At a time where you can’t go anywhere without an LCD screen of some kind shining brightly in your face, IRL Glasses have appeared to take us back to simpler times.
To the average person, IRL Glasses look inconspicuous as if they only exist to keep your eyes safe from the Sun’s menacing rays. There’s more going on here, though. Created by Ivan Cash, they use a style of lens that completely blocks light emitted from screens, making them appear as if they’re turned off.
The use cases for these $40 glasses are quite limited, but that hasn’t scared away everyone. The Kickstarter for IRL Glasses has already accumulated over $90,000 of its $25,000 goal thanks to more than 1,360 backers.
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That got us thinking: what will these backers first do when they receive their fresh pair of IRL Glasses? Turn their TV on and enjoy not being able to watch what’s on the screen? Maybe. Go to Best Buy and enjoy not being bombarded by hundreds of screens all playing Planet Earth in unison? Now that sounds more like it.
IRL Glasses use horizontal polarization, which is a fancy way of saying that they have a lens angled in such a way that certain types of light (such as that of a TV screen) is filtered before reaching your eyes. In their current iteration most TV’s are blocked, but only some laptops, and virtually no smartphones.
While that might be a dealbreaker, there is a level of novelty here that could make IRL Glasses a fun gift for friends, provided you are up for giving your friends $40 gifts that they’ll probably never use.
