Google ceases sales of Google Glasses

In what has been a very short lived love affair, Google has stopped selling its Google Glasses product.

Loved by few and lambasted by many the internet giant is shutting down the Explorer programme which was driving adoption of the Glass product and halting sales of the controversial specs while it focuses on unspecified “future version of Glass”.

Beloved of geeks worldwide, Google Glass failed to excite the general public, who found the technology not only creepy but also painfully embarrassing.

Aware of the problems, Google initially attempted to overcome concerns by publishing a list of the do’s and don’ts for Glass users, with the reprimand “Don’t be a Glasshole”.

Google’s decision to shelve the product will not come as a surprise to early adopters – for many of whom the novelty had already begun to wane – but it will be an irritation to development teams and innovation heads at the handful of banks and startups that had been working on banking applications for the smart specs.

The news is unlikely to dent the growing wearables market however, which is ticking along nicely for applications primed for integration with the next generation of smart watches. All eyes will be on Apple in this respect, as the consumer tech company gears up for the launch of its own timepiece/payments product in the near future.

In a recent study, the consumer survey found that almost one out of three (30%) of US smartphone owners already own a wearable device.

The most popular wearable type was a wristband like Fitbit or Jawbone while the least