Along with the Pixel phones, watches, and earbuds at Google’s annual showcase of software and devices last week came a pair of nifty-looking translation glasses.

Put them on and real-time “subtitles” appear on the lenses as you watch a person speaking in a different language. Very cool. But the glasses are not commercially available. It’s also unlikely they will make anywhere near as much money as advertising does for Google’s parent, Alphabet. Of the company’s $US68 billion ($98 billion) in total revenue for the quarter ended March 31, about $US54 billion came from advertising.

Bloomberg Opinion