaying a planned international rollout of the device.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/wearables/handwriting-is-my-new-favorite-way-to-text-with-the-meta-ray-ban-display-glasses-213744708.html?src=rss
Category:
Marketing and Advertising
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