{"id":827388,"date":"2026-07-27T17:49:21","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T17:49:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/827388\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T17:49:21","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T17:49:21","slug":"meta-is-rethinking-subscriptions-on-its-smart-glasses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/827388\/","title":{"rendered":"Meta Is Rethinking Subscriptions on Its Smart Glasses"},"content":{"rendered":"

If there\u2019s one way to rub people the wrong way, it\u2019s introducing subscriptions where there previously were none. Meta pulled that very agitating lever<\/a> earlier this month by announcing plans to start \u201crate limiting\u201d its smart glasses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As quickly as it introduced that soft paywall, however, Meta is putting it back in the bag\u2014at least temporarily. According to The Verge<\/a>, Meta is pausing its plans to add rate limits to a feature called Conversation Focus, which uses AI and the smart glasses\u2019 microphones to help you better hear someone you\u2019re talking with.<\/p>\n

For full context, a Meta spokesperson makes it clear in a statement to The Verge that subscriptions are not being ruled out entirely\u2014there are still plans to paywall certain features down the line\u2014but its plans to start with Conversation Focus have been paused, and for good reason.<\/p>\n

Starting the subscription plan with Conversation Focus was a strange choice. For one, the feature works offline, meaning there\u2019s no burden on Meta\u2019s servers for using it. That makes a \u201crate limit\u201d for power users odd at best. As I pointed out earlier this month, Conversation Focus is a tool that\u2019s likely to be used by people who are hard of hearing, even though it\u2019s not explicitly marketed as an accessibility feature.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s worth mentioning that since the planned rate limits on Conversation Focus were announced, Meta has been sued by a group of employees<\/a> who say it used AI to target people on medical, parental, and family leave for layoffs\u2014emphasis on the medical part. That\u2019s to say that, optically, this may not be a great time for Meta\u2019s Conversation Focus subscription even if it\u2019s not explicitly an accessibility feature.<\/p>\n

Meta tells The Verge that its rate limits are being introduced in an effort to subsidize hardware, but whether we\u2019d see reduced prices on smart glasses with tons of subscriptions in them is anyone\u2019s guess. For now, anyone who uses Meta\u2019s smart glasses can look forward to more agitating news down the line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If there\u2019s one way to rub people the wrong way, it\u2019s introducing subscriptions where there previously were none.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":827389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[64,63,1333,1774,105,9544],"class_list":["post-827388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-meta","tag-smart-glasses","tag-technology","tag-wearables"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=827388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/827388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/827389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=827388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=827388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=827388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}