Glass is going nowhere… yet. Photo: Google

Google’s first foray into wearables didn’t do as well as the company expected. Despite closing the Google Glass explorer program in January though, Eric Schmidt says the project isn’t dead yet. It’s just getting ready for users.

Nest founder Tony Fadell, took over the project earlier this year after the company decided to stop selling the first version of Google Glass. According to Schmidt the technology behind Glass is too important to scrap, so they’ve moved it out of the Google X research lab and are developing it into a standalone unit.

Photo: LeWeb

After failing to garner consumer interest for nearly two years, the fate of Google Glass is now in the hands of former Apple executive Tony Fadell. The Glass Explorer program is also being shut down on January 19th, which means it will be impossible to buy the $1,500 headset commercially.

Fadell, whose claim to fame at Apple was leading the development of the original iPod, joined Google last February when Nest was acquired for $3.2 billion. Now Google Glass is being moved out of the experimental Google X division and placed under Fadell’s leadership.

The development of Glass hasn’t been halted, but the move signals the trouble Google has had gaining momentum with the project.

You cannot receive notifications on Google Glass and Android Wear. Photo: Google

Google Glass users can finally view Android notifications as they arrive on their smartphone — but only if they’ll give them up on Android Wear. Notifications cannot be delivered to both devices simultaneously, so unfortunately for wearable junkies, it’s one or the other.

Pandora is compatible with the Google Glass earbuds. Photo: Google.

An official Pandora app is now available for Google Glass, allowing you to enjoy and control Internet radio on your eyewear using only your voice (and your ears, obviously). Initially built only as a hack-a-thon project and never really intended for public use, Google liked the app so much it made it an official Glass add-on.

When Google Glass first went on sale to a select few members of the beta testing public back in April, 2013, there were only two major complaints — one was the non-inclusion of an external speaker, and the other its design. Within a matter of months, the search engine giant resolved the first issue by introducing a mono earbud, and now it looks like it’s addressing the second.