Tech

Selkirk: Jabberwocky Cartography of/as a Little Mind

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Selkirk: Jabberwocky Cartography of/as a Little Mind by Wilfried Hou Je Bek and Orkan Telhan:

...SELKIRK is a special purpose application of our ongoing fundamental research in the creation of little minds (grassroots artificial intelligence or rather telligence similar to the distinction between humour and black umour of Jacques Vaché, the Selkirk behind the Surrealist movement)... In SELKIRK the wiring of it's little mind is the streetgram of Amsterdam. Severed from the city, stripped of its physical components, each neuron in the mind of SELKIRK is equivalent to a street, or a part of a street, in Amsterdam... like a face in a cloud: some see the head of a sheep, some the contours of a ghost while other the backside of a minotaur, all in the same cloud.

Soccer realtime coverage on your cell phone with playing vatars

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Interesting product by betomorrow: now you can use LiveFoot to get a real-ime coverage of a soccer game. LiveFoot is available on Wap, J2ME and Microsoft Smartphone formats: According to the society:

LiveFoot is a complete soccer information service. It allows presentation at all times of information on games, teams, players and statistics. Thanks to a very innovating technology, LIVEFOOT allows to follow, in real time, the highlights of a football match over a mobile device. Along with the reconstruction of the actions, a spoken or written commentary is supplied by a journalist.

  • The specific system developed by Symah Vision, Epsis LOCATOR, assesses in real time the position of the players as well as the ball. Moreover, it offers in-depth information such as the speed of the ball or the distance to the goal.
  • BeTomorrow developed a cutting-edge process to integrate the data in a real time environment. Thanks to this solution using very little bandwidth, LIVEFOOT offers an operational alternative to video on mobile devices.

There is also LiveSailing dedicated to live reggattas broadcasting. Why do I blog this? It do think it's an innovative applications: now you can have a "real-time replay" of a soccer game on your cell phone, played with avatars. It's dead crazy! Even though it's not working for the whole game (just highlights), there is an tremendous paradigm shift here: real players will play and some users will watch avatars! The LiveFoot system seems a but outdated, don't know if it was thrown to the market and I'm not sure whether it would work, it just sounds curious.

SAGEM Head-Up Display

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The FELIN system (designed by Sagem) offer the follwoing head-up display: What is interesting here is the way the soldier can interact with the devices, according to defense-update

The soldier does not use a microphone for voice commands, but instead wears a headband with an osteo-phone. The helmet will also be equipped with passive elements for audio protection. The helmet mounted day/night microcamera will offer 50 degrees field of view. Using the standard headgear, the soldier will be able to detect a human target at 150 meters and identify it at a range of 70 meters. (...) The computer is connected to a man-machine interface enabling the soldier to control the system and carry out operations such as firing around a corner or see through obstacles. (...) The specialized section commanders will get portable information system terminals, (SIT), which are PDA sized digital assistants, used for tactical situation assessment. The SIT will display images, maps with overlaid symbology, and will be able to exchange encrypted messages with other commanders and higher echelons.

In terms of group coordination, it also appears interesting:

The infantryman will use a small personal radio (RIF) transmitting voice and data communication. The RIF will be functional both in mounted or dismounted operations enabling GPS position tracking and information sharing within the squad and platoon. The communication bandwidth provided by the RIF is sufficient to pass operational graphics, imagery, maps and video sequences between team members and back to the higher echelon. (...) FELIN platoon will operate five networks: four will operate as RIFintra squad networks, (three infantry and one antitank squads) maintaining continuous and open "conference" between the squad members. Each RIFIntra network will also be separable into two intra-team sub-networks, allowing control of small team operations when required. At the platoon level, RIF Command network will operate, communicating between squad leaders, platoon commander, CO, snipers and the unit's armored personnel carriers.

Why do I blog this? No I am not a military freak however, I do think military stuff offers an interesting potential in the field of Human-Computer Interaction as well as to study how technology disrupts/impacts/reshapes/supports group coordination, which is closely related to my phd project. Moreover, I would be interested to see how people could hack this kind of tool and turn it into something crazier...

Automatic user interruptability with wearable sensors

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A Model for Human Interruptability: Experimental Evaluation and Automatic Estimation from Wearable Sensors by Nicky Kern, Stavros Antifakos, Bernt Schiele, Adrian Schwaninger In 8th International Symposium on Wearable Computing (ISWC), Washington DC, USA, November 2004:

For the estimation of user interruptability in wearable and mobile settings, we propose to distinguish between the users' personal and social interruptability. In this paper, we verify this thesis with a user study on 24 subjects. Results show that there is a significant difference between social and personal interruptability. Further, we present a novel approach to estimate the social and personal interruptability of a user from wearable sensors. It is scalable for a large number of sensors, contexts, and situations and allows for online adaptation during run-time. We have developed a wearable platform, that allows to record and process the data from a microphone, 12 body-worn 3D acceleration sensors, and a location estimation. We have evaluated the approach on three different data sets, with a maximal length of two days.

This paper is interesting, especially after reading this post.

New cell phones features

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A short piece in the IHT about how european and american carriers can benefit from asian's mistakes when designing cell phone features:

American and European carriers have the luxury of learning from mistakes the Japanese have made, particularly when it comes to designing attractive and reasonably priced handsets. A bigger hurdle is persuading people to use their phones to write e-mail, surf the Web and hold videoconferences. (...) To stem the decline, DoCoMo and its rivals are introducing a host of services to encourage consumers to transmit more data. The latest phones can download 40-second video clips and ring tones and store hundreds of photos. DoCoMo 3G subscribers can hold videoconferences with as many as eight people. Some 3G handsets even include infrared readers that convert phones into television remote controls. Wakabayashi also uses the removable memory disk in his handset to transfer two-megapixel pictures he snaps with his phone to his computer. Many phones now have chips that turn phones into "smart cards" that allow subscribers to pay for tickets, food and other items at 20,000 stores. DoCoMo plans to expand this service so commuters can use phones that have special chips as train passes. DoCoMo's new generation of handsets can even scan two-dimensional bar codes posted, say, at bus stops, allowing customers instantly to get a bus schedule and an estimated time of arrival. Once on the bus, they can receive coupons sent to their cellphones from stores along the bus route.

Why do I blog this? The article gives a summary of all the new services that are offered on cell phones. Interesting for people who missed such information.

Rojo: a newsfeed aggregator that allows tagging

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This rojo web applications seems worth to have a glance. It's a kinf of newsfeed aggregator/del.icio.us mashup:

Rojo is a FREE web-based service that lets you efficiently read RSS feeds from publishers big and small, ranging from millions of blogs to the New York Times. There is NO SOFTWARE to download and only Rojo (rhymes with mojo) offers ALL these features:

  • FEED READING & DISCOVERY. Find, track and read RSS feeds from millions of sources around the web, including major news outlets, weblogs, discussion boards, email groups, and ecommerce sites.
  • SEARCH. Search millions of RSS feeds for the latest news and information.
  • SHARING. The only social network for content, with Rojo you can connect with your friends and colleagues to help discover what you should be reading.
  • TAGS & COMMENTS. Tag and comment on stories for yourself and for others. Use others' tags to find stories that matter to you.
  • ROJO BUZZ. Find Recommended Links based on the feeds you subscribe to with Rojo's proprietary link analysis.

Why do I blog this? 'cause I am a newsfeed addict, that'y why I am always playing with tools related to it. This one is of particular interest (compared to bloglines) since it added the power of 'tags' to the exploring function (stories and feeds). It seems powerful, I am looking at it more carefully since it might be overlap our rss4you project (a francophone newsfeed aggregator that allows social navigation through RSS feed ratings).

Gamepad for cellphone

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(via), the BGP-1001 is an interesting add-on to turn your cell phone into a portable console. It's actually a bluetooth-enabled gamepad: I am wondering if people would use it in public transport or in a queue at the supermarket - would they carry it all day long in their bag?

Remote Controller Devices names

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I am digging lately into the history of old interfaces, with a peculiar emphasis on remote controller devices for tv. It's impressing to see how the name of the devices were imaginitive and user-oriented in terms of fun/innovation. Look at the following:- the “Lazy Bones" in 1952 [Truly my favorite name!]: - the "blab-off" in 1953 (signal sent through a 20-foot cable) - the "tun-O-magic" in 1955 (signal sent through a 20-foot cable) - the "flash-matic" in 1955 (signal sent through light beams): - the "space command" in 1956 (the first true wireless clicker, thanks to ultrasonic waves): - the "homenet" in 1980 (a remote controller used for other devices than TV and VCR)

Now the remote controller turns to be a boring device among others with awful names like URC-100, URC-200 & URC-300 or Sony RM-AV3100. That's an interesting pattern here, the same thing happened to computer, to some extent.

[Picture taken from museum.tv]

Estimating human interruptibility

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Predicting human interruptibility with sensors by ames Fogarty, Scott E. Hudson, Christopher G. Atkeson, Daniel Avrahami, Jodi Forlizzi, Sara Kiesler, Johnny C. Lee, Jie Yang in Transactions on Human Computer Interactions, Volume 12 , Issue 1 (March 2005), pp. 119 - 146.

A person seeking another person's attention is normally able to quickly assess how interruptible the other person currently is. Such assessments allow behavior that we consider natural, socially appropriate, or simply polite. This is in sharp contrast to current computer and communication systems, which are largely unaware of the social situations surrounding their usage and the impact that their actions have on these situations. If systems could model human interruptibility, they could use this information to negotiate interruptions at appropriate times, thus improving human computer interaction. This article presents a series of studies that quantitatively demonstrate that simple sensors can support the construction of models that estimate human interruptibility as well as people do. These models can be constructed without using complex sensors, such as vision-based techniques, and therefore their use in everyday office environments is both practical and affordable. Although currently based on a demographically limited sample, our results indicate a substantial opportunity for future research to validate these results over larger groups of office workers. Our results also motivate the development of systems that use these models to negotiate interruptions at socially appropriate times.

Why do I blog this? I am interesed in how people rely on specific information to judge whether they could do something, like interupting. The experiments described in this paper does not rely tackle this problem but they provide interesting insights about how one can use sensored activity to model interruptability.

Scream: a software application to facilitate screaming.

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(via) Scream by deprogramming.us ( a cool bunch of folks, check their philosophy on runeme-org):

Scream sits quietly in your computer's system tray and automatically springs into action when it detects a scream.

Scream disturbs your Windows interface. But it isn't aimed just at computer frustrations. In a world where "anger" is paired with "management," Scream encourages the return to prominence of the lost art of screaming. As Howard Beale said in 1976, "I don't have to tell you things are bad.... all I know is that first you've got to get mad." But whereas Howard advised his viewers to turn their television sets off to get mad, Scream proposes that you leave your computer on.

Scream can be used in private. Or public. It can be used at home, at work, or on the street; at a Fluxus-style Scream-in; at the mall or at your favorite cafe. When your throat gets tired, Scream can double as an unusual music visualizer - or as a new approach to desktop filmmaking. Use Scream to start a meme. Or simply as a random act of deprogramming.

Scream - The Screaming Enhancer. (Also indicated for use with door slams, domestic disputes, and police helicopters.)

Besides, there is a social scream tool bound to share you screm à la del.icio.us!

Scream Themes utilize the web page bookmarking system in del.icio.us to create bundled themes you can scream at on your own or share with friends. Especially useful for launching at Scream-Ins. Join the anti-social bookmarking revolution!

Webootie

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(via): webooti is a very simple computer made up for people who are not tech-savvy. 500euros for this rough platform. Developed by What is funny is that the tagline is: "webootie, as simple as the Minitel". The french minitel is still given as an example of a successfull product: people does not fear it then it's a good way to promote new product.

Broadband in trains

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A pedagogical account of how broadband in trains (will) work on the ESA website:

21Net [Anglo-Belgian operator with Siemens as technological partner] is working to design and implement a Wi-Fi (Wireless LAN) access system for use on trains with the capability of multimedia, broadband internet and intranet access. The initial target market is high-speed trains in Western Europe where journey times allow for its use. (...) The 21Net system architecture is based on two-way Ku-band satellite transmission to provide connectivity between the internet backbone and a master server on the train. Direct reception of satellite television channels on the same satellite is also possible.

A hub earth station provides the connection from the backbone (and from the network operations centre) via the satellite directly to a low-profile tracking antenna on the train. GPRS and Wi-Fi access between the train and available networks (e.g. in stations and in tunnels) is also provided. On the train, Wi-Fi (wireless LAN) connections are used between the master server and customers with Wi-Fi enabled laptops and PDAs

The project started on 1st March 2004 with the Baseline Design Review one month later. Two three-month trials on different high speed trains are foreseen in October-December 2004 and February- April 2005. The project is expected to be concluded in May 2005.

Now it works on the french/belgian Thalys network.

Cell-phone-like radio wave to communicate with your prostate

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Mauro pointed me on this nice device: Mauro translated the text:

This is a nice example of Italian technology that can be useful, patented and sold abroad. I wonder why the medical field is one of the only context where international results are produced.

The probing device emits radio waves similar to the cell phones that are reflected by the body, returning a signal that indicated the health state of the tissues.

NBIC = nano-bio-info-cogno

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NBIC = nano-bio-info-cogno I was unaware of this acronym NBIC I read in the french newsfeed Internet Actu. MOre information in this huge NSF report about Converging Technologies for Improving Human Performance.

The phrase “convergent technologies” refers to the synergistic combination of four major “NBIC” (nano-bio-info-cogno) provinces of science and technology, each of which is currently progressing at a rapid rate: (a) nanoscience and nanotechnology; (b) biotechnology and biomedicine, including genetic engineering; (c) information technology, including advanced computing and communications; (d) cognitive science, including cognitive neuroscience.

Nice program but the convergence will be hard: cognitive sciences is still messy as hell.

A robot in the nursery

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Sony's Qrio robot attending nursery school in California:

TOKYO — Qrio, a humanoid robot developed by a Sony Intelligence Dynamics Laboratories Inc has been attending a nursery school in California since March to play with children up to 2 years of age in an experiment to help develop a robot that can "live in harmony with humans in the future."

Qrio spends time each day with more than 10 toddlers at the nursery school located in San Diego. Qrio is always accompanied by a researcher, who is in charge of making sure everything goes smoothly. While the children were at first apprehensive about Qrio, they now dance with it and help it get up when it falls. "The children think of Qrio as a feeble younger brother," researcher Fumihide Tanaka said. (Kyodo News)

The Sidney Morning Herald has also a paper about it:

Qrio is always accompanied by a researcher, who is in charge of making sure everything goes smoothly.

While the children were apprehensive at first about the automatically moving Qrio, they became fully used to it in about a month. They now dance with Qrio and help it get up when it falls. (...) Based on observations over the past month, Mr Tanaka said he believes a robot needs to have two contradictory functions to be able to live in harmony with humans - one for making "timely responses to human approaches" and the other for showing "unexpected, accidental moves".

He said a robot should have the two functions in a well-balanced manner.

Single-handed keyboard

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A compelling device for single-handed users: Maltron's single-handed keyboard:

The special shape and letter layout have been very carefully planned, taking into account the limited number of keys that can be accessed quickly and comfortably. Single handed MALTRON keyboard in use, plus left-handed keyboard

Word-processing input speeds of 85 words per minute have been demonstrated by operators using Maltron single handed keyboards. The fully ergonomic shape ensures freedom from strain and no RSI type problems have been reported in over 10 years, although all the work is done by one hand.

Left-hand or right-hand keyboards are available.