The New York Times has today reported that Google is planning to release its rumoured Google Glasses (or ‘Google Goggles’ as they’ve been dubbed by some) before the end of 2012.

Many may think that this type of move by Google into such a different and (as yet) unexplored market is a strange one by Google. However, the company does have a history of investing in strange technologies. The Google Lunar X Prize, for example, promises $30 million to the first privately funded team to "to send a robot to the moon, travel 500 meters and transmit video, images and data back to the Earth." In addition, who can forget the bizarre Google self-driving car news story from 2010?

So, Google doesn’t necessarily always stick to convention when throwing its millions around, but you could be forgiven for thinking that their latest creation was an early leak of one of the company’s famous April Fool’s pranks. 

It seems this isn’t the case, however, and that ‘Google Goggles’ could be on our shelves before 2013, according to the "several Google employees familiar with the project who asked not to be named" in the article.

Other details revealed that the glasses could be priced similarly to top-end smartphones (between $300 $600), meaning that they wouldn’t exactly be out of reach for the average consumer. The rumoured glasses will run Android, and will resemble Oakley Thumps (pictured below), according to the sources.

  

As for what these things will likely be able to do, we must delve into the world of HUD (Heads Up Display) Technology. Anyone who’s familiar with video games such as Call of Duty or Need for Speed knows that a HUD offers visual information to the user by projecting or otherwise displaying it on a screen they’re looking through. Real-life HUDs are already in place in some military technology and have recently made their way into the automotive industry, displaying GPS directions, fuel gauges and speedometers.

  

Google’s new glasses aim to bring that kind of functionality to eyewear, with users able to see information being displayed by Android as an overlay onto reality. They will use a small camera to take in what the user is viewing at any given time and adapt to that view. This could be useful in several situations, such as using Google Maps for navigation or for viewing reviews of restaurants as you look at the building.

Certainly, an augmented reality view of the world could have many advantages, but many also argue that this type of distraction could cause accidents among users. Imagine how easy it might be to find yourself stepping into oncoming traffic or missing a tricky step while reading an augmented reality display of your Facebook news feed.

Google’s ‘Goggles’ are still in the experimental phase for now, and for the general public augmented reality glasses will remain in the realms of science fiction for some time to come, one would imagine. Still, it’s interesting to speculate on this emerging technology. The New York Times interestingly notes that Apple has been looking into similar technology, and it’s all too easy to imagine Tim Cook and Co perfecting this technology and sweeping the competition aside in one fell swoop. Watch this space, folks.      

What’s your opinion on this story? Would you buy a pair of ‘Google Goggles’? Let us know in the comments or chat to us on Facebook or Twitter.