My review of glidance.

Thanks for taking the time to check it out and report back. 🙂👌

A. What are the materials used? This goes for everything, base, handle, and the grip.
B. The teliscoping handle/cane, when you extend it to your prefered hight, does it lock in to that hight by twisting, like how it is for lot of normal teliscoping canes?
C. When you said you felt motors vibrating, did the device actually propelled itself, or motion was solely based on your physical push to the device?
D. What was the wait like? For 2-3 mins, is it okay to heft it around the flights of stairs and such?
E. Did you test navigating in crowded areas? Was the device able to navigate busy footpaths, shopping areas and such? If someone accidentally steps on it, would it break?
F. How was the haptick feedback, and the speaker output? In a busy streats with lot of cars and such, would you be able to here this device without earphones?
G. Were you able to over-power the device in situations, say it's guiding you towards left, but, you want to go to right for whatever reason? I know you make the choise initially, but, once you select 1 direction, what if I want to change my choise?

The glide team is doing an impressive job of developing an assistive device from scratch, with such a deep community engagement. It's almost as though they are showing the potential customers, here's a product, what improvements would you like and going back to drawing board. Rince and repeat, and that seems like a solid strategy to win.
This is why I feel this might be successful and perhaps game changing.

How would this do in traffic?

How does this handle train platforms, specifically the gap between the train and the platform?*.

I know some places have tactile bumps before you reach the edge, but let’s be honest, not every station has them.

With a cane, it's easy to feel when you’re approaching the edge. How would this device manage that situation?

In the demo I had the other day, I was told that the current version will handle it the same as a step, so it will stop before you get to the edge, you'd then need to lift it up to get it on.
Another thing was that although they're still working on how they can get it to work out the gap between the platform a lot of people have told them they'd still like to carry a white cane with them for those exact situations, which I personally feel I'd probably do as well, because with the gap, you're always better off if you can measure that yourself I feel.

Am I understanding this correctly, that the handle can be raised or lowered telescopically? Do we know how small the handle can get? Also, did Brad say there was a grip at the base of the model for carrying purposes?

Thanks in advance. 🙂✌️

Brian, as a founding member we get surveys. One of these was how small do you want the device to be. Basically, it was agreed that when the handle was down it would fit under the seat on a plane. So not sure how big a gap that is but it is probably quite small. and yes a 2nd fixed handle should be there to pick the thing up.

Reading through this I just had one reoccurring thought. This sounds like a sad attempt at creating a robotic guide dog. It appears that this device mimics some of the same advantages of having a dog, but does so in a cold mechanized manner. It was said that the device is approx. 6 or 7 pounds. That is going to be annoyingly heavy to lug up flights of stairs or into train cars. I will stick with my loving and alive dog guide. Hahahahaha

6 or 7lb is heavy? What do you do with a suitcase? that can weigh 50lb. So it isn't for you fine but actually this could be the biggest mobility aid that we have ever seen and for me I'm quite happy to give it a chance.

Does this mean that the subscription is only required for AI features? So you can use it without a subscription but you just can't do everything.

I think this sounds amazing and your comments were really interesting. One thing that does worry me a little is how reliant it is going to be on an internet connection. My Meta Ray-bans often complain about not being able to access the internet. That's ok if I'm just asking a description of what's around me, but less good if you are reliant on it to get around.

I'd also be curious to know how much data it uses if it is constantly online.

I've got to say, though, that the more I hear about this the more impressive it seems. It feels so much more ambitious than any other mobility tech I've heard about. And the way the company is engaging with actual customers is fantastic.

Reading the train platforms comments, I was just wondering: how do guide dog users handle the gap? I've not had a guide dog and the problem seems similar? Does the guide dog user also carry a cane to scope out these areas?
I am eagerly awaiting being able to take it for a walk. And yes I'll be taking my cane along at least on the first trip

Hi,

Regarding internet. The internal workings have been designed so that even if you lose a signal i.e on the underground the sensors will guarantee that you won't fall down a hole or off a platform and will still guide you round obsticles. Just the map type functions would not be available until you get the signal back. In terms of canes, I spoke to them about this and they intend to have some kind of clip or something on the side so you can attach a folded cane to it just in case you need it.

Ah OK, so that's the free roaming mode or whatever they call it? I think it would make sense if you could download maps onto the phone to use. Maybe that will come later. It does worry me a bit if I am out and suddenly I lose internet and I was relying on it to navigate me somewhere.

I definitely like the idea of being able to attach a cane to the side of it.

I have only had limited experience with trains, but when I had my guide dog, I could always tell the gap by my dog's positioning and movement while boarding or Disembarking from a train. That may sound weird, but if you have ever worked with a guide dog, you will understand.

If you have any suggestions you can mail direct to gliders@glidance.io.

I wrote a review of driving Glide back in June. I did have a chance to fondle version 2 of the prototype at the demo.
The body of the unit itself is made of metal. The texture was matte and the metallic shell was quite strong, so not something that could easily be dented if bumped by something. The body itself was about the size of a can of paint, maybe a bit bigger.
the handle was a hard plastic with the column of the handle being metallic, similar to what you would find on fancy luggage, but much higher quality. there is a button in the column that when pressed, allows you to raise and lower the handle to your height of choice.

the wheels felt like tricycle wheels in size and were more like discs rather than having spokes like a bicycle.

There are a number of principles that are being adapted from the automotive industry to the mechanics of Glide which is nice to see.

I was just having a look around the Glidance site. I knew you could get a 30% discount on Glide by pre-ordering by the end of the year. I hadn't appreciated that you also get a discount on the subscription - in that it is $20 a month locked in for the life of the device, as opposed to $30 a month (estimated) if you don't pre-order.

I also see you can buy 1 or 4 years subscriptions up front and save a bit more there. I'm not sure if you carry on paying the discounted subscription after that time.

I was thinking if the initial price was $1800 (or £1400 in UK) and it had no subscription I would probably think that was reasonable for what you get.

I think my main reservation is whether I would use it enough to justify the cost. I think day to day dog walking is going to be better with a cane. There's just no need to introduce Glide to the mix, and I think it's better to maintain some cane skills. O do really want to try it though. The more I think about it, it just seems almost too good to be true.

I think it would be a bad idea to rely 100% on tech to get you around. What happens if you suddenly find that your battery on the Glide or your phone has run dry or if it breaks when you are out for some reason. Or you lose internet, or their servers go down. Canes are easy and cheap and if you follow old bear's example you can always improvise. I would be very wary of using Glide only.

In my case my usual thing is to go walk the dogs and the routes aren't that difficult so using Glide just feels a bit pointless.

However, I'm not proud of saying that I am very concerned about going out on my own. The Glide offers me the chance to move me out of my comfort zone a bit more.

I like how they are designing it so that you can attach a telescopic cane to it in case of emergency, of you find yourself somewhere that the Glide isn't working so well. Little details like that show how well thought out this is..

I'd be interested to know how well the Glide works if I am walking with my dogs - for example if I take them into town. Is it going to be confused because it's walking jus tin front of me or to the side and see it as an obstacle?

Anyway I fired a load of questions like that to the email address.

I am tempted to just go all out on the 4 year plan and think of it as a single big purchase without worrying about a subscription in the short term. I'll see what answers I get back, if any.

I showed my wife the recent video and she was immediately hassling me to get it. I think she'd love to get me out of the house more often.

On Double Tap they were also talking about possibly allowing the audio to be routed through the phone. I hope this will work as it presumably would allow you to wear your meta ray-bans and use glide at the same time. Which sounds awesome to me.

I pre-ordered Glide. And I am elligible for the $20 a month subscription as I understand it. When I did the math on the pre-paying subscriptions, the discount was not significant. Possibly less savings than putting the money on interest, at least at the time I calculated it here in the United States. I need more incentive than that to prepay for something that doens't quite exist, such as the big Founders discount I did. Plus I am happy to give them my support, even if it fails. But... I have my limits and pre-paying the subscription is it I guess. haha. I don't know if my musing help you decide; if you're on the fence so to speak I suggest splitting the difference and pre-ordering it and put the rest in a high interest savings account to pay the subscription if it makes it to market.

I used to have enough vision to walk around safely. Now that has gone the issue was I never really learnt to use a cane in the correct way. So for me, the two things I can't wait for even if the rest doesn't work is being able to walk down a street knowing I won't bang into anything. Even things like people leaving their car doors open or high up signs will be avoided. If all comes together being able to go to a new place and glide will be able to take me to that pub that everyone has raved about.

I'm not sure of your circumstances or where you are in the world, but have you looked into getting some O&M lessons? I doubt it's too late unless you have other issues preventing you using a cane.

None of us know if Glide will fulfil its promise. If it does, it is still a year away, and tech is never infallible. So having some basic cane skills may be useful both in the short term and long-term as a plan B. But also protects you should it not work out as hoped.

I remember when I was losing my sight I was always clinging onto the thing that was just around the corner that would solve everything. So far nothing has really done whatI was after and I feel better concentrating on what is there now not on the promise of things to come.

I'm in the UK and happened to get referred to someone from an eye consultant I was seeing at a local hospital. No one else had cared to mention it to me before. But if I was trying now I would look for local blindness organisations and ask the question.

Sorry if I'm interfering. I realise you are not me but sometimes there is help available but it's just not obvious unless you know it's there.

Not meaning to be a downer on Glide as it has got me pretty excited.

Ye'h in the UK. Been blind all my life and did have mobility training at school. Just never really used it. like riding a bike I can do it but it's just bad habbits wwe can get into. So, with luck this thing will work lol.

I have to admit I'm not really following my own advice. I am confident with my cane in some situations but it's a big difference to being out on my own which is something I don't do often enough. This is the promise of the Glide for me. I guess I feel I have very basic cane skills to fall back on in an emergency with it but if it broke down in the middle of town and I was on my own it is still a pretty scary thought.

I suspect you could get a few refresher lessons if you asked for them. I keep meaning to do that for myself.