12 replies to this topic

[kevin]

Link: http://www.gatech.ed...rablecomputing/
Date: 09-01-03
Author: Staff
Source: Georgia Tech University
Title: Wearable Computing - Providing Everyone with a Personal Assistant
Comment: Many links to video and audio resources in the Complete Article

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Wearable Computing - Providing Everyone with a Personal Assistant

Thad Starner has been wearing his computer since 1993. What began as a short-term experiment became a life-long project, some would even say a mission.

Starner is a guru of sorts when it comes to wearable computing. Several of his graduate students in the College of Computing at Georgia Tech also use wearable computers on a daily basis. For these researchers, however, a wearable computer is not just the newest gadget or high-tech status symbol, but a driving force in their computer research – how to build computer applications that make the user smarter and more efficient in completing day-to-day tasks.

"The exciting thing about wearable computers is the fact that they’re with you everywhere and they have access to the same sort of sensory information that you do," says Starner. "The display in your eyeglasses might also integrate a camera so the computer can see as you see. If you use a headphone for listening to music or for cellular phone calls, that headphone could also incorporate a microphone, so the computer can hear as you hear. Suddenly, for the first time, our computers have the ability to see and hear the world from our perspective. Instead of being deaf, dumb and blind sitting on our desks or in our pockets, our computers might be able to observe what we do all day, understand what is important to us, and act as a virtual assistant who helps us on a second-by-second basis."


Complete Article

Related Links
Contextual Computing Group
Wearable Computing Research
Industrial Wearables Research
Smart Shirt Commercialized
International Symposium on Wearable Computers

[nefastor]

Wearable PC's are commercially available today. The target market segment is people who can't use their hands to access a computer, because their hands are otherwise taken or inside bulky gloves (like people working on the mains power lines)

However, there doesn't seem to be anyone using them. Because all the people whose work implies the use of "handless" devices already have devices designed for their specific application, and a PC would actually be a downgrade.

Besides, I suppose most potential users are like me : I couldn't bear having a computer display in front of me at all times, I like to be able to turn my head, even for a second, a see something else (birds through the window, a poster on the wall, the latest RadioSpares catalog...)

Besides, all the available commercial software for wearables has nothing to do with your article : they don't check your environments or try to look into your acts because that's comfort AI, not "real work", and also because of hardware limitations : the best wearable, AFAIK, is a low-power 486 with 64 MB of RAM and a special, anti-shock HDD that's about 6 GB large.

Wearables suffer from user interface problems. The computing power issue ain't so bad, it can be solved if you really want to (AD "SHARC" DSP's offer 3.6 GFLOPS performance at 1.25 volts in a micro-BGA package that's 2 cm x 2 cm and barely heats up... and it's an SoC designed for direct 8-way multiprocessing ! all this for a unit cost of less than $50)

The user interface problem is both hardware and software. Unless you find a way to "plug it in your brain", a wearable will have to rely on HUD's, eye-movement detection, voice recognition and synthesis...

The best option in terms of user interface, I believe, is an arm-mounted flexible keyboard and display. Flexible displays are made possible by light-emitting polymers that can be printed as matrix displays on virtually any surface, including flexible foil.

Regarding processing power, you can also look into the latest Xilinx FPGA range (Virtex II Pro) : the largest chip includes 4 powerPC 32-bit processors, 10 million reconfigurable gates and enough multi-gigabit I/O to route half the internet's total bandwidth. Only problem is... It costs $8,000 dollars apiece and PCB design has got to be a bitch.

If you're interested, I can tell you more about wearables. At some point I even wanted to make one, out of a PC-104 motherboard.

Jean

[wildzbill]

Wearable computing, combined with GPS systems, can give you Augmented Reality. This allows the embedding of data in real 3D space.
Some of this technology has been funded by the Pentagon to create the MARS system, allowing soldiers to pass location information around very rapidly. For example, if one soldier sees a sniper, but is pinned down by him, another soldier may see a graphic on his goggles that shows the exact location of the sniper.
This type of information can also be sent back to CIC and transfered as a target for combat drones.

This type of technology is also being used by surgeons, so that they can see graphic data extracted by MRI scan overlaid on the patients body, allowing them to tunnel directly to problem areas.

I would love to have a wearable computer that is completely hidden, with a display hidden in my sunglasses, and sleek data input gloves. Combine this with cell phone technology and wireless snooper software, to give me access to people and the internet.
I could post on the net, or write a book, while accompanying my wife to the mall.

[Mind]

From the Daily Times of Pakistan:

Read the full article here

TORONTO: When you first meet Steve Mann, it seems as if you’ve interrupted him appraising diamonds or doing some sort of specialized welding. Because the first thing you notice is the plastic frame that comes around his right ear and holds a lens over his right eye.

But quickly you see that there’s more to his contraption: A tiny video camera is affixed to the plastic eyepiece. Multicolored wires wrap around the back of Mann’s head. Red and white lights blink under his sweater. Mann greets you, warmly at first, though he soon gets distracted by something on the tiny computer monitor wedged over his eye.

In fact, being with Mann sometimes feels like the ultimate, in-your-face version of having a dinner companion who talks on a cell phone. But don’t be put off by it. Someday you, too, might be a cyborg.

Why he’s doing it: Mann, a 41-year-old engineering professor at the University of Toronto, spends hours every day viewing the world through that little monitor in front of his eye -- so much so that going without the apparatus often leaves him feeling nauseous, unsteady, naked. While the small video camera gives him a recordable, real-time view of what’s in front of him, the tiny screen is filled with messages or programming code fed by a computer and wireless transmitters that Mann straps to his body. He calls the experience “mediating reality” -- sort of like having icons from your computer screen transposed onto your regular vision.

Mann manipulates the computer through a handheld key device he invented, though he has experimented with putting electrodes on his skin and trying to control the cursor with brain waves. If it sounds a bit creepy, consider this: Mann became a cyborg so he could be more human. To be sure, that runs contrary to the sci-fi movie treatment of cyborgs (short for “cybernetic organisms”) as electronic beasts, like in the “Terminator” movies. It also seems to violate a pastoral sense of what it means to be human: governed by spirit, reason and instinct, not infused with wires and silicon. But Mann has sensitive and perceptive motives for his electronic immersion, which began 25 years ago. He believes that wearing computers and cameras will give people more power to maintain their privacy and individuality......

......Not alone in his dream: Steve Mann is not alone in dreaming of enhancing human capabilities with computer intelligence. Some futurists consider it inevitable. Inventor Ray Kurzweil predicts a human-computer mind meld this century that will usher “The Age of Spiritual Machines.” Gazing into that same ethereal future, professor Kevin Warwick of Britain’s University of Reading had circuitry implanted inside his arm for three months last year. In one aspect of the experiment, Warwick moved his hand, and the implant relayed signals through the Internet to move a robotic hand. The gestures weren’t coordinated, but Warwick said the test showed the feasibility of plugging electronic devices into the nervous system. Now Warwick hopes to lay the groundwork for a brain implant that could aid people with disabilities or augment existing abilities.

Read the full article here

[kevin]

Link: http://www.extremete...,1553138,00.asp


March 23, 2004
Baby, You Look Hot in That Phone
By Jim Louderback

Focusing on phones and wide-area wireless networking, The Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association (CTIA) wireless convention is in full swing in Atlanta. It was mostly talking heads and Bluetooth technology, but in the back of the Georgia World Congress Center, nestled among the sleek handsets and svelte headsets, was a fashion show runway.

Along with the great gear, CTIA presented the Fashion in Motion catwalk show. Semi-starved models flounced around the runway sporting mobile (and not so mobile) gear, accessories and smart clothing. I arrived just after it started, and pushed my way to the front. Luckily, I brought my digital camera, so I was able to snap pictures of this spectacle as it unfolded. What follows are some highlights – and lowlights – of this oddly compelling exhibition. And, because sometimes truth is stranger than storytelling, instead of pithy and cynical comments, I'll let the fashion show speak for itself. I managed to snag a copy of the script from its author, Kathy Klingele. So enjoy what follows, in Kathy's own words.

[kevin]

Link: http://news.bbc.co.u...ogy/3673619.stm

Entire countries focusing on Wi-Fi.. hmm...

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Estonia embraces web without wires

By Clark Boyd
Technology correspondent in Estonia

Wi-fi hotspots are clearly marked by orange and black signs
There is a new revolution brewing along Tallinn's ancient stone streets and inside its charming Gothic buildings.

But it is not political, it is technological.

Wireless net access, or wi-fi, is quickly becoming the rule, not exception, in the Estonian capital.

That is due largely to the hard work of Veljo Haamer, editor of the wifi.ee website.

Mr Haamer, a former computer science student and tutor, got turned on to wireless internet access a few years ago, after reading about projects in America.

He visited friends in the United States, learned more about wi-fi, and then decided to start his own project in Estonia.

Working with local net providers, Mr Haamer started pushing wi-fi as a cheap, effective way for Estonians to get online.

Electronic evangelism

"Wi-fi is such a wonderful technology," says Mr Haamer, as he types away on his laptop in one of Tallinn's swanky new cafes. "My job is simply to explain to people how easy it is to use."

The first wi-fi hotspots launched in the spring of 2001. Today, there are more than 280 throughout the country.

You can find access points in many of Estonia's cafes and pubs and two-thirds of them are free to use. Those that charge usually offer slightly faster connection speeds.


It's a social and political project. People need to see how comfortable it is to use the internet

Veljo Haamer
And more importantly, he says, the hotspots are clearly marked with orange and black signs and stickers.

Haamer says that in the US, many people did not know wireless access was available, because the hotspots were unmarked.

He was determined that would not happen in Estonia.

Even local petrol stations offer access, ensuring that Estonians car owners can check their e-mail on the road.

Mr Haamer convinced the major oil companies here, Neste and Statoil, to put in free hotspots. Wi-fi web access may add a bit to the price of the petrol being sold but the companies think of it as an add-on service.

The project has proven so successful, says Mr Haamer, that Statoil is thinking of expanding it to Latvia and Lithuania.

"I heard also that maybe Texaco will start this in Great Britain," he says with a bit of pride. "That means Estonia is like a starter for this idea."

Mr Haamer says he spends about half his time "wardriving", buzzing along Estonia's roads, trying to find out where wireless access is limited or non-existent.

He believes that about one-third of the country is still without wireless access and it is a problem that he wants to fix.

"We have so many people outside of towns who do not have internet connections," he says, "and wi-fi is a cheap possibility to give them the internet."

Rural retreat

The surge in wireless access hardly seems strange in a country that some have dubbed "E-stonia" for its hi-tech prowess.

After all, in Estonia the vast majority of the population does its banking online.

Drivers in Tallinn can pay for parking by simply sending a text message from their mobile phones.


Fill up and surf the web on the forecourt
Even the Estonian government has gone hi-tech. Cabinet ministers meet weekly in a room fitted with more than a dozen high-end computers, complete with flat screen monitors and broadband connections.

Linnar Viik, an adviser to the Estonian government and a lecturer at Estonia's technology college, has pushed hard over the years for the adoption of such technologies.

"It's not the technology that's so important," says Mr Viik.

"More important than putting a new piece of technology on a shelf and hitting the button is how people start to use it, and whether they embrace the change which is causing new processes, or new services [to be] available to people."

Many Estonians, especially the younger ones, are embracing wireless internet access wholeheartedly. That is especially true now that the economy is starting to improve, and more can afford laptops.

Cafes that offer free internet access are filled with young professionals checking email, surfing the web, and designing PowerPoint presentations.

This, Mr Haamer points out, is exactly what wi-fi is all about.

"You don't need to invest in an office anymore," he says Haamer. "You have an idea, a computer with a wireless card, and a space to work. You can use your time more efficiently."

If Mr Haamer has his way, you will not be able to take a walk in the park here without finding a wireless access point as his next project is to get free wi-fi in some of Tallinn's green spaces.

"It's a social and political project," Mr Haamer says. "People need to see how comfortable it is to use the internet."

Clark Boyd is technology correspondent for The World, a BBC World Service and WGBH-Boston co-production

[kevin]

Link: http://www.newscient...p?id=ns99995015

Related Stories 3D ads to put virtual beers on bars 23 March 2004 Human handshake opens data stream 7 October 2002 Non-verbal sounds key to controlling computers 17 October 2001 Weblinks Queen's University Human Media Lab Wiki Video Blogging

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Smart glasses detect eye contact

13:02 19 May 04
NewScientist.com news service

The current appearance of the glasses is likely to ensure plenty of looks (Image: Human Media Lab)

A pair of sunglasses that can detect when someone is making eye contact with the wearer has been developed by Canadian researchers.

Besides being useful in singles bars, its inventors say the system could play a key role in video blogging, a hi-tech form of diary keeping.

Video bloggers record their lives from the point of view of a first person video narrative. "I think this is something that we will see over the next few years," says Roel Vertegaal, co-creator of the glasses at Queen's University's Human Media Lab, in Ontario, Canada.

The main problem is the tedious process of editing out the dull bits where nothing much happens, says Vertegaal. So the glasses allow a video blogger to automatically detect and record interactions and conversations with other people.

Infrared emission

The glasses consist of a normal pair of shades with a small CCD camera attached on the bridge between the lenses. This is connected to a handheld computer, worn at the hip, which handles the image processing.

Light emitting diodes, or LEDs, positioned around the lenses emit infrared light creating a kind of "red eye" effect in the eyes of anyone facing the camera. This is used to locate any eyes in the scene.

The system then looks for the glint created by the light reflecting off the cornea of the eye to determine if that person is looking directly at the wearer's eyes, or elsewhere. If the glint appears right in the centre of the pupil then it means the person is making eye contact.

Vertegaal admits that, given the current appearance of the glasses it is likely that everyone will be looking at the wearer. But he says that is part of the point - to attract people to interact.

But the glasses have failed to impress one video blogger contacted by New Scientist, TV producer Steve Garfield. You would look like a crazy person and still end up having to do substantial editing of your footage, he says. "I would never use anything like this."

Attention sensitive

Another potential application for the glasses is to create attention-sensitive devices, such as mobile phones. Vertegaal's team are experimenting with using eye-contact detection to tell when someone might be too busy to receive a phone call.

But instead of switching the phone off when the person is busy, he says, the team have designed an icon to appear on the caller's phone indicating that the person they are calling is currently busy.

Vertegaal says they have also considered broader applications, such as possible use in a singles bar. But there is a possible drawback, he says: "The glasses don't distinguish between male and female."

That is the least of your worries, says Garfield. "No one's going to hit on you if you're wearing these glasses," he says.

Also the system currently only works if people are no more than a metre away from the wearer. But the Canadian team are working on a new system that extends this to four metres.

[kevin]

Link: http://abcusinc.com/...rvicePoint.html

Now all we need is that neuronal jack we've been asking ocs for..

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Wearable Server


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[Matt]

I think the apperance of the glasses on the post before need a bit of work and the features of it need to shrink drasticly before it becomes accepted by majority..

We basicly need Glasses that are well... As stylish as regular sun glasses Any new versions around yet?

SO when do we get smart clothes?

[amar]

See how smart clothes work here.

[Jay the Avenger]

Ian Pearson seems to think that active lenses (alternative for retina-goggles as described in this thread), as he calls them, will be possible in either 2006 or 2008. I forgot which one. I also forgot in which of his many articles I have read that.

It was one of these:

http://www.btinterne...pearson/future/

[amar]

Talk about sunglasses for the paranoid. Will they detect if people are looking at you from behind too?

[kevin]

Link: http://www.wired.com...html?tw=rss.TOP

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Surviellance Works Both Ways

By Kim Zetter
02:00 AM Apr. 14, 2005 PT

SEATTLE -- Surveilling the surveillers. It's an idea that Number 6, the nameless hero of the classic British TV show The Prisoner, would have loved.

In an attempt to establish equity in the world of surveillance, participants at the Computers, Freedom and Privacy conference in Seattle this week took to the streets to ferret out surveillance cameras and turn the tables on offensive eyes taking their picture.

Following wearable computing guru Steve Mann into a downtown Seattle shopping mall, about two dozen conference attendees, some of them armed with handheld cameras, snapped photos of smoked-glass ceiling domes in Nordstrom and Gap stores, which may or may not have contained cameras.

Companies have been known to install empty camera domes to save money while giving the impression of surveillance.

The idea of surveillance that's powerful even if it's not actually present was in line with the theme of this year's CFP conference -- the Panopticon. The Panopticon, a model prison envisioned by philosopher Jeremy Bentham, would feature guard towers using mirrors that allowed the guards to see the prisoners without being seen themselves. This would leave the inmates uncertain as to when they were actually being watched.

But the mere possibility that someone might be watching would be enough to alter their behavior, ensuring, in the words of French philosopher Michel Foucault, that the effect of surveillance would be ongoing even if the surveillance itself wasn't. The mere perception of power would "render its actual exercise unnecessary."

Mann, a University of Toronto professor who helped found MIT Media Lab's Wearable Computing Project, has made it a mission to make people more aware of the surveillance around them -- in the form of cameras concealed in store smoke detectors, smoked-glass domes, illuminated door exit signs and even stuffed animals sitting on store shelf displays -- by engaging in what he calls "equiveillance through sousveillance."

The opposite of surveillance -- French for watching from above -- sousveillance refers to watching from below, essentially from beneath the eye in the sky. It's the equivalent of keeping an eye on the eye.

With that in mind, Mann conducted his tour with conference participants to see how those conducting surveillance would respond to being monitored.

Mann sported his signature camera eyewear, while some of the other participants wore CFP conference bags around their necks. The bags had a dark plastic dome stitched on one side -- modeled after store surveillance domes -- which they pointed randomly at passersby, unnerving them. Conference organizers had outfitted a handful of the bag domes with wireless webcams -- they wouldn't say which bags contained cameras -- which transmitted and recorded live streaming video to monitors in the conference lobby.

In the stores, as conference attendees snapped pictures of three smoked domes in the ceiling of a Mont Blanc pen shop, an employee inside waved his arms overhead. The intruders interpreted his gesture as happy excitement at being photographed until a summoned security guard halted the photography.

Mann asked the guard why, if the Mont Blanc cameras were recording him, he couldn't, in turn, record the cameras. But the philosophical question, asked again at Nordstrom and the Gap, was beyond the comprehension of store managers who were more concerned with the practical issues of prohibiting store photography.

At the Gap, photographers were told they couldn't take pictures because the Gap didn't want competitors to study and copy its clothing displays. At Nordstrom, an undercover security guard who looked like Baby Spice and sported a badge identifying her as Agent No. 1, summoned a manager who told Mann that customers would be disturbed by the handheld cameras.

Illogically, she didn't have a problem with participants pointing their conference bag domes around the store to take photos, just with the handheld cameras.

Mann said that duplicity is often necessary in order to mirror the Kafkaesque nature of surveillance.

He has designed a wallet that requires someone to show ID in order to see his ID. The device consists of a wallet with a card reader on it. His driver's license can be seen only partially through a display. And in order for someone to see the rest of his ID, they have to swipe their own ID through the card reader to open the wallet.

He also made a briefcase that has a fingerprint scan that requires the fingerprint of someone else to open it.

Mann quoted Simon Davies of Privacy International, a London-based nonprofit that monitors civil liberties issues: "The totalitarian regime is the regime that would like to know everything about everyone but reveal nothing about itself," Mann said.

He considered such a government an "inequiveillant regime" and likened it to signing a contract with another party without being allowed to keep a copy of the contract.

"What I argue is that if I'm going to be held accountable for my actions that I should be allowed to record ... my actions," Mann said. "Especially if somebody else is keeping a record of my actions."